Jerry’s 45 caliber bullets
The Burple 341 grain Hollow point .452 Bullet.
Jerry sent me some a sampling of slugs to try in the 45 Ranger this week, he sent three different weights and each weight had three different diameters. And each diameter has a different color.
He stressed and I need to relay this to you, these bullets are not run of the mill production bullets, they are 2nds that did not make the selection to be sold. I would expect them to shoot better as production selected bullets, but in reality they would be hard to beat with any quality.
The bullets is a true .452 diameter, is just over .900 inches and has 4 full caliber driving bands, the top band is above what would normaly be the crimping groove but in fact is I think another lube grove and is half the width of the other three, a rough measurment would give .35 inches of bore contact on the .50 inch body. The hollow point is .50 inches deep and roughly .15 acrossed. At .50 the hollowpoint extends down to the beginning of the 2nd driving band. The nose extends .390 above the first dirivng band. It is consistant with what I would call a well designed bullet and shooting bore this assumption out.
I had never shot festive bullets before, and try as I could to come up with the correct color and asking two different women, women are supposed to know these things, the color of the .452 bullet for today will be called Burple, it is not quite blue and it is not quite purple.
For lube, I stuck my finger in a bottle of ATF transmission fluid, wiped it in a sandwich baggie and rolled the 13 bullets inside, the dye on the bullets did not fade or migrate to the sides of the bag or onto my fingers.
I shot them in my rifle tethered to a 44 cuft bottle with a fill pressure of 4400 PSI, it was first time I have tried this.
I had the Burris 2×7 Fullfield set at 7 power. That scope is parallax set at the factory at 100 yards, it is not a bench rest scope and the aiming point was hard to see. Taking into consideration parallax error and that I was shooting at 60 yards, and the fact that this is consistant with the best bullets I have shot at 50 yards, they did pretty darn well.
I shot off a Caldwell bag with no butt support on the hood of my Ford Exploder on the full power setting. A this weight in the Ranger 45 it is a toss up whether to go for full power or mid power.
They were consistant, the bottom group shows a little factor with the wind, but like I say I was ignoring the wind while shooting.
My Chrony said they were traveling at 811 FPS which computes to 500FPE.
Although I would never take the shot, for practical purposes, with a good supported field rest, log , stump or correct height limb, this bullet would shoot minute of elk eye at 60 yards. 🙂
All Replies
I don’t readily recall seeing the same design cast in multiple alloys tested in a powerful custom bigbore airgun. It will be very interesting to see the velocities, air efficiency, optimum fill pressures, accuracy, etc of the 20:1, and 40:1 alloys compared to each other when shot from that Ranger.
Butcher,
The problems I had with HP’s and Jerry will probably agree with this in his case, is that the nose around the hole is wrinkled.
I always felt it was from the difference in heat of the HP pin causing the wrinkle and putting an additional void in the bullet inside the hole.
I noticed the bullets I got from Adventures that I assume were Vogels, that there were voids inside that hole.
I tried a lot of different things, heating the pin with a torch to get it hotter, trimming the pin to lower mass and lower the depth of the HP hole, but I never mastered that mold.
When you sent me that information on the guy in Corvallis putting the two pins that are attached to the mold and not a seperate wooden handled pin, I thought that might be a improvment.
What kind of luck does Tof have with that setup and casting good bullets?
Years ago I used to cast for a friends 45 Colt with a 250 Lee HP mold, the mold was aluminum and the pin of course was steel, same wrinkled nose thing was going on with it as happened on my Lyman mold years later.
On a side note, the more I cast with this Accurate mold the more I like it. Lead splatter cleans off so easy by just pouring lead on it and letting it harden, when you remove it it takes the lead splatter with it. At one cavity it takes about 10 to 12 castings to get up to temp, and then starts to get hot just about when I need to add more lead to the pot. By the time my lead is hot again, if I have left a casting in place in the mold to retain heat, it is ready to go after only a couple cycles.
Most of the time after it gets hot, I do not need to use the rawhide mallet, I just open and close it with a gloved hand, and open it over my bullet catching box because the bullet just falls out.
I am not competing with these bullets so I don’t weight them, thank gawd!
So my little bullet pile is growning daily, and it is time to order more lead next week, 40-1 this time.
Regards,
Roachcreek
Yeah, some designs are just a pain from start to finish!
Do you guys think the Hollowpoint #454424 would be tough to cast as far as hollowpoints go? I’m fairly certain it has the rounded lube groove, as opposed to the old square cut that is generally considered tougher to cast with. I know that design is about as accurate as anything@50yards in my 909 rifle cast in both near-pure pb, or 50/50 WW-pb.
😆
Yeah, some designs are just a pain from start to finish!
Jerry,
I had a Lyman 457 for the Gould HP, same shit. Never shot good in any of my guns. I don’t know what Elmer Keith was doing to get them to shoot, maybe I was too tall ❓
I figured it was the depth of the cavity, so I started grinding the HP stem shorter to yeild a shallower depth. After a while I had a non HP bullet, it still did not shoot worth a shit.
When you said one of those molds Timmy would like to throw away, I knew which one.
Regards,
Roachcreek
😆 Yeah, that Devastator (or Devastator like) mold is a PIA! The mold we have is a very nice bit of kit, made of iron and machined with precision. Sadly, the bullet design and how it relates to the mechanics of casting yields a mold that tosses junk most of the time. It makes no difference if Timmy does the casting or if I step in with all my tricks ( 😆 ). Most of the slugs are shit, they are just shit in different ways. The nose area is a major pain as it is rare to get a slug with a square and weel formed nose. If you get a good nose, look in the cavity and you’re almost as likely to find voids as a clean cast. Get by those hurdles and you’re probably OK but some of the remaining slugs will have the normal incidence of a bad base edge or voids at the sprue cut-off.
