Worth A Try?

[Semisane]

Couldn't make it to the range this week end. So naturally, this afternoon I ended up in the computer/gun/junk room just playing around with guns and components.

Tried once again to get a 210 grain.410 Speer Gold Dot (.41 Mag) bullet to load in thenew 45 caliber GM/Renegade barrel with a crush rib sabot. Man, it "almost" goes in - but does not look like it will make it.

Well, anyway, I got to wondering if anyone has ever tried a jacketed pistol bullet with a patch instead of a sabot. Grabbed one of my GPR's .016 "table cloth" patches and gave it a try.The darn thing loaded perfectly! Really snug in the bore just like you would want for a perfect sabot fit. The patch fills the grooves just like you would want for around ball.

Now I know that jacketed bullet is not going to upset upon firing and fillthe borelike a ball or lead conical would, and the patch is not going to seal the bore like a sabot would. But I wonder if I could get a good seal with 20 grains of corn meal under that patched pistol bullet, and if the patch will be tight enough to grip the bullet and impart spin.Heck, I'm gonna try it.

I'm sure I won't be the first. Have any of you guys tried patched jacketed bullets???

The 210 grain.41 Mag Gold Dot is a real neat bullet (picture below). It's designed for hunting and Speer shows a BC of .183.



And it fits the bore perfectly with a .016 patch.

[Johnmorris]

Semi I use full cal 50 remington with a 50 cal oxyoke below in my 21 in 1x28 gm LRH load with 75 gr 3 ff shot a few at 25 yds none for group yet no time.

[Semisane]

shot a few at 25 yds none for group yet no time

Come On JM - get your priorities straight.

Were you able to recover any of those bullets to see if they had any engraving from the rifling? It would sure be interesting to see if they upset in the bore.

Are those bullets designed for the .50 Action Express? I wonder what the velocity parameters are for expansion, and how well they hold together on gameat ML vleocities.

[corey012778]

semi, I thought about asking about something like that for a while.

[dmurphy317]

I tried something similar once. I had some 50cal REALs that were very tight in my 50's so I tried patching them and shooting them in my 54. I was using .020 ticking patch to make up the difference on the .510 bullets. They went down somewhat tight but shot about an 8" group at 20 to 25 yards as I remember. I think the technique would work if you could get the right patch and could get it to wrap around the bullet the same way every time but that is always the trick isn't it. I would say give it a try and see if you find a combination that works. I know with my inlines I can shoot round ball if I use a tight enough patch and get good results all the way up to around 70 or 80 grains of 777.

[lemoyne]

You might consider the way some bench shooters have been doing it since before cartridges were invented, they use a linin paper patch cut in the shape of a cross so the edges fit together closely. If you watch at Friendship when they have the bench rest championship match at a 1000 meters you can see how good it works, there are a number of different bullets even a hybredbullets that have 2 different hardnesses of lead in them. Normally a soft lead bullet is used with a paper patch I dont know if a jacketed bullet can be made to work but the possability is there; you might even try a cloth or teflon patch cut that way. Lee

[bronko22000]

Semi, I was thinking of trying a .451 cast pistol bullet and a .458 cast rifle bullet. My cousin is into cowboy shooting so I asked him to bring some up next time he visits his mom. I think the 405 gr - .458 bullets for the 45-70 would be good shooters. You may want to try using a felt wad under the bullet to help the seal.

[HEAD0001]

I am not sure why you would not think the patch would "seal the bore like a sabot would". IMO the patch will seal just fine. BP cartridge shooters have been shooting paper patched bullets for a long time, with great long distance success. It sounds like you have bullet to patch to bore fit just right. You should have great success. But just like anything else in shooting, each individual rifle is hit or miss.

It has always been my opinion thata sabot is only a "convenient"patch. Tom.

[Underclocked]

Who was it that did the test with raw bullets here awhile back? He was shooting full bore pistol bullets and doing pretty well. What happened to him?

[bronko22000]

Semi, I just measured my 45 GM barrel. Thegrooves are .451" and lands are .458" . This would mean your .451" + .016" = .483" (patch doubled) which should be plenty tight.
I would love to get my hands on some .458" cast bullets in 405 grain to try.
The maxiball I cast only measure .452" so they are barely engaging the rifling but still shoot pretty good.