How do I paper patch a .452 bullet up to a .458 bore?

[1886nut]

I want to make some "express" rifle loads out of cast .45 Colt boolits...how do I do it? Even thin household paper is .003 thick or so, how can I wrap it around itself so that it will stick but not be bigger than .460 or so? Or is this just not possible and I need to size the boolits down?

[Kenny Wasserburger]

use tracing paper of .0016 two wraps easy!

KW

[bigted]

second Kenny's suggestion. only I use the 9lbs onion paper from buff arms to do mine. I have wrapped the colt boolits at .452 inch and shot them out of my 45-120 ahead of 132 grains of GOEX cartridge. they really whistle thru the air but never chronographed them to see what the exact speed was. guessing tho ... I would think they were reaching close to 1800 to 2000 FPS. pleasant recoil with the 250 grain boolits but a bit hard to wrap ... so short n all. I think they will lose steam pretty soon after leaving the barrel ... compared to the heavier boolits usually shot in the .458 cal.

[Kenny Wasserburger]

The Express bullet concept was tested for a good many years, 150 yards or so was the goal of a flat trajectory, As Ted said they loose steam real quick.

Also forgot to mention damp patch the bullets.

KW
The Lunger

[johnson1942]

sizeing dies, the push through are very very reasonable in price. resize them down a coupe of thousands to what you want and use number nine paper.

[1886nut]

Thanks to all...i made some 500-450 2-3/4 no. 1 loads for an old WR single shot and got 16 in groups and keyholes before I realized the rifling rate was for lightweight "express" boolits, not 450gr loads like an American .458 bore.

I have ordered some 300gr .459 cast boolits but I wonder if leading will be too bad once I get above 1200-1300 fps?

[bigted]

is the 500-450 what your loading for? also what is the measurements of your bore and throat? and lastly what is the twist rate of the rifling? these dictate your success with patched boolits. your success with patched boolits will also be affected with the paper thickness as well as the bare boolit diameter.

so to get the best advise from some of the truly great patch shooters here ... you should arrive at/add these measurements to help them to advise you as to what to do for your particular rifle. with their help you ... as I have ... will advance in your pursuit of success with these patched demons.

the paperpatch boolits will go far in helping your barrel in smoothness as well as to heal the slight irregularity's in it. if shot for awhile you will also note a super easy cleaning as the smooth metal in the barrel stops gathering fouling like a rough barrel will.

good luck.

[johnson1942]

i really took it serious when paul matthews in his book years ago said one thousands over top of land size for you full size paper patch bullet. i then order a .451 die and nose punches and base punches for my swageing press. i swage my own bullets and they really are consistant in accracy. recovered ones show a slight lands imprint on them i use number 9 paper to wrap. .451 for a .450 bore is perfect. i also got a .459 reamer with a .450 pilot in front and throated the back of the bore. my bullet fits up in the barrel easily. i think bump up bullets work very well also. i have a douglas .45 1/18 twist muzzle loader and i swage .440 bullets and use number nine paper to wrap that bullet. it is just as accurate consistantly as my 45/70. it is even more powerful than my 45/70 as i use 110 grains of 2f in that. i love paper patching and would never switch to a cast bullet.

[1886nut]

Barrel has Metford rifling and is bright and shiny except for faint frost at the muzzle....slugs out to .458 / 453. Not sure if its a tapered bore so throat may be larger. Rifling rate is slow....about 1 turn in the entire bbl length, which is 26in. I've already shot some .459 / 450 gr. lead cast boolits and gotten 16-18in groups with several key holes. Be interesting to see if paper patching will work with polygonal rifling at all.

Bought a packet of JOB 1.25 cigarette papers and they worked like a charm....perfect .460 when dry, using the papers right out of the box with no trimming! As soon as I get a chance to stoke the boilers with coke and seat the boolits I'll post pictures of the finished ammunition and some results.

Not sure if Trailboss and the 70% rule will give enough velocity. Any rule of thumb for safe IMR 4895 loads with an unpublished case? Gun is a falling block that should be as strong as any 1886 but I dont want to push it. I usually test new loads with two 50lb bags of corn on top and a 15 ft long cord leading behind a huge oak tree, so it could be said that I am the cautious type.

