I am considering purchasing a Lyman #457122 (Gould 330 gr HP) mold to use in an modern Marlin 1895 (no crossbolt safety) and an 1895 SS Guide Gun. Primarily hunting Whitetail deer.
I am looking for a load/alloy/lube that will give minimum leading/maximum expansion/ranges to 200 yd w/reasonable trajectory/ and large exit wound for large visible blood trail if shot is not a "boom flop".
Don't want much do I?
Thanks
HL

Yeah, you don't want much...




OK, couple of different issues here. First, Marlin for many years built their rifles with "Micro-Groove Rifling". That phrase will be stamped on the barrel if that barrel is micro groove. I don't remember when they started using the shallow groove barrels, so you'll have to look at your barrel on your early gun, it's probably "micro-groove". They did finally stop and go back to "Ballard" rifling on the late model barrels, but I don't think they stamp the barrels with it. Your Guide Gun may have Ballard rifling. I have an old "pre-safety" Marlin in 30-30, and it has the "Micro-groove Rifling" barrel. If the barrel doesn't say "Micro-Groove" on it, then it's Ballard rifling (which is wider and deeper), and you'll have an easier time with cast loads.

Basically the micro groove is as it sounds, the rifling is shallow, and it's narrow. Not so good for cast bullet shooting, but it can be done. Leading is more of a problem with the shallow groove rifling. This means you'll have to cast your bullets harder to compensate for the shallow rifling. Harder bullets are counter productive to good expansion. A gas check bullet would help a little, but I believe the Gould mold isn't a gas check? Not sure as I don't cast that bullet myself?

A possibility for you, if you're up to the challenge, would be to cast your bullets in 2 steps. First cast some soft lead into the nose section, and then some harder lead into the body area of the mold. Kind of a hybrid bullet. I've read about guys doing it, but I've never tried it myself. The control of how much of each alloy is in the bullet would be a pain (and why I never bothered).

Back to the original intent, to hunt whitetail deer with, you're really hitting ants with sledgehammers there. The cross section of an unexpanded 45-70 bullet is larger than most "premium" deer caliber bullets could ever hope to reach. So, what I'm saying is you don't really need much expansion, just plow the bullet through the proper area and you'll be cutting venison steaks.

I haven't shot a whitetail with my 45-70, but years ago when I still shot smokeless out of it, I hammered an elk with mine. I was shooting a 440 gr Cast Performance bullet at 2200 fps. Those bullets were heat treated and gas checked, and about as hard a bullet as was possible to cast I believe, like shooting cast iron. I had full penetration, from stem, to stern on a real heavy fat bodied cow elk with that load. She went down so fast it was like the ground was yanked out from under her feet. She was dead before the smoke cleared.

It was NOT a fun load to shoot however.

As far your load, you might try IMR 3031 or RL-7 for your powder. I was using IMR 3031.

I had a change of attitude about the 45-70 a few years ago, and now just shoot it as it was originally intended (instead of trying to make it into a 458 win mag), which is still a very potent hunting round. I now shoot SOFT bullets cast from 30-1 alloys and REAL blackpowder out of my levergun 45-70, which is a Winchester 1886. I cast a 350 gr flatnose and a 390 gr flat roundnose alternately. I'm sure either bullet would yank a deer off it's feet without a problem. Whitetail are NOT hard to kill. If you have any "blood trail" to follow, not to worry, it will be very short, and very WIDE.

4570forever

Slowpoke Slim give a lot of good information. I had the 457122HP for a while. I had two problems with it the second of which probably applies to you. First the mould with softer alloys for expansion in deer would not cast large enough to give a good fit in my .461" TD barrel. Second in my Siamese Mauser bolt action it could not be driven over 1500 fps with "reasonable" (questionable to me) accuracy when cast of softer maleable alloy and with it's PB. Why Lyman does not make a GC'd version is beyond me. At 1500 fps or less I did not find it to be a "reasonable" flat enough trajectory to 200 yards. I gave up on that bullet for my 4570s because it didn't fit my needs.

I used the Lyman 457483 which is a GC'd 457124 (400 gr RN), cast them soft and HP'd them with a Forster HP tool. I found these worked really well in both my TD and Siamese Mauser. At 2000 fps out of the Siamese recoil was manageable, accuracy excellet and the trajectory made for a 200 yards range (zeroed at 150 yards). They killed deer like lightning even at 1400 fps out of my TD. However that was still a little more bullet than I thought was needed for deer (mulies and blacktails in the Pacific NW).

Recently I've been shooting with the RCBS 45-300-GC cast of 50/50 WW/lead. I also HP these with the Forster tool. Accuracy is running about 2 moa (the Siamese has a Leupold 2.5X with a very, very thick reticle) at 1900-2000 fps. Zeroed at 100 yards they hit about 10-12" low at 200 yards so with a 150 yard zero (about 3" high at 100 yards) or so they should do quite well to 200 yards. I've not killed any deer with them expect very good results. I'd suggest you take a look at that bullet for use in your Marlin. It may fit your needs better than the Lyman 457122.

