My friend was up to shoot yesterday and brought his new SRH. First thing I found was his scope was on wrong (he installed it) with the elevation adjustment on the left side. I started to change it and the screws were also way too loose to hold it in place under recoil. Anyway, I fixed it and he had some WW 265 gr loads that looked like XTP's. What pipsqueek loads! I was very dissappointed in how they shot, patterns, not groups. Recoil was like moderate .44 mag loads. Then he had spme cowboy action 45 colt loads and they didn't shoot good either. I tried some of my .45 colt heavy loads with the big Lyman slug that casts out at 347 grs. Now that was more like it, recoil was more in tune with a .454 and it shot pretty good. A big LBT would be better I think and a worked up load should make it talk.
What are the factories doing? Are they loading light .45 colt loads in these big cases? I told him he needs a much bigger bullet for the rifling to stabilize.
Not ever having loaded for the .454, I have to ask what you fellas find shoots the best as far as a heavy cast boolit load. I am looking for at least one inch groups at 50 yds for him.

Every firearm is a law unto itself. Sometimes they shoot every load tried adequately, sometimes not. Both Speer and Hornady have loading data for the .454 Casull.

Personally, I shot 32.0 of WW296 with the 260 Speer. Since then, I believe Speer has toughened this bullet up because they give a starting load of 34.0 grains of WW296 in the 13th edition of their manual.

Freedom Arms also has load data and this would give your friend starting loads for several different powders. He just needs to be aware that most jacketed bullets need to be kept under 1600 fps unless they are designed for higher velocities.

Cast Performance has some loading data on their website for the bullets they sell. The Hodgden annual load data has some information for the various LBT bullet weights as well.

Hope this helps.

My SRH 454-7 1/2" w/ Leupold 2x shoots the CP 395gr WFNGC into 3/4" at 50 yds with H110-24.0gr @ 1350 fps (MAX LOAD)
it won't shoot this good with lighter bullets.
Sean

My setup is a 7.5" SRH w/ 2x7 burris shooting 260gr freedom arms JFP bullets. The load that seems to work best is 35.5gr of H110 with velocitys averaging 1900 fps. Groups in the 3/4 to 1 inch range at fifty and the performance on deer and hogs is excellent. I had considered shooting heavier bullets because I had had worried about the bullets stabilizing, but after the first batch went out the barrel, i figured i'd stick with what I had. As far as the recoil goes, rude is the only word that comes to mind. I can't help you out on your question about factory ammo, the only store-bought stuff that goes through my rifles is rimfire.

I personally use the 300 grain Speer Unicore at about 1500+ fps out of a 6.5 inch barrel.It is a very tough bullet for being inexpensive.I think it is tougher than the 300 JFN Cor-Bon factory load.It has come apart and shed it's jacket before unlike the Speer Unicore.I also have some 360 grain hardcast I haven't had time to work up all the way yet.The .454 is just to fun to shoot.

Best of luck.Jayco.

475, thats the stuff I am looking for. Thanks. I have all kinds of load data, but just wanted your experiences. I don't like condom bullets unless I am shooting silhouette, which I quit because of travel distances and expense. Hard cast is my game, and the bigger they are the better.

I forgot to mention that I have an old oxygen tank at 100 yds for a gong. I hit it with my 45-70 BFR and it makes a deep nasty dent. When hit with the WW .454 loads it just leaves a smear.
I went back to 200 yds with my BFR. I had the pig and ram propped up. I figured 16" of drop and shot one shot at each. Before the gun was up in recoil, the steel targets were actually thrown back. Great fun and my friend with the SRH fell in love with the BFR. With the right boolits and load, the SRH will be a joy to shoot long range too.

I have a bunch of Mountain Molds designs and in my Raging Bull the 70% nose seems to work about the best in the 330-340gn range. My best accuracy came in around 1350fps, so I left it there. I'm shooting WC820, 26gns if I remember right.



When I first bought my gun, I got 2 box's of Win factory 260 and 300gn 454 ammo. The velocity was not even up to a warm 44mag Ruger load.