[Frank Savage]

Rule of thumb for unpublished case is to find case which has the most similar base diameter, neck diameter, inner volume and bullet weight and start there-since these parameters are the most crucial for ignition progress, initial burn rate and pressure development. I suppose that 1886 in your nick is the Kropatschek, which is somehow very special and extremely dangerous rifle to take generalization from. So here you can use 348 win data for start, count for higher volume of the Krop case and avoid powders which seems to be advertised to avoid to use in loading density needed for for your needed pressure (or max pressure).
The 500-450 case is very like a longer version of 44-77 Sharps, which has at least one more cousin in Europe-the Austrian military 11,15x58R Werndl and somehow also the 11,3x60R Mauser. The cartridge is also originaly a BP case, so count for that 30 000 PSI is max-this is close to absolute max the BP can create under any non-laboratory circumstances. I don´t have my complete tables on hand, but I would avoid IMR 4895 in this case. The powder is originaly for 30-06 and was not created for pet loading it. The max. pressure created by this powder is rather too high for a BP cartridge. In such a voluminous case as 500-450 is, there is also too big risk of erratic ignition and/or improper burn establishment, resulting in possible impredictable pressure pikes or pressure surge upon ignition-the worst case of all.
Here a load data for 450 Nitro express 3" with reduction for bottleneck (0-15% depending on powder), of powder capable of mildly low loading densities at desired pressure under 30 kPSI can be used I would say. Or loads for 44-77 of powder which gives low pressures and don´t give a s*/t about low loading density-5744 or similar in burn properties (always burn rate AND pressure for given loading density).

As to the rifle-the falling block action will hold almost anything just minorly sane or possible to squeeze into the case-the thing which fails will be always the barrel. Even Ballard, which has the take-ahold geometry way out of axis of the barrel (the most of all falling blocks) will steadily hold almost anything. If you run some math, you´ll find out you can almost carve a Sharps action out of dried bull **** and it will hold. So the barrel is the question. (And keep in mind there´s almost only other originaly BP gun that will hold any minorly sane smokeless load than 1886 Krop-the 9,3x60R Turkish Mauser of 1887). In any original gun pre-1884 where BP was the only choice, with no other propelant even to think of I would strictly stick to max pressure of the max sane BP load. Simply because barrel material and wall was not chosen to hold more-due to no need.

[1886nut]

My name refers to the 1886 Winchester, which unlike the 1873 and 1876, is more than strong enough to shoot mild smokeless loads. Hogdon has numberous loads in 4895 specifically for trapdoor rifles that are well under 20ksi. I've also used the Remingon ammo marked "safe for all firearms" with no trouble at all, although I'm not fond of jacketed boolits in .45 caliber rifles.

[1886nut]

Boolits are lubed .452 meant for .45 LC. Trailboss up to the end of the shoulder of the case weighed out at a paltry 25.7 grains. Topped that with COW to protect the paper and used the mouth of a .45 ACP size die to apply a slight crimp to the mouth, just enough to snug the boolit but not bite the paper. As I mentioned, JOB 1.25 cigarrette papers are ready to go, just wet and apply and got a perfect .460 dia without squeezing the jaws of the mic.

Don't know if this will give the velocity needed for stabilizing the boolits, so I'm going to load up some with black powder and milk carton wads just in case. Looks like its going to be about 100 - 110 grains, with a few wad disks. Any recommendation as to powder size?

[bigted]

that is a good looking round.

if you have not yet done so ... I would seriously look into the pressure curve of your trail boss. that powder is fine in straight walled revolver rounds but the pressure gets high very fast and is nowhere in the neighborhood of any load of blackpowder or mild smokless.

as to granulation ... I would opt for 1F or 2F powder and load a full case of it with compression to the bottom of the neck.

