Loading the 50-140 Sharps

[black vic]

I have a C. Sharps 1875 chambered for the 50-140 Sharps, heavy 34" barrel with 1/22" twist. I have a custom mold for a bore riding 795 grain cast bullet w/1-20 mix. My standard load is 120 grains of 1FG, 1 wax wad, 1 card wad. I want to put together a milder load using SR4759 smokeless powder. I found 1 load using 45 grains of SR4759 but it was with a 438 grain bullet and kapok filler. obviously my bullet is much larger so I wondering how much SR4759 powder & or filler to use with my bullet. I know there was a load using a 700 grain bullet, but I can't find any info on that using SR4759 powder. Any information would be much appreciated.

[varsity07840]

Find a good undertaker.

[black vic]

That's not very helpful. What would an undertaker know about reloading a Sharps rifle?

[earlmck]

I can tell you that QuickLoad thinks that 45 grains of IMR 4227 (which I use as a stand-in for 4759 which my QL doesn't have listed) would give about 20k psi and almost 1400 fps (I estimated your 795 grain bullet would be 1.5" long). QL shows a max pressure of 28k psi for the cartridge, so this would be a moderate load according to QuickLoad. I don't have any experience with the 50/140 cartridge so can only report what my elderly software tells us.

[Thundermaker]

When you're shooting a 795gr bullet, I don't think any load is going to feel mild on your end.

[Mikedominick]

Black Vic, I think they're trying to keep you from blowing it up with a reduced load and filler, thus the undertaker comment. I had a 50-140 Sharps many years ago and got away with it, but load all black in the 3 Sharps I have now.

[Thundermaker]

Back Vic, I think they're trying to keep you from blowing it up with a reduced load and filler, thus the undertaker comment. I had a 50-140 Sharps many years ago and got away with it, but load all black in the 3 Sharps I have now.

Yeah, sometimes small charges of smokeless in great big BPC cases don't act right. I encountered this when working up a 45lc load for a uberti revolver with HS6. It was the max load listed in the SAA section. It claimed 850fps on a 255gr bullet. My chronograph results were mostly similar. Only problem was that a couple rounds gave about 1,100 fps and kicked like a mule. I figured that the powder in those might have been detonating, instead of burning. Whatever it was, something was spiking the pressure. I switched to CFE pistol. Didn't have that problem anymore.

[Rockindaddy]

Had an original 50-140 14 lb original !874 Sharps. I shot the 700 gr cast boolit and 140 grs of Dupont 2F The gun shot great but the recoil was fierce! From the bench I would place a 25# lead shot canvas bag filled with play sand against my shoulder. It was a great long range gun. I wanted a hunting rifle. So I traded it off to a collector who fell in love with it. My smokeless loads in that big cast needed a lot of kapok to take up the space. I have a 50-70 that I always shoot smokeless. Have shot a buck with it. A 45-90 Sharps is a much better choice as the recoil is not as fierce shooting 2F and cast boolits.

[black vic]

Yes I'm a little worried about that to, too little smokeless powder in a big case. I have tried reduced loads of 1F - 90 grains, wad on top and 20 grains corn meal. It did reduce the recoil a lot. I was hoping to find something in a smokeless load and since I came across a bunch of SR4759 which is supposed to work well in reduced loads in big cases I thought I'd try it.

[black vic]

You're right! I used this rifle in the long range 1000 yard matches at Camp Borden and the Nationals at Ottawa. Shooting this rifle prone was rather demanding to say the least! I had to get a sissy pad that went up and over my collar bone. The ranges were 800, 900 and 1000 yards and by the time we were back to the 1000 yard range I had run out of Tylenol and my trigger pull felt like it was around 50 pounds. But that was 25 years ago when I was younger and more stupid then I am now. LOL I don't shoot the rifle that much anymore as I have since acquired a few 45 cals which are much more pleasant to shoot. The Sharps being my first BPCR has a sentimental attachment and I still like to shoot it once in while at my club. It may be that I'll have to stick to BP with more corn meal. We'll see! Thanks for the input fellows, much appreciated!

[steveu]

Increase your wad stack with either cork or felt wads to take up the space between the bullet and BP charge.

[earlmck]

A fellow member here, marlinman93, has posted about loading for his 50/140. He is using amaranth seed as a filler (which I had not heard of but it sounds promising). He got his off eBay https://www.ebay.com/itm/255451520519?var=555416328708

I believe he is only using black powder loads with the filler used to reduce the vast quantity of black needed to get a good fill in that humongous case. I ordered some of the amaranth seed to try for myself, and I plan on using it with smokeless powder in 45/70, 38/55, and 38/40 as my first potential uses.

