45 long colt favorite load data

[Dale53]

Last year a good friend talked me into getting a Ruger SS Bisley .45 Colt/.45 ACP (he and our dealer both got one at the same time). They shoot EXTREMELY well with both cylinders after reaming the cylinder throats to .4525" (all three handguns had undersize cylinder throats). What at first was a bit "off putting" turned out to be a blessing in disguise. We all ended up with custom dimentioned cylinder throats. Here is mine with the .45 ACP cylinder:



My general purpose load for the .45 Colt is a 250 gr Keith with 8.5 grs of Unique. After I get my MiHec Cramer style bullet mould for the RCBS 45-270-SAA bullet (I should have it in hand in a couple of weeks) THAT will become my general purpose bullet. I am REALLY looking forward to that "wondrous time to come"...

Dale53

[Nrut]

Dale,
Is your Ruger a special run or regular production revolver?

I have a regular 7 1/2" Bisley and a old style SS Bisley Vaquero, both in .45 Colt, but lust after yours..

[Dale53]

Nrut;
I know it's a bit lame of me, but I really don't know. My buddy located several of these from a particular distributor and I pretty much just went along for the ride. If I had known how well they would perform, I would have JUMPED on the wagon without having to have my arm twisted.

Frankly, I have always been a .44 man (early Elmer Keith disciple) but these .45 Colts certainly rank with the best out there. I had a trigger job done on mine as well as the pawl modified to a free spin pawl and it NOW is a superb revolver in most every way. It is finished extremely well, mechanically is as strong as a bull and just flat feels GOOD. It is also a user friendly platform seemingly allowing good scores to be shot with little effort.

FWIW
Dale53

[mroliver77]

There are a lot of guys unhappy with Rugers. I have three New mod. .357, .44mag SBH and a brand new last year 45 Colt. They all shoot well and cylinders are dimensioned correctly. I had a .45 go back and the new one is a replacement. According to the female I talked to at Ruger they did not have my model so they built one for me. I dont know if this is true but it has no issues and has shot very well from the first day I got it. Only jacketed it has seen was at the factory.I am very happy with all my Rugers so far. It was my fault the .45 needed replaced and I told them so and they still treated me well on the replacement.
8-10gr Unique,under the Lee 255RF works well. I also shoot some "warm" loads in it and it is a fine shooter. I put rubber grips on them for heavy recoil and that tames them a bunch.
Jay

[Trey45]

I have the RCBS 255gr Keith style mold for 45 Colt. I was using 8.5gr Unique and dropped it down to 8gr Unique, it's one of my favorite loads. My Redhawk and Blackhawk both shoot it very well.

[Dale53]

Here is my Bisley Vaquero:



I got the Vaquero when I was shooting BPCR Silhouette matches. They had side matches for black powder cartridge revolvers and the Bisley worked VERY well in that capacity. Frankly, it really opened my eyes to the REAL properties of the original .45 Colt black powder round. The Army got it right "Back in the day"...

Dale53

[Changeling]

Dale is that the original case coloring on the Vaquero, if so you are very lucky.

[Dale53]

Changeling;
Yes, that is original case coloring on the Ruger. That is a recent picture, too. That revolver has been shot a good deal - a lot of it with Black Powder. It's been a VERY nice piece to me - it's won me several matches and has been totally reliable.

Right out of the box, it shot to point of aim at 25yards. My most used bullet with it is the Lyman 452664 (250 gr RF with a generous grease groove filled with Emmert's home mix). It will run 70 rounds of full charge black powder loads without cleaning or wiping.

FWIW
Dale53

[9.3X62AL]

Another 45 Colt user here, and I enjoy 8.0-9.0 grains of Unique with any 250 grain-class boolit--usually #454424 or #454190 lately. My revo is a Ruger BisHawk x 7.5". Every so often, I'll run some #454490 SWC/GCs through it at 1200+ FPS, but I'm not so certain that our coyote-sized muleys and blacktails out here would be any more impressed by the thunder & lightning loading. They would likely tip right over with 250 grains of Elmer's Brainchild running 900-1000 FPS and placed correctly. All the velocity on earth can't make up for crummy hit placement, and that 1873-level 45 Colt load PRINTS WELL.

[StrawHat]

... My most used bullet with it is the Lyman 452664 (250 gr RF with a generous grease groove filled with Emmert's home mix). It will run 70 rounds of full charge black powder loads without cleaning or wiping.

FWIW
Dale53

I just looked up that bullet, it certainly looks interesting. It would seem to hold more lube than the 454190.

[EDK]

Dale,
Is your Ruger a special run or regular production revolver?

I have a regular 7 1/2" Bisley and a old style SS Bisley Vaquero, both in .45 Colt, but lust after yours..

