I was wondering if any one has ever seen anything like this. I inherited a few rifles and reloading equipment from my father who passed away about 18 years ago. I came across a box of 270 cal. reloads. This plastic box contained 50 rounds, of which 10 of the rounds were loaded with the 130-grain boat tail bullets loaded backwards. The bullets are actually seated with the point facing the primer. The other 40 rounds in this box are loaded using the same bullet but seated in the conventional manner. To add to the mystery of these 10 unusual hand loads, after extracting one of the bullets, I noticed that the powder charge appeared to be a compressed load. When I dumped it there seemed to be an unusually low volume of powder. Upon further inspection of the case (marked �MATCH LG 63 on the bottom� I noticed something inside the case. I cut the case in half with a tubing cutter and found a piece of aluminum tubing about two inches long inside the case. This tubing fits tight in the casing and has about 1/4 inch inside diameter. It also appears to have been fired before as there are powder burns on the aluminum tubing.

My father was an engineer, and I remember him taking great pride in reloading. I have an idea that maybe he used the aluminum tubing to take up space to use a particular powder and still get accurate loads. I have no idea why he would seat the bullet backwards.

Can any one give me any insight on what he might have been doing with these mystery loads?

Keith's "duplex" load used a tube from the primer's flash hole to the front of the case to carry the "fire" to ignite the powder at the front of the case instead of at the rear. The theory is that the pressure keeps the powder compressed at the rear of the case where it will burn evenly and completely - instead of getting blown into the barrel leaving unburned grains of powder. He claimed that his experiments during WWII at the Ogden armory using 50 BMG cases showed 200-300 fps more velocity with slightly less powder being used (the tube takes up a significant amount of space). Keith worked out this system with O'Neal and Hopkins - the OKH wildcat caliber developers back in the 30's.

Your dad may have been trying to duplicate these loads, but why he put boattail bullets in backwards I don't know. I have heard of loading jacketed pistol bullets backwards, and firing a couple of shots of them after leading a barrel with cast bullet loads - the jacketed bullets are supposed to scrape all of the leading out of the barrel. I don't think this would work with boattail bullets, and the higher pressures of rifle loads may blow-up your rifle instead of scraping the lead out of the barrel..

Firing jacketed bullets after lead will indeed scrape out any leading left behind, but seating .270 gr bullets backwards makes no sense to me. I'm sure your father was experimenting with something but I can't say what.

You said the powder volume seemed "low." Do you have a guess what the powder was? I am thinking maybe he seated the bullet backwards so that the POINT of the bullet would fit into the aluminum tube and perhaps hold it in place??? (Just a wild guess.) I am also guessing he may have been trying to come up with some sort of REDUCED LOAD.

Just how reduced and for what purpose, I don't know.

As a lad I have gone so far as to throttle back on 30/06 loads until I was shooting 1.5 grains of bullseye and a 170 gr cast bullet in my back yard. It has surprising accuracy.

My question was what was going to become of the aluminum tube when the rifle fired? Was it expected to exit behind the bullet? That follow up shot would make me nervous until I knew where the tube went.

Did you Dad keep any loading notes? There may possibly be a clue written somewhere.

Let us know if you figure this one out, Flame.

Can't even guess what your Dad was doing but as for the tube I can say the 5"/54 cal guns the Navy uses have a shell casing that is about 36" long and is ignited with a "flame tube" that extends up about 20 - 24" inside the powder casing. I was told this design allowed for a more uniform ignition and a more complete and consistent powder burn. Beyond that I can't add much
"Shoot straight, shoot safe and shoot a lot!"

Pecos,
Maybe I didn't make myself clear on the aluminum tubing. Sorry, but I do not think the tube is ever meant to exit the shell case. This tubing fits tight against the inside of the case and runs from the base all the way to where the shoulder starts. This tube appears to have been inserted in a case with no shoulder, the the case was formed somehow to chamber in a custom 270. This particular rifle, not that it makes any difference, has a mouser action with beautiful inlays, custom barrel stamped "270" and one of the most beautiful wood stocks I have ever seen. If my memory serves me coreectly, these "mystery loads" may be his rendition of a turkey load. Would this make any sense? The reverse seated bullet really blows me away. Also, I looked at his notes to no avail. I can tell you this. The powder in the conventionaly seated bullets weighed out at 57.3 grains and is of the type that looks like little discs. The powder that was in the mystery loads weighed 33 grains and was of the type that looked like long cylinders. I would realy like to know what powder he was using in the conventional loads so I could duplicate it. I would bet they are very accurate in this particular rifle.

Flame - That tube situation is really wild. It sounds like perhaps he was trying to artificially reduce the case capacity for some sort of reduced loading. Swapping ends on the bullet might have been some attempt, as you speculate, at producing a fmj for things like turkey etc. I have shot inverted bullet in pistols and at pistol velocity, it doesn't seem to much matter which way is up at close range...but I have some reservations about this working very well in a rifle like the 270...unless he was getting CLOSE, i.e. 25 yds or less. Again...all speculation.

