Some unscientific results 44/444 mihec

[arcticbreeze]

Thought this may be of interest to some. The boolits were fired from my Ruger NMSB Hunter (The one in my avatar) at 15yds into milk jugs filled with water. Next I am going try the flat point version with an alloy of AC 25/75 WW/PB. I believe that will achieve better terminal characteristics. It is kind of funny how when I first started casting I was in search of the hardest alloy and now I am trying to go as soft as possible without leading and so far I have achieved as much as 2100 fps with a MG barrel with AC 50/50 WW/PB with Speed Green with zero leading.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/picture.php?albumid=30&pictureid=1609

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/picture.php?albumid=30&pictureid=1322

[Down South]

Hmmmm, I'm going deer hunting in the morning with that same boolit with AC WW. I need to try the 50/50 WW & PB.

[yondering]

Can you show a side view of those expanded boolits? Optimally, you'll get large expansion, but still have a decent section of un-expanded boolit remaining. On that boolit, it looks like expansion down to about the crimp grooves would be good.

Also, you might try heat treated 50/50 ww/pure. Straight ACWW is soft but somewhat brittle, while 50/50 ww/pure is ductile but a little too soft in my opinion. (Results in wet newspaper show considerably more weight lost than water filled milk jugs.) Heat treating 50/50 may give you the right hardness while retaining ductility. Just a thought.
Every HP boolit/gun combo has it's own requirements for hardness and ductility, and I don't even have a .44; my results are from similar boolits in .45 Colt, 45 Auto, and .40/10mm.

[arcticbreeze]

Here you go. The boolit measures .496 from the base to the highest point. Measuring an unfired one, that puts it right between 1st and 2nd crimp groove. I already remelted the other one last night with the rest of the remelts as I considered it a failure.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/picture.php?albumid=30&pictureid=1610

[arcticbreeze]

By the way Dan, have you had a chance to try those MM 35s?

[Lloyd Smale]

thats typical of the results i got when i was testing lyman devestators. Using most alloys the bullet would loose its nose. I shot a buffalo with one out of ww and it happened then too but the shank of the bullet gave complete penetration. Hardly a failure as guys spend big bucks on nosler partitions to get the same result.

[44man]

Yeah, I used to do the same thing years ago with my .44's. It was fun to blow up stuff and imagine the damage to a deer. But I only hunted with archery back then, there were few deer and revolvers were not yet legal.
I did a lot of work with hollow points and soft lead along with J word stuff. One thing I always seen was just how few jugs, etc the boolit would go through and that proved out when I started killing deer. The energy meant nothing and some deer had little or no reaction, the instant blow up and drop never appeared. Blood trails were poor with one hole that the hide could slip over when the deer ran.
Then the question of a quartering shot or a bone hit made me change to a larger meplat and harder boolits. Results were 100% better and even a 28 BHN boolit puts deer down with any hit whether just lungs or a shoulder. Blood trails have been enormous.
Looking at this with a critical eye has shown that the heavier the boolit, kept in the same velocity range, the better the results and the larger the boolit diameter, results are even more dramatic.
The .44 is great as is the .45 with just a good meplat but when you get to the .475 it gets scary deadly.
The 420 gr WFN, cast hard and water dropped, going 1329 fps will completely blow up 4 water jugs, split a few more and still exit at jug no. 14.
I gave up all faith in quick expanding boolits or bullets that did not have penetration and I want penetration from any angle. After many, many deer with revolvers, it has proven true. I feel the picture being projected by blowing up a jug or so will prove very disappointing in the field. Your proof is in how few jugs a light, fast expanding boolit gets through. They are too easy to catch. These might actually work better at a very low velocity.
When I shoot a deer with the .44 I do not want any expansion or such a small amount that it will not impede penetration. Going to 300 to 330 gr boolits has proven they are better.
Just talking deer, I sure would not plant the wrong boolit in a very large animal like an elk or buffalo. Pure folly! :veryconfu
This is self explanatory, the boolit exited jug 14 and I don't know how many more it would have done if we had more jugs.

[Lloyd Smale]

one thing i did learn shooting hps is when the caliber gets bigger then 45 an expanded bullet acts like a big parachute and penetrations is very iffy. We shot sheep and buffalo with 500 linebaughs using a couple differnt cast 450 grain hps and about all we got was 8 inches of penetration

[yondering]

By the way Dan, have you had a chance to try those MM 35s?

Shot some over 12gr Unique with good results, but haven't shot any full power yet. Maybe today...