Larry Gibson

Larry
I found 2 RCBS .45-300 GC molds, one is a SWC #82083, .45-300 SWC (I believe primarily a pistol bullet) the other #82051, .45-300-FN (I believe this is the one you are referring to).
Looks good, and I already have a Forester HP'er.
How deep do you Hollow Point? What is the final weight? What lube do you use to get the 1900-2000fps? Do you get any leading?
With the 50/50 WW/linotype what kind of expansion do you expect?
Just full of questions ain't I.
Thanks for the info.
HL

4570Forever

"I found 2 RCBS .45-300 GC molds, one is a SWC #82083, .45-300 SWC (I believe primarily a pistol bullet) the other #82051, .45-300-FN (I believe this is the one you are referring to)."

Sorry, forgot they make a pistol mould to.

"Looks good, and I already have a Forester HP'er. How deep do you Hollow Point?"

I HP about 3/4 of the depth from the nose to the front driving band.

"What is the final weight?"


I don't know as they are HP'd after they are loaded. I could have weighed the drilled out part of the bullet but never did. I cast them out of 50/50 WW/lead so they actually weigh 312 gr lubed w/GC before HPing.

"What lube do you use to get the 1900-2000fps?"

Javelina

"Do you get any leading?"

No

"With the 50/50 WW/linotype what kind of expansion do you expect?"

My bad; should have read WW/lead. Yes I do get expansion but I've not shot a deer with one. However they expand in water soaked newsprint like the 457483s did which was very nice and I have killed deer with them. I've a tapered drill bit for drilling stocks for sling swivel studs. I have opened the HP on a couple up with that. They "donut" expand in the wet newsprint with the GC almost pushed all the way through! I don't think I want that much expansion on deer!

"Just full of questions ain't I.
Thanks for the info."

No problem with the questions. Glad to help.

Larry Gibson

First off, if you don't have a copy of "Forty Years with the 45/70" by Paul Matthews, go buy one. Anything you can do, any way you can screw it up, this guy has done it and will save you the trouble.
I’m not 100% sure it was Paul Matthews but he or someone else over the years came up with a solution to your problem by casting a bullet I believe they called a "hard Soft" bullet with two different metals or at least two different alloys. Very easy the way that they did it, take your mould, drop a #4 buckshot in the mould, hold it perfectly level and pour the molten metal in on top. I cast a lot of these with a .358 HP mould and BB size lead shot. The BB Shot would lodge and stay in the HP hole, perfectly centered and they really worked well fired from a 35 Rem rifle, absolutely deadly on white tails.
And now for the sad ‘rest of the story’ - my Marlin 1895 has the Micro-Groove rifling, and in a word, it does not like cast bullets at all. Deadly accurate in a Browning SS I owned and in my Ruger #1, then 6-8" in my Marlin. I have actually considered either trading the rifle for another or having it re-barreled.
Sorry for drifting of the subject and I hope some of this helps.
Best regards,

45/70; go to the castboolits site and do a search for casting soft nose bullets by Bruce B, I also seem to remember John Goines gas checking this bullet, he was punching a hole in a gas check and casting with it in place, he posts there also under the handle Beagle.

Design a duplicate of the Lyman mould that is large enough to cast to fit your rifle and get it made at Mountain Molds. Be sure to put a gas check shank on it.

As mentioned above, your biggest problem is getting any normal commercial mold to cast a boolit big enough. The Marlin MicroGroove rifling has anywhere from 12 to 16 grooves. Most are 12 groove that I have seen. The new Ballard cut "deep groove" rifled bbls have 6 grooves. Both Ballard and MicroGoove rifling is cut to approxiamately the same depth. Around 0.0030 to 0.0035 deep. "Deep Cut" is BS. This is all based on actual sluggings. The first year, "BO" serial numbered barrels had real 8 groove rifling that measures 0.0045 deep on mine. Not all of the "BO" marked barrels are this way.

I've yet to see a Marlin 45-70 that would not safely chamber a boolit diameter of 0.462. Both Ballard and MG typically run a grrove diameter of 0.4585 to 0.4595. Ballard rifled bbl's will typically do real well with boolits sized to 0.460. Even better with ones at 0.461 or 0.462. The MG bbl's like them at 0.462. You can cet away with smaller boolits, but at the price of increased boolit hardness and a little less velocity. The MG bbl will also shoot markedly better if it has been firelapped. This reduces fouling which is detrimental with such thin rifling. Another common problem with Marlin bbls is bore constrictions. You'll find bore constrictions under the dovetail cuts, roll stamping, and bbl thread. I've seen constrictions from 0.0005 to 0.0015" Again, low velocity firelapping will cure this. Both Beartooth and LBT offer fine kits with instructions. On a new gun, I don't fret too much about a half a thou of constriction. A few hundred rounds of jacketed will iron that out.

As far as boolit alloy, I like 50/50 WW-Pb. I cast some air cooled and some waterdropped to see what the gun likes. If you can shoot out the back door, a good test it to WD boolits and shoot groups immediately after casting and over the next couple of days while taking hardness readings. 50/50 alloy will be around 10 bhn AC'd and 22 bhn WD'd. Your gun may like them somewhere inbetween. You can alloy the mix toward the softer side with additional Pb. I have water dropped 35/65 WW-Pb and it will still harden to around 15 bhn. Even at 22 bhn this alloy will expand. As an alternative to casting dual alloy boolits, you can also torch anneal the WD'd boolit nose. This will leave you with a soft, expandable nose with a hard shank.