This may be as close as you ever come to an answer to this question. My advise would be to mark these cases some way and be sure you get them out of your loading room so there is no chance of using them.

The powder you are describing as "discs"...are you talking like a "flattened ball powder." I don't have a load book here at work and am reluctant to guess, but this load your father was using shouldn't be hard to figure out.

Most 270's are inherently accurate and usually shoot well with a lot of loadings. If you want to tune up something and hunt with this gun, I would predict a very high chance of good success.

Sorry I wasn't of more help.

As mentioned by other posts, it does sound as if your father was reducing the case capacity for reduced loads. Further, it is probably a Mauser action rather than the rather rare "mouser" action.



Ok, ok, I did wink, didn't I? Anyway the backwards loaded boattails are probably because there is a theory that at subsonic velocities the most stabile shape is a rain drop. This is most closely approximated in the available projectiles by the backwards loaded boattail. I've seen this mentioned again only recently. Perhaps on this very board.

The flat base of the boat tail becomes a broad meplat and very effective on turkey and such.

Sounds like your dad was a great fellow and would have been a hoot to talk to. You are really lucky. Enjoy.

You guys are awesome! I may not be able to spell Mauser, but got a kick out of the way I was constructively criticized As you can see from the number of posts I have posted, I am new to this forum. In the past few days I have read many posts and learned allot. My true intension here was to try to figure out what my father was doing. Now I have a much better idea of dad's methods. Hobie hit the nail on the head. My dad was a great fellow and passed away at the early age of 53. Not only did he enjoy reloading, but he was also a HAM radio operator. It is truly a shame that he missed out on the Internet age, and fine forums like this one. He would have fit right in here.

Thanks for the input, and let me warn you that I have a few hundred other questions for you guys.

Handloader magazine has run 2 different articles that I know of on using a smaller case inside a larger case, in order to reduce the powder capacity for more consistent reduced loads. The first article was on using a trimmed off .223 cases inside of .308s. IIRC, the second was on using trimmed off .308s inside 45/70s, although I can't remember how the filler case was retained inside . I'd be willing to bet that you father was doing the same thing with the aluminum tubing.

I've also seen .308 cases produced on either NC equipment or a screw machine. These came out of bar stock, and had very small powder chambers. Basically they were bored .308 straight back to the flash hole. The purpose was to produce nice consistent ballistics with subsonic loads - .300 Whisper in a .308.

As for backwards bullets... Well, seems to me that a backwards facing jacketed soft point would have appropriate terminal ballistics for turkeys. It's also inherently stable, unlike point forward projectiles. That may overcome the hinkyness caused by the powder gasses expanding past the point as the bullet exits the bore. I'm more optomistic than pecos45. It wouldn't surprise me if your dad got good results out past 50 yards.

Sounds to me like you father was quite the experimenter. I'd keep the cartridges as a keepsake.

Regards,
Scott

Hobie is right.

The reversed boat tail is used, in a reduced loading, as a plinking and small game load. Let's say you're on a whitetail hunt, and you've also got a turkey license. Well, when a nice gobbler just happens your way, are you going to explode him into a cloud of feathers with a 130 grain spitzer at 3000 fps?

I didn't think so!

No, you reach into your jacket and take out one of the plinking loads, which will do the job without destroying the bird. You'll of course need to know the sight hold for this secondary load.

Such light loads can be put together without the aluminum tube you mention. That tube, if it fits tightly against the case walls, doesn't sound like it was intended to redirect the primer's flame. It sounds more like it was simply a way to get decent velocity out of a smaller powder charge for the plinking and small game load.

The flattened ball powder, in the 57.3 grain charge with the 130 grain bullet sounds like the old H450 (Hodgdon), which is no longer made. It can still be found on shelves in some places.

To identify an unknown powder (from a dismantled handload), do this:

1. Weigh the powder charge (which you've already done).

2. Decide on some likely candidates. (I would look at H450 if you can find any).

3. Use a test tube, or something like the Lee dippers, to compare volume levels of the equal charges.

4. If the volumes of equal weights of the unknown powder and the suspect powder are also the same, go to step 5. If not, go back and try another powder.

5. Very, very important. Consult a couple of loading manuals to see if the particular charge of powder you believe to be "the one" is a reasonable and safe charge for that load. Reasonable would mean that such a charge would drive the bullet to the cartridge's potential. Safe would mean not over max.

6. If you have a chronograph, you can test one of the unknown loads against one of the loads you suspect of being the same powder...

Then you'll know that if it looks, walks, and quacks like a duck, well, that's probably your bird ...

Anyway, take care, sounds like you have a nice rig there...

