Bore Demensions for Badger Barrels?

[rldarmstr]

Anybody have bore spec's for a Badger 45-70 barrel? I slugged mine and came up with .450 bore and .458 groove but I have been told that Badgers measure .460 groove.

I'm currently working with a .458 reduced first band 550gr GG bullet with a .450 bore riding nose. It seems to do good off the bench at least out to Turkeys. The Rams were about 60% hits and that I think is my fault. At a match this last week end, however, I did very poorly. Bullets were very inconsistent. Could be me and my old eyes but I have done well in years past with another gun and this same bullet and am wondering if my bullet could be the problem now that I'm using it in a Browning BPCR with a Badger barrel?

[John Boy]

450 -4585

[rldarmstr]

Since I was investigating the issues I have with the Browning BPCR rifle I found that the rifling in the Browning is much different from the rifling in the Pedersoli. I'm not sure what this means to me or the problems I have with this bullet and the Browning but there is a significant difference as can be seen in the picture below. The bullet works well in the Pedersoli and is the one I described in my initial post to this thread.

The top bullet is Browning, the bottom is Pedersoli.

[montana_charlie]

I found that the rifling in the Browning is much different from the rifling in the Pedersoli.
The top bullet is Browning, the bottom is Pedersoli.

You described the bullet as "a .458 reduced first band 550gr GG bullet with a .450 bore riding nose", but you did not say which Pedersoli rifle style this bullet works well in.

A reduced first driving band (or more bands) is usually chosen to achieve a particular goal. It may be to set the bullet out to increase the powder charge, to prevent leading by positioning a grease groove at the front of the chamber, or to fit the bullet to the throat of that particular rifle.
So, without stating your reason for choosing that bullet, we can only guess why it works well in the Pedersoli.

If we knew that it works well in (say) a Pedersoli Sharps rifle, and we know the chamber shape of that gun, then we could compare that with the chamber in the Browning and see if there is reason to believe that the bullet simply doesn't fit the Browning well, at all.

Maybe ...

But (if you are shooting black powder) I truly believe that the difference between a .458 groove diameter and one of .460 is not an answer to your search for lost accuracy.


Since you are in Illinois and winter is approaching, I recommend that you locate a place where a good snow drift will form ... and shoot a few bullets into that 'trap' from both rifles. A metal detector is handy for digging them out, but you may prefer to mark the spot and wait for a thaw.

In either case, you can learn a lot by looking at snowbank bullets.

[rldarmstr]

The bullet was chosen by me when I first got interested in BPCR some 12 years ago. I had an Pedersoli 1874 Sharps and I found that this bullet did quite well in that rifle. I won several matches and always placed at the shoots. The design of the bullet was my own based on information I read in various forums and talking with local shooters that had been doing BPCR for a while. The nose of the bullet is .450 and the reduced first band is .456. The remaining bands are all .458. I really don't remember my exact thinking at the time but for whatever reason it worked well at all BPCR distances in the Pedersoli Sharps.

I also have a Pedersoli 1885 High Wall and the bullet appears to perform well in that rifle also though I have yet to test it in that rifle at the longer distances. The closest range to me for 500 meters would be 1 1/2 hours away and I don't just hop in the truck and get there on a whim. I have shot this bullet in the High Wall with the exact same load I used in the Sharps at 100 yards and put 15 shots in the target you could cover with a silver dollar. I realize that 100 yards is not a good distance to test these rifles but I'm just saying....that was all I had to try the bullet out.To the best of my ability I believe that the barrels/chambers are the same in both rifles. I am unaware of Pedersoli changing chamber dimensions from rifle type to rifle type.

That said the Pedersoli rifles have long chambers compared to the Browning. I seat my bullet to jut touch the rifling and when so seated in the Pedersoli rifles I have the first two bands and one groove out of the case. In the Browning, when seated touching the rifling I have only the first band out of the case.

As for snow; Where I live we'd be lucky to get an inch or two, never mind a snow bank or drift. We used to get snow and hard freeze winters here but that has slowly faded and now we rarely get enough snow to cover the grass.

[montana_charlie]

Pedersoli's Sharps barrels have proven to be quite good, so it's possible that they use the same production line for the Highwall barrels. If true, the chambers would be the same, and bullet performance form both models should be similar.

Rick Kalynuik (Red River Rick of KAL Tool & Die) likes a reduced band bullet for his Pedersoli rolling block rifle.
The rolling block predates the Sharps (in the Pedersoli lineup) and has (did have) a totally different chamber and throat.
That knowledge made me wonder if that is what you found success with, too.

So, your two Pedersolis tend to like that bullet, and we can assume their internals are about the same (until proven otherwise).
Which brings us back to the Browning not liking that bullet.

Well, as you already said, it's chamber and throat are not similar to the others, and that may be the whole story.
Does it have 18-twist rifling?

[rldarmstr]

Yes, 1X18 twist. Bore measures .450, groove measures .4585.

I currently have loads that are 1 grain apart, everything else the same, that I want to try at the longer distances. My intent is to try and determine the relationship between velocity and group size, especially at the longer distances (400-500yrds.).

This coming Thursday I will have the Browning and the Pedersoli HW at the range. We'll see what the HW will do at the longer distances also.

[montana_charlie]

Press on ...

[semtav]

One thing you might think about if you really want to know how well they group. Have a mount made for a modern scope and test them off the bench with that. Then you will realize how much better your loads are than you can reproduce with the iron sights. Compare a few good loads iron to scope to give yourself a datum. Then you will know if you can get a sub 2" group with the iron sights, it might be close to a 1" group in reality.

[Idaho45guy]

I have an 1885 high wall with a Badger barrel and shoot this .456 boolit with good results...

Attachment 177393

It was enough for me to win this...

Attachment 177395

[EDG]

I have a Steve Brook's 4 groove mold that casts .454 on the first 2 bands and .462 on the last 2. It is sort of an odd mold because the nose is pretty much the government RN.
I shoot it in both a Pedersoli and a Browning. It groups close to 1" at 110 meters in both rifles with the same powder charge.