Guys,
I've spent hours reading forum posts about cylinders, bullet fit, throats, the fact that the cylinder throat should not be smaller than the barrel because we don't want the bullet to get swaged down before it gets to the barrel and the fact we need to slug the barrel itself even on revolvers to find out where we're at. Even read a bunch of stuff at Beartooth bullets about Ruger revolvers. You guys have gotten me STRAIGHT with my rifles but now it's pistols you've got me pulling my hair out about
Here's my dillema. I've got two .357's. A Taurus 669 stainless SA/DA 6" that is an older gun and a brand new Ruger New Model Vaquero SA 5.5". In all fairness I've not been able to bring myself to slug the barrel of my new Vaquero because I want to make certain I don't scratch that beautiful piece all up, it's my first SAO gun. Taurus hasn't been slugged either. I have put 12 .358 sized bullets down the barrel of the Vaquero and no appreciable leading was noticed, wasn't aiming, just shooting at the ground outside my basement to see if I would get any leading (darn cold weather).
I've taken bullets from my Lee .358 RF mold to the cylinder of my new Vaquero. Bullets dropped unsized at .3595-.360 are extremely tight, bullets I have sized .358 drop in, do not come out on their own, but are easily pushed through with a wooden dowel and just a bit of finger pressure. It's yet to warm up enough for an extended shooting session so I don't know how it performs on paper with cast or jacketed.
My Taurus 669 whether you like Taurus or not has been a dream gun. I got it in a divorce sale about 7 or 8 years ago for $200 along with about 700 cases and a couple of hundred rounds of reloaded-with-who-knows-what. Since I don't trust most other poeples handloads I have never shot the handloads I've got, but with jacketed factory bullets it's a tackdriver (for a revolver....). Keep in mind I'm not a great long distance shooter with a handgun. A new member here had posted about a Taurus 66 he was thinking about buying so I hauled it out of the safe and cleaned it up a bit.
Then I got to thinking about cast bullets in it (the Taurus) so I did the same test on the cylinder. This time my unsized .3595-.360 bullets I dropped into the cylinder fell right straight on through to the carpet. I know the ya-hoo that owned this pistol didn't know what he was doing when reloading because like I said I have about 7 or 800 nickel plated cases and every stinking one of them has been stretched and needed to be trimmed back so God knows what he was loading them with, they came with the gun. If I put the unsized bullets in the cylinder gently and let them seat sometimes they won't come out, but just to drop them in they fall right through.
Maybe I'm nit-pickin and maybe not -- got any words of wisdom as far as either gun goes? I did not expect to find THAT much of a difference between the two and am a bit puzzled. Could be normal for all I know.
Sorry to be so long winded but I wanted to give you enough information so you could let me know what I'm looking at.
Thanks,
Art