Here is a picture of a 360 grain bullet that I designed using MountainMolds excellent website. I think the turn around was a little over 4 weeks. The mould looks like it is of very high quality. I have not shot the bullet yet, though. For comparison I included a 360 grain CPB handload and a 335 CPB as loaded by Buffalo Bore. Thr BRTC is the one I designed.

The nose is a little messed up from sizing the bullet with a nose punch that was too small. My correct size nose punch has made it in and the problem should be eliminated now.



Thanks for making me a great mould, Dan.

















David

How does it shoot? That's my question. I have several of dan's molds and love them. However, I couldn't get the bore rideing design to shoot well in my Taurus 454. That was awhile back and he has probably changed the specs on them by now. The ones that I tested were a comparison of the different noses on a similar base in the 340gn range. What's the diameter of the bore rideing section.

I loaded and shot 12 of these monsters today. At 7 yards I was getting 1280-1300 fps. At 25 yards I shot a 2" group (6 shots) with my bisley.
The bullets I shot today were a mixture of Linotype and wheel weights lubed with SPG.

The bore riding section should measure .448 if I remember correctly. As you can probably see it is smaller than the front driving band and it is probably not a true "bore rider".
I think this bullet shows some real potential, but I want to shoot it at 75 and 100 meters before I start singing its praises too loud. Nevertheless, it should make one hell of an up close pig slayer.

If this bullet shoots as good as I hope it does out to 100 meters I am going to design a 44 bullet using this 45 as a model.

David

David, you're getting 1300 fps out of that load? What is the load if you don't mind sharing, and what length is your barrel?

Whitworth

Why the bore riding design? That�s usually reserved for long rifle bullets. Not criticizing at all, but honestly curious as to what factors went into your decision.

Yes, I am getting an honest 1300 fps. out of a 7.5" ruger Bisley. But you have to remember that this load while safe with my lot# of powder and bullet, my gun, etc.. may not be safe with/in yours. I have designed this bullet to have the maximum amount of case capacity. The inside the case length is only .408, if I remember correctly. I belive the Hodgdon manual lists 21 grains of H110 as the maximum for a 360 grain bullet with close to .5 inside the case length. I am a little over the maximum. but I think their velocity estimates for 21 grains are a little conservative. I also got 1305 fps with cast performance's 360 lbt.

David

Jim in Idaho,

I was trying to get a large meplat while stil keeping the bullet accurate and stable. I also wanted to get as much weight forward of the case, thereby giving me similar case capacity to the longer 454 case.
The bullet design was somewhat inspired by Garretts 44 bullet and JD Jones old 44 bullets. I made mine with a bit more aggressive meplat and longer bore-riding section, though. I also do not know what their lube grooves look like.
I figured I could order the standard plain jane bullet moulds from midwayusa.
Since I wanted to try Dan at Mountainmolds.com, I thought I would try a more aggressive/unique bullet design. No matter what the bullet ended up like, I knew I would be getting a good Idea of the quality of the moulds made by Dan. I could not be any happier with the quality of the mould and the friendly, expedient way Dan conducts his business.
I will be doing business with him again in the very near future. I already want a similar 44 and have some hair-brained ideas about a few 38's and 45-70's.

David

I like David's design, although the proof will be in how it shoots. The so-called bore riding section on the nose is big enough to engage the rifling, it carries a lot of weight up front, yet the cartridge should easily drop into the chamber.

Dave, the boolit design looks good but I have 2 questions. Why in the world are you using SPG instead of Felix lube? SPG was designed for black powder (and doesn't work that good with it either,) not smokeless. It does not work good with smokeless pressures and does a poor job preventing leading. If you switch to Felix you will see an immediate increase in accuracy.
Two inches at 25 yds is not accurate and I would only be happy with this at 75 yds.
Why are you trying to push this boolit so fast? If you start backing down the load you will find a sweet spot for it where it will really group and this might be around 1100 fps. I assure you, no animal on earth will know the difference.
It never ceases to amaze me why everyone pushes handguns to the max when an accurate load is NEVER the max load. Handguns are the easiest guns to work up loads for and if a boolit will not shoot good during the process, it should be rejected. I don't see that problem with your boolit but I'm sure you will find it doesn't like the velocity you want.
Next thing I would do is to scrap the magnum primers you are probably using, this alone will increase accuracy I would bet.
Have you checked the throat size on your Vaquero? What diameter is your boolit? Why do you size it? You should be able to thumb push a .452 boolit through the throats. If you can't they need to be lapped out. Most Ruger .45's have throats that are too small. They should measure .4525.
Next thing to do is don't full length size the brass. Use a titanium nitride Hornady die or a carbide die and only size to just below where the base of the boolit will be when seated. You also want very tight brass tension on the boolit, crimp will not correct this.
Yes, a lot of questions, but you never gave much information on your loading process. I don't care about how much powder you are using because I would never trade accuracy for velocity. When I shoot at an animal out to 100 yds. I want to know I am not taking a chance by only getting 8 to 12" groups out there. 3" or less is what you want at 100 yds.