[Kenny Wasserburger]

Had an original 50-140 14 lb original !874 Sharps. I shot the 700 gr cast boolit and 140 grs of Dupont 2F The gun shot great but the recoil was fierce! From the bench I would place a 25# lead shot canvas bag filled with play sand against my shoulder. It was a great long range gun. I wanted a hunting rifle. So I traded it off to a collector who fell in love with it. My smokeless loads in that big cast needed a lot of kapok to take up the space. I have a 50-70 that I always shoot smokeless. Have shot a buck with it. A 45-90 Sharps is a much better choice as the recoil is not as fierce shooting 2F and cast boolits.

Couldn’t be an original, as Sharps never made a 50-3-1/4. Cartridge came out in 1885-86. The original big fifty was the 2.5 inch case with a 473 gr pp load.

KW

[Winger Ed.]

I know the price of those brass cases are higher than giraffe lips and nobody wants to waste them.

But would it be practical to cut down the case to decrease the volume for lighter loads along the same idea as
.22 shorts working in a .22 LR, or .38Spec in a .357Mag chamber?

[Kenny Wasserburger]

I know the price of those brass cases are higher than giraffe lips and nobody wants to waste them.

But would it be practical to cut down the case to decrease the volume for lighter loads along the same idea as
.22 shorts working in a .22 LR, or .38Spec in a .357Mag chamber?

Excellent way to ruin the chamber, plenty of evidence to back that up too.

Many ruined 22 lr chambers ruined by shooting shorts in them.

I have seen multiple 45-110 chambers in original Sharps rifles ruined by shooting 45-70s in them.

This is one of them urban legends that needs to go away.

KW

[indian joe]

Yes I'm a little worried about that to, too little smokeless powder in a big case. I have tried reduced loads of 1F - 90 grains, wad on top and 20 grains corn meal. It did reduce the recoil a lot. I was hoping to find something in a smokeless load and since I came across a bunch of SR4759 which is supposed to work well in reduced loads in big cases I thought I'd try it.

get rid of that 800grain boolit !! should be able to come back to 450 - 500 surely?
launching a hunk of lead that size is always gonna cause hefty recoil .

[freakonaleash]

I'd sell any 45-110 and get something that is fun to shoot.

[Kenny Wasserburger]

My 3 45-110s are all fun to shoot, my business rifle has taken 4 buffalo, my First Shiloh has won 2 Creedmoor Scope National championships at Raton NM and 2 winter Nationals in Phoenix. The 3rd is my 25# rifle that actually weighs in a tad over 21# last big win was in 2018 at Raton, midrange National championships. Won the scope class, actually beat all comers at 600 yards the first day shooting PP to boot.

KW

[black vic]

I started off with a 525 grain Lyman bullet but they were all over the map. It was like shooting round balls. At 100 yards I'd be lucky to keep 5 out of 10 shots on paper let alone group! The twist on this rifle is 1/22 which is fast for a 50 cal as most are 1/36 like an express rifle in order to shoot the smaller bullets. I used various programs to figure out the design of the bullet that would work with this twist and they all came out to a length of 1.75". I finally decided on 1.625" and with 1/20 alloy, this bullet works out to approximately 795 grains. If I change the alloy to something lighter I might get them down to about 750 to 760 which is still heavy. I was hoping that with the SR4759 smokeless I might be able to reduce the load to get around 12 to 13 hundred FPS with the use of filler of course. If not I'll just stick to 1F with lots of filler & wads. I was also thinking of getting a mold around 650 grains to see if that would stabilize. Sort of Postell style with most of the bullet in the case.??? Even my 45-120 with 600 grain bullets is a ***** compared to the 50. If that don't work I'll just have to quit being such a sissy!

[indian joe]

I started off with a 525 grain Lyman bullet but they were all over the map. It was like shooting round balls. At 100 yards I'd be lucky to keep 5 out of 10 shots on paper let alone group! The twist on this rifle is 1/22 which is fast for a 50 cal as most are 1/36 like an express rifle in order to shoot the smaller bullets. I used various programs to figure out the design of the bullet that would work with this twist and they all came out to a length of 1.75". I finally decided on 1.625" and with 1/20 alloy, this bullet works out to approximately 795 grains. If I change the alloy to something lighter I might get them down to about 750 to 760 which is still heavy. I was hoping that with the SR4759 smokeless I might be able to reduce the load to get around 12 to 13 hundred FPS with the use of filler of course. If not I'll just stick to 1F with lots of filler & wads. I was also thinking of getting a mold around 650 grains to see if that would stabilize. Sort of Postell style with most of the bullet in the case.??? Even my 45-120 with 600 grain bullets is a ***** compared to the 50. If that don't work I'll just have to quit being such a sissy!

ahh ok - so cant lighten the boolit - can you add weight to the gun ?

If you are making powder ? switch to cannon grade 8 -12 mesh screened powder - that would drop velocity heaps and still fill your case - velocity proly under 1000fps and your twist should still stabilise

I proly sell that cannon to someone I dont like and downsize