.458 Win Mag sanity check

[offshore44]

OK guru's of paper wrapped galena...I need a sanity check on my project.

Background:
Rifle: CZ Safari in .458 Winchester Magnum

Rifle Specs:
Lands slugged out to 0.450" diameter
Grove slugged out to 0.458" diameter
Long, gentle throat

Bullet specs: Saeco 405 grn. non-gas checked with lube grooves
As cast: (unalloyed lead)
Bore riding nose dia.: 0.449"
Diameter over the lube grooves: 0.4575"

Double wrapped with 0.003" cotton tracing paper, applied wet. Paper covers the bullet from right at the start of the ogive and gets wrapped and folded down on the base.

I let the wrapping dry out completely, and then ran it through a 0.459 sizer lubricator die. The wrapped bullets measure out at 0.460" to 0.4595" after being run though the lubrisizer.

I have cast and processed about 50 - 60 of these so far and the yield is really low. I've produced 15 "shoot-able" bullets so far. At least I think they are shoot-able.

Do the numbers look like these things are going to shoot decently? Am I headed in the right direction?

I made up one dummy cartridge and cycled it several times. Lots of dings and marks on the bullet nose from cycling...so there may be some work to there. The paper got cut and wrinkled on several attempts at loading the dummy round while seating. Any tips on avoiding that?

[pdawg_shooter]

Start by sizing the bullets to .4515 and wrapping with a good 16# paper. I use green bar printer paper. Wrap wet and get a good stretch. After drying clip tail, lube and run through a .459 push through die. Run your patch to the start of the ogive. Should cure most of your problems.

[offshore44]

Thanks pdawg...now to discover a way to crunch those things down a bit more with what I have on hand...

(Edited to add) I just did a little experiment with what I have on hand. Do you think that 0.450, plus a smidge is close enough? I'm trying to make sure this thing will shoot PPB's before spending money on additional dies and such.

[303Guy]

You CAN wrap a 458 boolit using a cig roller.

This is a 16mm diameter bit of steel I patched.



I have patched a 45 boolit too and it works real well.

[pdawg_shooter]

Thanks pdawg...now to discover a way to crunch those things down a bit more with what I have on hand...

(Edited to add) I just did a little experiment with what I have on hand. Do you think that 0.450, plus a smidge is close enough? I'm trying to make sure this thing will shoot PPB's before spending money on additional dies and such.

In most cases .450 WILL work fine. Try using a fairly soft alloy and keep velocity down to around 2200/2250fps. Use a good 16# paper (I use green bar printer paper) and have a go at it. If you want to your sizing die can be lapped out .001/.0015 without much trouble. Have fun!

[offshore44]

Thanks Folks!

303Guy - That looks like a handy little tool to have. Where did you come up with that? The bullets that I have wrapped so far look a lot like that second picture, right down to the wrap over the base.

pdawg - That is the velocity range that I was looking to achieve. My current batch of cast is "pure" lead. I may have to try some other alloys in the future to allow these things to survive the trip from the magazine into the chamber though. 2,200 fps is exactly the range of velocity that I was hoping to achieve, so at east I'm not totally crazy.

I kind of hate to lap my current sizing die out, it works really well for the 350 and 465 grain gas checked bullets that I shoot. If it looks like this rifle will shoot paper patched pretty well, I'll probably get a Lee push through sizer of the correct size.

Here's what I have done so far: I wrap the 'as cast' bullet in dry printer paper and push it into the sizer nose first. That gets me a bullet sized to 0.450 plus a little. I then wrap it in wet tracing paper and let it dry out. Then I push it into the sizer base first and iron the patch on. It comes out between 0.4595 and 0.460 with the paper nicely ironed on and the tail flat against the base.

As an aside here; and this is probably in the wrong part of the board, but how do you get a nose punch that is supposed to fit your bullets, but doesn't, modified to fit? The nose punch leaves a nice little ring about 3/16" down from the meplat when I go to size. The punch profile is close, but not exactly perfect. This happens on all three bullet weights that I cast for this rifle. Saeco moulds and Saeco top punch. It may not effect anything, but you can see it and it irritates me some.

(Quick edit: I just loaded up 10 of these bad boys using loading data from Hodgen's site for j-word bullets. New Hornady brass, CCI 250 primers, 63.5 grns H4895. The load range is 72 grns to 77grns. The 77 grn load is compressed. Seated length is 3.20". I pulled three down to check and see if the paper was buggered up from all of the handling. Looks good to go! I lubricated the patched bullets with Sno-seal and allowed to dry completely before seating. Sno-seal is 65% bees wax and 35% mineral spirits...once the mineral spirits evaporate you have a nice bees wax lube / sealant / water proofing. My-oh-my, these are some good looking loads. Some more practice with creating these things and they may turn out to be my favorite loading!)

[leftiye]

I think he meant to lap out the .450 die. Just an idea, - get some lyman .452/325 grain gas checked revolter boolits and patch them?

[bearcove]

+1 on 452 boolits. I have a LBT 452 325 WFN that drops about 340 gr with soft alloy I have. Wrap and size to .460.

[pdawg_shooter]

On your nose punch, fill the cavity with hot glue and push the nose of the bullet into the glue. A little sizing lube on the bullet will keep it from sticking. The glue can be removed with a little heat if you change bullet designs. I use this trick on all my seating dies when loading cast.

[offshore44]

On your nose punch, fill the cavity with hot glue and push the nose of the bullet into the glue. A little sizing lube on the bullet will keep it from sticking. The glue can be removed with a little heat if you change bullet designs. I use this trick on all my seating dies when loading cast.