It is called an "ACCU SPORT," a limited edition done for Accu-Sport first, and then later for Williams Specialties (IIRC.) Check out gunbroker under Ruger Bisley for prices....anywhere from $600 to $900 for Dale's gun. (I've been lusting after one of them with the extra 45 ACP cylinder for some time, but just put a 7.5 inch Old Model convertible in layaway. Temptation overcomes empty wallet once again!) The 45s are probably the most common...and popular! The 357 is d*** near impossible to find and the 41 and 44 are somewhere in between. I got one of the 44s CHEAP...new but no box and collector goodies.

[StrawHat]

...Frankly, I have always been a .44 man (early Elmer Keith disciple) but these .45 Colts certainly rank with the best out there...
FWIW
Dale53

Dale,

Like you I am also an early Keith disciple, but I got over my magnumitis and went with what Keith used early in his career, the 45 long Colt. I believe his pick of cartridges, if restricted to factory loads, was the 45 long Colt in the old blackpowder load. After his death, his 45 revolver was found with 5 of those loads still in the chambers. Not a bad choice. (Not to say a 44 is a bad cartridge, just no longer my choice.

[Dale53]

StrawHat;
What is often forgotten, the original handguns Keith experimented with were the early Colt SAA. The .45 Colt cylinder, in addition to suspect metal in the early ones and mismatched parts Army surplus revolvers that were quite available in the West, had much thinner cylinder walls than the .44 Special. THAT is why Keith chose the .44 Special. The .44 Special could be SAFELY loaded to much higher power than the comparable .45 Colt IN THAT PLATFORM.

The Ruger large frame .45 Colt put everything in quite a different light. Now, for the first time, the .45 Colt could be loaded to it's potential.

I have spent too many years admiring and using the .44's to abandon them, but any rational person MUST recognize the effectiveness of the .45 Colt in the modern, large frame Ruger with properly designed bullets for medium to large game as well as self defense. What is also not generally recognized is that the big bore (.40 and above) revolver also works quite well on edible small game without excessive meat damage. I can PERSONALLY attest to that! Visions of cottontail rabbits, snowshoe rabbits, and grouse that I have taken with the handgun thoroughly support that idea.

FWIW
Dale53

[Nrut]

It is called an "ACCU SPORT," a limited edition done for Accu-Sport first, and then later for Williams Specialties (IIRC.) Check out gunbroker under Ruger Bisley for prices....anywhere from $600 to $900 for Dale's gun. (I've been lusting after one of them with the extra 45 ACP cylinder for some time, but just put a 7.5 inch Old Model convertible in layaway. Temptation overcomes empty wallet once again!) The 45s are probably the most common...and popular! The 357 is d*** near impossible to find and the 41 and 44 are somewhere in between. I got one of the 44s CHEAP...new but no box and collector goodies.

Thanks EDK,
I kinda figured Dale's little Bisley would be a special order model..
It always baffles me why Ruger can't figure out what configuration would be a best seller and a distributer can..

[leadloader]

i load a 250 gr lead rn over 5.5 gr American select in my Ruger new Vaquero and get great results a plus is American select powder is formulated with recoil reduction in mind so it kicks like a 22 lr ... great plinker

[Outpost75]

I am also interested in hearing about favored Loads suitable for an older Uberti long Barrel SAA in .45 Colt.
BP loads take care of themselves nicely...but in Smokeless, I would not want to strain it of course.

With 260-grain Saeco #955 Cowboy bullet 6.5 grains of Bullseye gives 880 fps in my Colt New Service 5-1/2", which approximates factory loads.

Same charge also shoots well for 900 fps with the 230-grain #954 bullet of the same shape. K.I.S.S. principle.

[bigted]

37 grains GOEX 2F black powder ... compress with the 250 grain boolit lubed with SPG ... no card wad of any kind ... just powder / boolit / compress / crimp / shoot!!!

if range shooting i do thusly;

i like the small hand held grease gun i bought designed for chainsaw bar greasing ... i fill it with crisco shortening and after loading my Vaquero with cartridges ... i grease the mouth of the chambers with crisco and wipe away the extra with my finger after spinning the cylinder to allow the forcing cone of the barrel to wipe the crisco off even with the cylinder mouth's.

for walking round i do not crisco the cylinder mouth ... just load n walk. very fun shooting and with ballistol/water mix in a 80/20 water mix ... it cleans rite up.

[USSR]

What is it with guys who resurrect 4 year old threads?

[9.3X62AL]

What is it with guys who resurrect 4 year old threads?

We are unreconstructed curmudgeons.

[DougGuy]

What's with guys who buy a pistol built like a tank and then shoot mouse fart loads in it?