That all leads to a mold that makes casting about as much fun as (fill in your own pain here). At least the slugs that look good, shoot like shit in most guns! 😆 😆 😆
RC,
I doubt thosae slugs will ever be worth a @%^*^%#&&*%$&^*(( but, you might want to try using a seating tool before you shoot them. Some slugs (especially round short nose) like to be pushed up against the rifling where the bolt cant get them. Use a stiff bit of plastic and “pre-seat” them and they might shoot a bit better. Probably still like crap, but better crap….makes it all worthwhile!
Those Raptors have good sized meplats on them. Did they make a screaming sound when you shot them?
I mic’d the Devastators I sent you right before sending them, and many appeared to be slightly undersized along with some that were more-or-less right on .452. They weren’t over-sized like the EPP/UG’s, and some of those other ROA designs I sent. The Devastators I sent you were cast in very close to pure lead. I have the box they came in several years ago right here…. it’s labeled 45 Devastator 207grain .452 diameter BHN 5-6 I recall verifying the weight when I got them and they had a tight grain variance.
They said that once they get the Devastator molds up to temp, that either only about %50-%60 of the slugs made the cut for sale, or maybe they said they threw %50-%60 back into the pot? and they were full time casters before going out of business. They sure didn’t look forward to casting them thats for sure…..I was real lucky to get them when I did.
I’m getting an original #454424 HP mold this week…that’s mold#2. Hope it drops the exact same 230grain #454424 HP I have had so much success with in the past, with no alterations that hurt performance.
Jerry,
Yes you did tell me that. And thank you, it was a pleasure.
My pleasure on the bullets, I love it when things work and those bullets do shoot great.
That Raptor would a ass kicking deer load. I have never shot a hog, but I would think they would work well for that too.
Tof, the 341’s were on High power, the ones today were on medium.
Regards,
Roachcreek
Sweet! Given the set-up, I’d say we have another shooter! The Raptors have been a great performing design for years, I’m glad they work from the Ranger too.
BTW, the Devastator like slugs are all pretty much the same size. We packaged them and colored them in conjunction with the Raptors and heavier HPs but they fell through all the sizing dies. I think I emailed that info, but just in case… Personally, I’d just toss the devastators in the pot…
Thanks for the report and picture. I appreciate the effort.
The next bullet I tried is the 220 grain Raptor.
As before I lubed by putting a smear of ATF transmisson fluid in a zip lock bag and shot from the bag. These again were seconds and the range was 60 yards, shot with the exact same equipment as the day before.
This bullet looks like a more traditional airgun bullet. And energy wise it is a real barn stormer.
I had shot the day before on high power, so today because I was shooting a 220 grain bullet, I adjusted the rifle to shoot at medium power.
I filled to 3500 PSI and shot two shots over the Chrony at 20 feet, it registered 1050FPS and 1045FPS, a third shot showed I had used up most of my PSI and registered at 740 FPS. That computes to two shots at 550 FPE, for a lightweight bullet on medium power it is no slouch.
The bullet, another Burple indicating it was .452 diameter is just over .600 inches in length, it has three bore diameter bands that make up .528 of the body and three very deep grease grooves. It resembles a REAL* Bullet design to me, Thompson Centers version is called a Maxi ball, and altho it is slightly different than either it works pretty well.
This Raptor bullet is a no nonsence killer, pure and simple.
I tethered my Pygmee tank to the rifle, the groups are somewhat verticle, as the 69 cuin bottle bled down for 3500 PSI to 3000 PSI, the left hand group was rotated to stay on my backstop and the left hole was actually the top of the group.
I had also brought along some Devastators, they are 45 ACP bullets that are 200 grains and have a generous hollow point, Lyman makes a mold very similiar, oddly enough called a Devastator and is mold #452374, the same mold without the HP is a traditional 45 ACP design with the same mold number.
I had shot some great groups with oversize Devastator bullets that Butcher had sent to me, my notes indictate they were 180 grain, but Butcher can correct me on that.
These bullets from Jerry were again Burple indicating .452 diameter. Apparently my rifle requires a larger bullet diameter for the Devastator, Jerry sent some, I have yet to try them, but the Burple .452 Devastator did not shoot well.
So the next installment will be a bullet of a different color.
Regards,
Roachcreek
LOL. That bullet shape looks familiar. So does that color…lol. Hey, i’m sending you and email.
RC, sorry if i missed this but, what power setting was your gun at when you shot the BURPLE bullets? Low, medium or high?
Tofazfou,
Thanks, I pressed Timmy into some high speed service between orders to do a little experimentation for the Ranger .45 crowd! I’ve had that 340gr HP mold laying around for years and never had an order for it. It’s a really nice mold and cost plenty…can’t remember what I was thinking when I bought it! Like all HPs, it’s a PIA to cast when you need a lot of slugs of great quality. I sent along this design in .4515, .452 and .4535. I expect that the .452 tested above are the best. The groups shown do not indicate a berrel that is “loose” (would benefit from bigger slugs) or “tight (might need .4515). There is sy=till a chance that the .4515s will shoot just as well or better but I don’t have the gut feel that anything but a stable bench and target scope could show that delta…
The other designs I sent are hugely different from this slug. One of them, Timmy can cast all day long, and the other…. I think he’d rather sell the mold for a bag of peanuts than ever bother with it again!
Nice!!!! Burple is your color hun! 😆
As usual, the slugs that come from Sure Fire Casting are top notch. And accurate to boot.
Good going JERRY
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
Butcher,
I did try the 408’s on medium power, I got 750 FPS.
One thing it will do to go to the 40-1 alloy, is that the bullets will not be as large. The mold was cut to get .452 with pure lead.
Regards,
Roachcreek