Excellent tip! Why didn't I think of that? I was contemplating using a little devcon, but that is a really permanent change...Thanks again pdawg!

[bigted]

oh man come on...shoot some n take pictures for show n tell. im almost as jittery as you are waiting for the results of this. it will be like a 45-90 on steroids.

[pdawg_shooter]

I built my .458 on a P14 action with a 1 in 22 twist Douglas barrel. I have taken a 405gr paper patched to just over 2600fps using H335. No pressure signs, but man, it started to HURT! I quit there. Guess I am just a wimp. My 45-70, 430gr load at 1812fps is enough for me. In a 7lb Marlin it is all I want.

[offshore44]

oh man come on...shoot some n take pictures for show n tell. im almost as jittery as you are waiting for the results of this. it will be like a 45-90 on steroids.

Ya' know...that is exactly why I bought this rifle in the first place. A .45-90 on steroids...well kinda. I shot a guys .45-70 Siameze Mauser conversion one time, three rounds, and that is all it took. After a bunch of mental gyrations and research I ended up with this rifle. Met all of my criteria.

Mauser action? check
Five round magazine? check
Longer barrel? check

.45 caliber? check

I loaded up the three cartridges that I pulled down the other day. The ones that I wanted to see what the paper looked like? Anyway, I have a feeling that they are going to be something to shoot. I used the starting load for p-word bullets in H4895. 72 grains for the 405 grn bullet. Filled the case up to where the bullet is seated nicely. Book says 2,250 fps with the jacketed bullet.

I'm already eying the 350 grn gas checked bullets I have and wondering just how fast I can run those things without the gas check and with a paper patch.


I promised myself that I would stay with nice conservative loads that amble along at 1,800 fps or so. Told myself that was all I needed. THAT didn't last long.

It may be a week or so before I can get out to shoot these things. I'll let you all know how it goes when it happens. Numbers and such from the chrony and the targets. If I remember, I'll take pictures as well. I should do that anyway, just so you-all can see the progress.

Thanks again for all of the input folks! In this thread and elsewhere. Couldn't and wouldn't of done it without you all.

[offshore44]

I built my .458 on a P14 action with a 1 in 22 twist Douglas barrel. I have taken a 405gr paper patched to just over 2600fps using H335. No pressure signs, but man, it started to HURT! I quit there. Guess I am just a wimp. My 45-70, 430gr load at 1812fps is enough for me. In a 7lb Marlin it is all I want.

2600 fps! I can imagine that it was a little less than comfortable!

I wouldn't mind shooting my 350 grn bullets at 2,600 fps (I think), but wow!

The CZ Safari weighs in at about 13 pounds or a little more with the sling, scope, five in the magazine and the long barrel. Shooting the 350 gc's at around 1800 fps she has less kick than my .308 Parker Hale does. I can hunt anything that I come across around here with that. Gotta work on tuning that load for accuracy.

[pdawg_shooter]

Never can tell, there might be an aggressive prairie dog out there. Western Kansas is noted for rouge elephants and such. Or I might need to stop a run away train! HaHaHa.

[clintsfolly]

offshore44 If you start low and work up slow, shooting a lot you. will learn how to handle the recoil! I have a 458AccRel in a Ruger 77 that weigh in at 9lbs scoped. So far the hottest load i have shoot is a 400rem sp at 2350 and it was not bad. At this time i am working on a 470PP and looking for 2150-2200. I my thinking this will make a great deer load! The big bore rifle is a very addictive thing to shoot! Just luv the look in some of the peoples eyes when they see the that big heavy round as you drop it in the rifle! Have fun Clint

[offshore44]

P-dawg, we don't have any p-dawgs around here on the wet side of the state, so I feel pretty safe on that account. We do have some really aggressive chipmunks though! One jumped up in the wife's lap last year when we were out camping, probably looking for food or something. A man HAS to defend his wife, right? I hear they charge when they're wounded...soooo.... (man, I crack myself up some times...)

Back to the subject at hand. I snagged one of my cast, gas checked 350 grn slugs from under the bench. It was raw from the last casting session. Lyman #2 alloy. I wrapped it twice with computer bond paper and ran it through the 0.459" sizer just for giggles. guess what? It came out of the sizer a nice uniform 0.4515" in diameter. Well, after I removed the computer paper wrap anyway. Did the deal with the 100% cotton vellum wrapped wet, the sno-seal bees wax lube and ran it through the sizer again. 0.459" diameter and a smooth, uniform, fairly hard bees wax coating. I really do have to go out and shoot up some gas checked now. I need the casings for reloading.

This is addicting, isn't it? I think that I may have fallen into the abyss of paper patching insanity. Is there, like, a 12 step program or support group or something?

[pdawg_shooter]

Addicting? Almost as bad as JD Old #7. 12 step program? Lets see; #1 gather lead. #2 smelt. #3 cast bullets. #4 size down. #5 gather paper. #6 cut patches. #7 wrap bullets. #8 trim tails. #9 lube and size. #10 load and shoot. Nope just 10 steps here. BTW, if you can find one the Lyman .451114 drops at .4515 from WWs and weighs 430gr. Saves step #4!

[nanuk]

Addicting? Almost as bad as JD Old #7. 12 step program? Lets see; #1 gather lead. #2 smelt. #3 cast bullets. #4 size down. #5 gather paper. #6 cut patches. #7 wrap bullets. #8 trim tails. #9 lube and size. #10 load and shoot. Nope just 10 steps here. BTW, if you can find one the Lyman .451114 drops at .4515 from WWs and weighs 430gr. Saves step #4!

#11 Repeat steps 1-10!

[bearcove]

#10 load. #11 shoot #12 repeat. Yep 12 steps.