Gents, I have loads for the 458 SOCOM with the following bullets.
300gr Remington HP & 300gr Hornady, over the same powder charge of H110.

The 350gr Hornady Round Nose,and the 350 FN over the same charge of IMR 4198.

The Speer 400gr FN over IMR 4198.

I chose these bullets because I had them on hand.

All of them except the Hornady 350gr FN hit into the same group at 100 yards, using an EO Tech red dot. The 350gr FN hits a few inches higher.

I plan to try all of these out on deer and hogs this upcomming deer season.

I have used these bullets in the 45/70, some in a 458 Win Mag and the 350gr Hornady RN in my 450 No2, with excellent results over the years.

I will be curious to see how well they do at the somewhat reduced velocities of the 458 SOCOM.

I will be interested as well.
the 325 FTX Hornady would also be a good option here too..

PC
I did not have any of those on hand, but I agree, I think they would be something to give a try.

michael458

I know you have done a lot of experimenting with .458 bullets, feel free to give your experience and thoughts on bullets for the 458 SOCOM.

quote:

Originally posted by N E 450 No2:
michael458

I know you have done a lot of experimenting with .458 bullets, feel free to give your experience and thoughts on bullets for the 458 SOCOM.

NE450#2


Yep, I did so on the other thread you started a few days ago? In fact, that lead me to discovering that somehow I had missed the .458 300 gr North Fork, in which I have 200 of those on the way to do some test work on at your velocities.

Jest of the matter was this;

I too have worked a lot with the 350 Hornady. 10 yrs or so, it was a god send for the 45/70 as long as we kept velocity up. It's a tough bullet, and you know designed originally for the 458 Win, Hornady just flattened the nose for 45/70-same bullet. I have found that it holds up great right on up to impacts of 2400 fps. Excellent in 45/70--as good as a premium bullet in the 1700-2000 fps impact range. But if you drop to 1600 fps impact velocity, then it does not expand at all and becomes basically a solid. So while you would get good penetration with your Socom, you would not get much trauma inflicted.

If you go down to the thread you started below the other day, you will also see where I spoke about the 325 Flex and being a good option for what you wanted to do.

This also lead to me stating that in the end, for what you wanted, if we had a 300 North Fork Premium, that would almost be the perfect solution. At that time, I had missed that North Fork had a 300 gr Premium in 458? John corrected me, and now I have 200 of them on the way, and will test them at your velocity range, as well as for some of my 458 desires too.

The low starting velocity is killing you on trauma with some of the bullets, case capacity and other limitations are present. I did a good bit of work with several of these lighter 458 bullets at low low velocity, you can see most of that on the other thread.

http://forums.accuratereloadin...481037971#8481037971

Some good solutions 300 Barnes Blue tip bullet, 325 Hornady Flex, and I think maybe the 300 North Fork might be the best of all for penetration on the hogs, and trauma inflicted with the low velocity. Of course for deer, you know most all of them will do fine, hell they all start at 458. But a little trauma inflicted always helps, and puts an end to chasing things, even with 458 caliber.

Michael

Michael, thanks, somehow I missed the posts on that other thread.

GeorgeS

If possible can you mend these 2 threads into one???

Harry is having good luck with the FTX

I have only shot heavy slugs with mine to date. 535 gr Hard Cast and 500 gr Hornady RN's Oh I have also mucked around with woodligh 400 gr protected points.

My two favorites are the 325 FTX and the Hornady 350 round nose. A lot of shooters on 458socom.com like the Barnes bullet but I haven't tried it yet. Mostly because I can't imagine it would do more within the velocity envelope of the SOCOM than cup and core bullets are doing now. I suppose if I lived in bear country or went for something over 200 pounds I'd be more inclined to look at the Barnes and North Forks but for local deer and hogs they don't bring anything otherwise missing to the party.

I had feeding problems at first with the 300 gr Remington hollow point but that was my ramp. I haven't tried again since I fixed that.

The FTX feeds flawlessly and is designed for 45-70 velocities, so the SOCOM is a good analog.

I started shooting 500 gr Hornadys in mine thinking I was going to suppress the rifle but in retrospect you don't gain anything. A non-expanding 45 caliber 500 grain bullet at 1050 fps doesn't work any better (maybe worse) than an expanding 350 grain bullet at 1700 fps. You get a bit more recoil but not much. I decided to live with the sonic boom and shoot the lighter bullets fast.

PC and tiggertate.
What powder and load are you guys susing for your 500gr Hornadys?

Also tiggertate, have you recovered either of the Hornadays from any shots on game.

If not which do you feel is expanding the most, and which one of them is penetrating the deepest?

So far my rifle has fed even the Speer 400gr FN.

First, I think a 458SOCOM set up right will feed almost anything. Mine had a bad ramp.

I haven't shot anything with the 500s so I can't comment on performance. I've assumed it would act like a solid at subsonic velocities and I had no interest in it at 1300-1400 fps because I could get a much better trajectory from the 300-350 grain bullets closer to 1800 fps. The animals that have fallen were complete pass throughs so I can't help there either (much to my regret; I'd like to see them too). Nothing over 150 lbs so far, but everything (being coyotes and hogs) DRT.

I used Rel-7 for everything at first with good results, lately I switched to Lil Gun. Also with good results. I tried 296 but never found the sweet spot in my rifle. People use 4198 for the heavies but I've never tried it. I used Trail Boss most recently for subsonic loads to tune the integral suppressor being built on my bolt gun.

Thanks for the info.

I guess the way I think of mine is that it will do anything the 45-70 will do seven times in a row, as fast as you can aim and pull the trigger .

quote:

Originally posted by tiggertate:
I guess the way I think of mine is that it will anything the 45-70 will do seven times in a row, as fast as you can aim and pull the trigger .

I agree. I cannot wait to do some pig and deer hunting with mine.

Didn't see this thread till just now so I copied my post from another thread...


**I have a RRA .458 SOCOM upper that I've been working with at the 50yd line. My best group to date has been with Barnes 300gr TSX FN seated to 2.195. With my gear (mostly milsurp magazines), that's enough room to clear the magazine all the way down and they chamber fine.

Running them with WWLP over 35gr of IMR 4227, I get one ragged hole at 50yd. I don't have electronic pressure testing equipment but I get no indicators of excess pressure on the brass. I have not shot them over a chrony yet but some load data suggests slightly over 1800fps at 35.1gr/IMR4227.

I've been working with bullet weights 300-350gr, both jacketed and hard cast. I'm getting much better groups on the lower end of bullet weight and, quickly looking at my data, my better groups are the ones with the longer C.O.L. pretty much across the board.

I have ground a slight bevel on the inside edge of the front of my dedicated SOCOM mags and that helps with feeding the shorter C.O.L. loads that tend to get hung up in my gear. I love working with the SOCOM!

Anyone have the bullet length for the 300gr ESP Raptor? I'm curious how it compares to the Barnes blue tip and the regular TSX.