Dan Newberry
green 788

Dan

If this tube was attached to the base, then you can count on it being an experiment meant to do some of the things gibbs?!? ackley? (wildcatter not the rifle company) talked about with the front of the case burning first. Ackley I think has a write up of this in his books. This was not to reduce case capacity, but to induce a more uniform burn. I think the army ord. dept also experiemented with this style.

If these are more or less factory produced, they should be worth quite a bit to a collector, btw, if you wanted to sell them.

i just don't remember all the "facts" around gibb's work, as I thought, as i read it, that I would never see/hear of these cases.

jeffe

Flame,
Any chance you could post pics? I also think, if its an option, to do a cross section of one. At the very least it would be cool.

Thanks
JAG

Hi guys, i belive that the theory if it being a advanced version of a cat�s sneese load is correct just look at what this finnish guy says about the matter..

http://guns.connect.fi/gow/QA.html

look under chapter 6 or just read the whole thing...

Chris

I think most folks have said what I am going to say in one way or another.
In the "old" days many western states had the turkey season concurrent with their big game seasons. To harvest a turkey while hunting deer most folks carried some sort of fully jacketed bullet or reduced load that shot somewhat predictably with the sight settings on the gun. I have only heard of descriptions of turkeys shot with "normal" deer loads, but the descriptions are enough to make me realize few were edible after being blasted by the trusty aught-six or 270 of the day.
4831 of some sort was typically a popular powder in those days but there were many different warnings about using reduced loads with that powder. Your description of the powder sure does sound like 4831.
My guess was that this was a method to utilize his normal bullets and reduce damage to the turkey or other small game and the tube allowed shooting reduced loads of 4831.

Back when magazines and national shooters organizations were based on shooters and experimenters the magazines was filled with "homebrewed solutions" of this sort and lots of knowledge was shared each month.
Now the latest whompum-bang magnum capable of wounding game at great distances fill the pages of ones favorite gunzine. The gun is capable of doing better things, most of us shooters (me included) are NOT capable of shots at those ranges. That said I once watch a capable shooter who was practicing "highpower" at 300 yards test fire his elk hunting rifle and load shooting off hand. He and the rifle were ready to go with that group of 3 shots.

LouisB

Just opinions of course


[ 11-04-2002, 04:40: Message edited by: TCLouis ]

FLAME - Certainly no criticism intended by anyone for you or your father on this matter. I think we all admire his creativity and handiwork.

It's true that back in the "old days" a lot of guys carried special "Turkey Loads" during deer season. I hunted mostly with 30/06 back then and always had a few FMJ's. 270 shooters would have a problem doing this and so you're Dad's creation was born. I suspect a research of the old American Rifleman magazines of that era might reveal an article on just such tactics as your father was employing.

This is one of the magical things about a firearm. It's one way a departed loved one is always with us.

Again, thanks for all the input guys...

The aluminum tube is not attached to the case at all. It looks like the neck was opened up, the tube inserted, and then the shoulder reformed. These casings do not look to be factory.

I attempted to take some digital pictures of these loads last night, but they didn't come out to good. I will try again after work today when there is more light and post them. I will also try to get some pictures of the rifle. It was custom built in the late 50s. It will shoot 1" MOA with factory Federal 130 grain ballistic tips. I am looking forward to working up a load for this gun.

Scott has pretty much explained what your father was doing, ..........I remember the articles on inserting the .223 cases, and I believe Nonte also suggested the tube insertion as a method of reducing the case volume for the safe use of slow burning powders. The 60's & 70's were full of warnings concerning reduced loads with these slow burners.
The use of reversed bullets were also well written up in the same time period. Obviously, your father was a true experimenter attempting to validate others' theories.

I posted some pictures of these mystery loads, that aren't so much of a mystery anymore thanks to you guys.

Mystery Loads

Does anyone else think that the case might have started out as a 30.06 match case, had the tube inserted, then necked down? Could the LG63 actually be LC? (Lake City)?

When first reading through this thread I thought Jeffosso had it nailed, with Mr. Gibbs use of "Reverse Ignition" where the primer charge travels up through a small tube to ignite the powder closest to the bullet and burns back to the base!
Man that had to create some chamber pressure!
It's trly amazing what some guys have Dreamed up and lived to tell there story!

just looked at the pics..

wow, that weird...

It's not the top ignition I thought it was.

jeffe

Neat pictures and a beautiful rife!
I can't offer anything else.

Very much what I expected. I was glad to hear that your dad was a ham operator as well. It is clear that he was a thinking man who loved both the traditional (see that rifle) and the modern technologies.

Just a note. You don't have to recreate those reduced capacity cases to use reduced loads in your .270. It looks like a beautiful rifle and I think that you will enjoy a lifetime of shooting with it. Descendents as well!

I have a wild guess.

Seating a bullet backward is an old method of expanding case necks. Did it myself back when .35 Whelen was a wildcat.

Just might have been done to get the necks right after the case was resized with the tubing in it.