[1886nut]

I'll look into it, but I have fired .450 gr boolits with Trailboss and the 70% rule in this gun with no signs of excessive pressure. Cases did not need resizing to reload and showed no signs of being tight in the chamber. Of course, I will proof this round with the gun under two 50lb sacks of corn and standing behind my favorite oak tree with a string.

[Frank Savage]

Man, with that 1886 I feel now pretty much lika an A**hole. How I could forget... Pretty good Freudian show about what realy occupy one´s mind. Please forgive.

The Trailboss was designed for reduced and light loads for CAS shooting while maintaining reasonable loading density to prevent erratic ignition. 25,7 grs of Trailboss at 100% loading density-I would suppose it can be max around 29-33000 PSI based on load data for 45-120, 300 WM and 416 Remington on IMR pages, since the efect of the bottleneck shape is hard to estimate-at least for me now.

[1886nut]

Pressure should be the same in a given volume of space for the gas to fill, regardless of container shape, should it not? In other words, two cases with the same volume, same properly sized and seated boolit, and same powder charge....why would the one with a slight shoulder have higher pressure?

[Frank Savage]

Straight (or +/- straight, like 45-70 etc) case has some crossection area at the base , creating some conditions to ignite the powder. The exit side has almost the same crossection area, through which the pressure expands-there you have the bullet, which through seating and resistance in the rifling creates some force, which "plugs" the expansion. But the bullet starts to move almost immediately, releasing the pressure.

In BN case of the same neck crossection and the same resistances from the bullet, you have bigger dia of initial powder chamber. The ignition starts on greater area of exposed powder, thus is a bit faster. The resistance on the exit side is from the bullet which moves-but also from the shoulder, which does not move at all. So under some conditions, the initial pressure wave can reflect from the shoulder and compress the charge a bit to higher density. This always increases burn rate and final max. pressure, difference between powders is only about how much, albeit smokeless is formulated as to be as much resistant to this as possible. If you look through tables, looking for the same bullet (easiest in 30 cal rifles) or at bullets with the same bearing area and weight, you´ll find that the more bottleneck, the higher the pressure is. If you try to plot the curves in Excel or so, you´ll find that straight or slightly tapered cases tends to linear increase of pressure with increasing load, while bottleneck cases tends to have somehow exponential increase-at least with some powders.

[1886nut]

but funny you should mention the pressure wave hitting the shoulder first before it can start the boolit moving, because my original load had a cardboard disk on top of uncompressed TB, followed by COW filler, another disk, and then the patched boolit. Then I got nervous and wondered if I was essentially creating a "full power" load by getting rid of the airspace rather than following the 70% by volume recommendation of the manufacturer, so I pulled all the boolits and tossed them in the melting heap, patched some new ones, and loaded them with no wad in there. Some were loaded this way with TB, and others with ffg and moderate compression on top of milk carton wads. Also used some straight .459 cast 300gr SW boolits with no patch on top of the same ffg coals. Both created good groups on my 120 pace backwoods range. Most of the taped over shots were the BP unpatched boolits and th patched TB loads....three shot group shown are the patched .45 colt boolits on top of the ffg, but the TB shot well too with no signs of excess pressure. All shots were high, probably because I've never really gotten used to front beads and tend to put them level with the top of the notch like I would a Winchester blade front sight. I'll remember to put the bead in the bottom of the "V" when I'm on the hunt this weekend!

[bigted]

nice!!! I would not sink that bead as I like the high shots at that range. allow a straight sight out to 150 to 175 yards. I like your rifle as well.

another successful way to patch those boolits is to use .004 inch thick printer paper and WET wrap em and allow to completely dry ... COMPLETELY DRY. then I swab em with Redding case forming wax and shove em thru my .460 inch push thru die. this sizes em exactly to what I want and irons that patch on the slick and grooved boolits alike. these will do nicely in some rifles and not so good in others ... just gotta play with em.

[AkMike]

I have a WR just like that except for the full stock military style trim, but mine is a 500/450 1 9/16" WR Carbine. I formed these from 50-70 brass w/o any problems.
I haven't tried any TB loads in it just 5744. My wife loves to pop those rounds all day long.
My other 500/450 is a 3 1/4" DR. That beast rocks!