bm-3 thank you for your response. I have checked the diameter of the bullets. They measure .429, I did not realize that undersize would effect barrel leading. I guess the next step would be to slug the bore. The gun is not ss. As is said before, I am new to cast bullets, although i have been reloading jacketed for almost 30 years. Again, any help is much appreciated and thank you.

Don't worry about the bore! You want the boolit to be a closer fit in the throats. My Ruger's throats measure .4325 and shoots very good with .430 boolits with no lead. .431 would be even better. You sure don't want .429 for it.
And like the guys say, make sure ALL the copper is out of the bore before shooting lead. Use Sweets and get it all out. Just cleaning with Hoppe's will not do at all.

I have one Ruger that have a bore .431 and throat .429. It did not shoot for beans that way and had a lot of leading.
Are you looking at hunting with this gun? I hunt Deer and Elk with my Super Red Hawk in 44 MAG.

bm-3, that is strange. I have never seen a .44 with throats smaller then the bore. That gun needs re-barreled to .429/.430 and the throats reamed out. Reaming the throats alone would work if you can find a larger boolit. The Ruger .45 Colts are famous for this problem and almost all of them need reamed. No way to get groups with the combination you have.

quote:

Originally posted by bm-3:
I have one Ruger that have a bore .431 and throat .429. It did not shoot for beans that way and had a lot of leading.
Are you looking at hunting with this gun? I hunt Deer and Elk with my Super Red Hawk in 44 MAG.

I have a DW that used to have a throat size of .427 I bought a reamer from Brownells and opened it up to .4325 it now groups great.

This is there link if you are interested.
http://www.brownells.com/aspx/NS/store/ProductDetail.aspx?p=7700&title=REVOLVER+CYLINDER+THROATING+REAMER

Ruger can and does produce all kinds of funky combinations of cylinder throat and barrel groove combinations.

I once had a 41 mag with cylinder throats of .410 and barrel groove of .413. Very bad combination and didn't do well at all.

In the case in question, the fix is to have the cylinder throats opened up to .432. Many bullet molds will cast bullet this size and Stillwell will make you a lube/size die in this size. He will also hone out the cylinder throats for a reasonable price. www.sizingdie.com

The gun went back to Ruger and they sent me a new one. It had more issues then I care to list.