Sqezer is the man.
 

He sent me a like new 1/20 twist SS 45cal Knight barrel to use for testing. I'm hoping to prove to Knight Rifles how important a faster twist 45cal will be. I hope it will shoot a wide variety of bullets really well.

I also have Lehigh making a really high BC bullet to fit the 1/20 twist barrel. I'm hoping it will be at least 230grns. I think that will make an awesome 40cal bullet. We will also test some sabotless as well.

Thanks to sqezer i will be shooting a lot this winter. I actually need to get some pictures up of this later.

I knew it was coming, you couldn't hold out too long without a knight and lehigh, thread!!!

Had to be a reason to so many threads tonight!

Why is it that they need so much convincing on this Grouse? The 1 in 20 seems to be a proven twist.
Anyway, Good Luck in convincing them, I would like to see them produce this rifle as well.

I don't get this? You have a Knight barrel to test to show Knight they need a Knight barrel?

I would buy a 1 in 20 45 Knight also. Looking forward to the test results.

I'm not actually convinced myself. When the 1/20 twist Knight first came out it failed drastically. My opinion is because of the weaker formulation of sabots. Now i think both MMP and Harvester have made great strides in making sabots better in all twists. Now we will see how well they do with a wide variety of bullets in the 1/20 twist at a wide variety of velocities as well. Lehigh, Barnes, Hornady to name a few need to shoot well to proceed i think.

In my opinion only, and no testing to back it up. I would think a 1/24 twist might just be the cats meow in a 45cal ML. Time will tell that's for sure.

should be interesting results. happy shooting.

The old 45 caliber mk 85s were the 1 in 24 twist. I like the 1 in 20 twist in my Whites but that is with conicals in the 450 to 500 grain range. I kind of thought those brass LeHighs would be long enough to shoot well in the 1 in 20 twist.

They are, but is the sabot going to be consistently good enough? And you also need to be able to shoot the 195grn Barnes and 200grn Shockwaves as well. I don't think a bullet specific ML would be a good idea right now.:wink:

Thats pretty much what i think too for a mass production. It will handle a good variety well and some loads extremely well, such as a 40-230gr SST or a Barnes type 40 in about 220gr. (if they made them) Brass is going to be even harder to get the weight up and get them to fit a current sabots.

Mainly for shooting 250-325gr sabotless a 1-20 or even a 1-18 wins hands down. Knights 2006 45cal target rifle was a 1-18 conical shooter. Gordy should have one of those BTW.

Most guys go with the 1-22 so they can shoot sabots and upto 300gr sabotless. Pacnor, Douglas, Brux and Mcgowen all offer them in 1-22 as well as other twists. The 1-22 is by far the most popular with the current 40cal bullets but 1-24 would shoot them fine. Knight MK85 45cals were 1-24. ;) If you REALLY want a sabot shooter, they need a new sabots/bullets to take full advantage. Current 45x40 sabots are too short to easily handle a monolithic bullet over 230gr IMO. Ive seen the new 237gr copper and the ogive is extremely long to achieve the high BC. Jacketed bullets you can probably get upto 240gr without much trouble.

The White Power Star sabots would be awesome if you can find out who made them but it uses a 40-350gr BT IIRC. You wont get the fps that most people will want from a 45 even though those are deadly.

Good luck. A 1-24 45cal i would buy and probably will from one of the custom barrel makers if Knight doesn't soon. :D

I sure cant complain about the 1/24 twist in my White rifle.

The problem with the .45 cal, 1:20 wasn't the rifle. it was the lack of saboted bullets on the market. it's still a problem and the .45 cal 1:24 would shoot a far wider variety of bullets, that are already available. as far as conicals go, flounder is spot on .45 cal 1:20 with the conicals he mentioned are deadly accurate.My.50 cal knight is a kick to shoot full bore lead from and extremely accurate to boot.IMHO, the 1:20 would be a mistake to mass produce again.

+1 for a 1/24" twist. I think it is going to shoot a wider varied of bullets well, but good luck testing the 1/20 Knight- it will be interesting, if nothing else :)

I agree, if you do the numbers to have any bullet choice you would have to come up with sabots for everything from a 38 on up. The 1-24 is the practical answer.

I look forward to seeing the results. .45s have always intrigued me but I've never made the plunge.

Lee , it's a shame more bullets company's haven't made more M/L specific bullets.

The worst problem around here in the .45's is that no one carries and bullets at all for them. Powerbelts and that is it. I was going to order some Lehighs for my new .45 from Lehigh and couldn't never get in on there site?

The biggest problem with .45's really is bullet selection. There just isn't enough. There are only 2 (200gr sst and 195gr bx) that are made for muzzleloaders and the velocities they shoot. I know people shoot the 200gr xtp with some success, but I have heard too many reports of it being fragile for me to risk it. There is also PR bullets, but expensive lead bullets aren't apealling to me not to mention their velocity limitations. I read a thread where 180gr gold dots where coming apart at 10mm speeds...... The .45 market is a niche within a niche so I don't really see manufactures spending a lot of time and money to develop more options.. I think if they could get the twist rate and sabots right to shoot .375 rifle bullets they would be on to something though.

Grouse thanks for taking the time to do the testing. I did get out last Wednesday with 3 generations of .45's, The SS .45 DISC I got from you, a NIB .45 ELITE, and my old go to ORIGANAL .45 1-20, all 3 had the LEIGH CONVERSIONS. The Disc & Elite were spottless in the plug & bolt area. The 1-20 was another story, lots of blow by in the plug & bolt area. The HEAD Space must be differnt, I know this is something Leigh & Knight will be able to work out. I was shooting 70 grs. by weight of BH-209, blue harvester sabots & 40x200 XTP's at 50 yds, they were printing almost 1 hole groups. THANKS.

also, when bh209 came out people were saying that it was going to revive the .45 market. I think that the opposite is true; being pogressive, it shoots heavy bullets well enough to close the trajectory difference between the two. Granted, all of my info is second or third hand, but I read a report where a .50 shooting a 245gr barnes was averaging 2100fps, whereas a .45 shooting a 200gr sst was getting 2200fps. Based on those numbers, the difference in drop at 200 yards was only about an inch, but the .50 had considerably more power. I like the idea of a .45 though. I really think the best thing for .45's would be to get it into an existing bullet range (hopefully rifle) by chaning the twist and sabots available

I do know that my i-20 really shoots the 200 SST along with the shockwave and the .223 gr. powerbelt very very well. The 2 deer I took with the 200 SST's were dead before they hit the ground. The last 1 was less than 50 yds. after the bullet hit her all she did was turned 180 degrees and see was dead before she hit the ground. Her heart was liquified. Just my .02 cents.