Here is a picture of a 360 grain 44 for comparison. On the left is the 44 loaded with a 360 grain bullet. In the middle is the Cast performance 360 grain bullet loaded in 45 Colt. On the right is the mountainmold.com bullet, which as stated before weighs 360 grains.
A propper size nose punch really helps the looks of this bullet,huh?




I think it looks rather good. Much more professional looking than the other two.

David

BFRShooter,
I normally use 50% alox and 50% beeswax for all of my cast bullets. But not too long ago I went to Midwayusa.com and bought 2 sticks of just about all of the bullet lube they had. I did not buy the stuff that I have first hand personal experience with, which gave me trouble. I have never tried SPG, so I am trying it now. Thompson's cold blue or blue cold is next.
As far as black powder lubes go, I have had good luck with the few I have tried, namely Lyman's Black Gold in the 44 magnum.

Have you ever tried SPG or are you basing your opinion on second hand info?

As to why I am shooting this bullet so fast, well, I guess there is two answers to that question.
1.) because I can
2.) the powder was set up to throw the normal charge for my 310 grain RCBS SWC. So insead of messing up my setting, I just used that charge and loaded 12 rounds (***WARNING never do this with your loads. ALWAYS follow a trusted loading manual***). I have shot that load with 360 grain Cast Performance LBT's and had a pretty good idea of what I was doing. Plus the powder charge is a very moderate one for the 310 grain bullet and slightly over the maximum suggested for the 360 grain bullet.

I do plan on developing a load for this bullet. Actually, I plan on developing 3 loads:
1. most accurate load for a 50% WW and 50% pure lead alloy
2. most accurate load for straight WW
3. a fast but safe load for straight linotype.

All things take time though.

yes I have checked all of my Ruger's throats and they are all right where they need to be. By the way I was using a Bisley not a Vaquero, however I am sure this load would make my 4 5/8" vaquero dance.

Dave, I am what you call a lubalolic. I have tried every black powder lube either bought or made in my revolvers along with every store bought smokeless lube. (I shoot BPCR also) All worked to some extent. The best for smokeless was LBT Blue and LBT magnum, the magnum better for handguns and the blue for rifles.
As soon as I made the Felix lube my group size really shrunk. I make it soft and sticky for revolvers and lever guns. I want the lube to spin out of the grooves as soon as the boolit leaves the muzzle. Nothing worse then having some lube left in part of the grease grooves as the boolit goes downrange. The other way is to make it real hard so none leaves the grooves, but this does nothing in the bore.
I use 20# of WW, .4# of tin and .6# of antimony for my hunting boolits. It is hard but not brittle. For plinking I use straight WW.
When I first started BPCR I bought SPG because it was supposed to be the best. Accuracy would go to hell fast. That is when I found the last 10" of barrel was full of hard, dry fouling and no amount of blow tubing helped. The barrel had to be wiped after every shot to shoot decent. I now mix my own with beeswax, Lube Gard and lanolin. This works fair with smokeless. I get leading with the black powder stuff and zero lead with Felix. Also some black powder lube is more soap and water soluble so it can be harder to clean with solvents.
For the lube over the ball in my cap and ball revolver, I use Mathews lube of beeswax, neatsfoot oil and Neutrogena facial soap. It will hold groups of 2" or less at 50 yds and the bore washes up fast and clean. I broke both shoulders on a big doe last year with the Ruger old Army, she went 30 feet.
I use the 335 gr LBT WLNGC in my Vaquero, 21.5 grs. of 296 and Fed 150 primer. I wipe the blue lube out of the grooves, smear in Felix and have shot sub 2" groups at 75 yds. I dropped a deer dead in it's tracks at 100 yds with it. I have shot 6 deer with it and none has gone out of sight. I switch guns a lot between the .44's, .45's and 45-70 during the season, so that many deer with the Vaquero is a lot because I only carry it when walking around.
I agree it is fun to see how much speed you can get, but in every case I did that, accuracy was bad. For example, I get 1535 fps with my 317 gr boolit in the 45-70 BFR, a mild load, but extremely accurate to 200 yds. I can get 1800 fps with the Hornady condom bullet with one hole groups at 50 yds. I have 4 boxes of these and I think they will turn green before I use them. I make my own moulds and would rather shoot mine then them stupid copper things.
By the way, Felix is dirt cheap and easy to make. I can make a years supply for what a couple of sticks of store bought stuff costs.
Have fun and keep me posted with your results. I wasn't running you down or anything, just wanted to know about some stuff.

bfrshooter,
I have always gotten best accuracy with max loads. That's especially true with H110/WW296, which thrive on pressure.

I prefer to full lenth size revolver cases, so the cartridge will easily drop into the chamber. I used to partial size, but chambering was sometimes difficult and I never saw a difference in accuracy.

I did extensive lube tests this year in one 357 mag revolver. Until I repeat the tests in other guns, I won't draw any firm conclusions, but for what it's worth, Rooster HVR was cleaner than any other lube in the test, and also produced velocities 50 - 100 fps higher than some other lubes. Lube seemed to have little affect on accuracy in that particular gun.