quote:

Originally posted by RIP:

quote:

Originally posted by Mike McGuire:
The 458 is all very practical. Like 7mm/08 and 308 the sort of calibre you get when entering the nursing home

Mike,

That is a very important consideration.
At the NRA Retirement Home for Incurable Riflecranks (NRARHIR) they have a rifle range for residents to use.
When shooting offhand, standing, with a 4-point walker and a pair of crutches for shooting sticks,
it is considered bad form to fall over backwards and break a hip or crack your noggin.
Likewise, when shooting from the sitting position in a wheelchair, a tip-over is bad form.
They won't let you unlock the wheelchair wheels before the shot.
Rolling backwards under impulse power is not allowed.
Too many nurses and orderlies have been run over.
Worker's Comp would shut down the NRARHIR if that was allowed.

Rip ...

Ron,

So 460s, 500 A2 etc. without a muzzle brake are not allowed.

As a side note were you on AR before it went the Bulletin Board format in 2000. Mitch Carter was and that is where I first met him.

Mike,

I was lurking, reading the old format BB in 1999, not posting, just researching cape buffalo hunting.
I may have had a couple of other handles here, starting about 2000, changed with wipeouts, "daggaron" and "RAB ..." something or other come to mind.
RIP forever after that.
Use of muzzle brakes is discouraged at NRARHIR.
The residents there are mostly deaf, but the nurses and orderlies still have some hearing to hang on to.

Rip ...

Harvey Anderson of Yakima, WA was James Watts' gunsmith.
In 1949 he used a "homemade reamer" to chamber a .458 barrel made by P.O. Ackley, installed on an FN Mauser that Harvey had opened up to H&H length.

They claimed some wild stuff for that .450 Watts Magnum.
500-grain Barnes RNSP at 2563 fps MV and pressure about 50,000 PSI were claimed.

An H&H-style "coned-up" throat would be a likely way to go if doing a homemade chamber reamer.
Maybe a separate throating reamer was used, possibly even made by a professional reamer maker?

Apparently we will never know.

Winchester finally decided to turn the .450 Watts Short into the .458 WIN in 1955.

Why not do the full-length .450 Watts Magnum of 1949?

Winchester had only the .30-06-length Pre-'64 M70,
which they had been opening up at the factory for the .375 H&H, since 1936 prototype, 20 years before the .458 WIN started being shipped to John Q.

The .458 WIN was the most powerful American factory rifle chambering, at the time it came out, so it was claimed in the 1950's.

Maybe Winchester feared such power in their opened-up action, so they left it .30-06-length for the African .458 WIN.
Maybe it was done just because it was uncharted territory for a factory rifle in America,
The .458/500-grainer at 2563 fps MV that Watts claimed
was may more than needed for the purposes of the .458 WIN.

Rip ...

quote:

Originally posted by RIP:
Mike,

I was lurking, reading the old format BB in 1999, not posting, just researching cape buffalo hunting.
I may have had a couple of other handles here, starting about 2000, changed with wipeouts, "daggaron" and "RAB ..." something or other come to mind.
RIP forever after that.
Use of muzzle brakes is discouraged at NRARHIR.
The residents there are mostly deaf, but the nurses and orderlies still have some hearing to hang on to.

Rip ...

I was there in August 1998 and have continues to today with of course some forced interruptions . I remember the exact date because that was when I got on the internet and I think it was via AOL and the old "dial up"

You just entered your name and email. I think it held 500 posts and then one would drop off from the bottom as a new one was entered.

In those early days AR was already a Big Bores thing.

Mike,

August 1998, and first time you surfed the net you ended up at ar.com?
That is funny.
It was about July 1999 when I first started off with hotmail and searching the net for cape buffalo hunting info.
I found the picture of the broken-tipped 49-inch buffalo posed with Saeed, and followed it to ar.com.
We can both blame Saeed for luring us into this!

BTW, I started listening to Rush Limbaugh in August 1988 while I was living in Tallahassee, FL,
where the local news paper was the Tallahassee Democrat.
I was puttering around in the garage with glass bedding a Brown Precision stock when he made his national debut on talk radio.
I am a Rush Baby.
When I went to Botswana through Johannesburg in 2001, the newspapers in South Africa decried Rush Limbaugh as the archetypal "angry white male."
No. He was just correct 99.6% of the time.
Just not politically correct.
The 0.4% of the time when he gets it wrong is when he tries to get into science and technology.
Sort of like a .458 Lott lover talking about the .458 WIN. Everybody has their areas of ignorance.

Rip ...

Switching from the brush-on blue, liquid, release agent that comes in the ACRAGLAS kit to a skin-tighter release agent:



Also thought I might just paint the sides of the Bizzarro Lug with liquid epoxy dyed black, or mixed with stainless steel powder.
Much easier and stronger than trying to polish it.

Rip ...

CTF,

Thanks for the idea, of using this on 350-grain, 450-grain, and 500-grain TSX bullets:



I have stopped blowing this off.
Never did like moly.

Rip ...

Ron,

Somehow you need to be honoured as not only AR's camera/posting man but the whole gun world.

We appreciate what you do, especially old gun articles, more than you will ever realise.

Mike,

Doing good has no end and is its own reward.
Shining the enlightenment and watching the cockroaches of ignorance scurry away is truly satisfying.

Rip ...

Ron,

I had a huge collection of books on my 3 favourite subjects, guns, space program and rockets and reptile. They were all stored in the garage. However, a friend of my mother's had a son or maybe it was a grandson who was interested in that sort of stuff so I gave him all the books.

These days I regret that very much, one reason I love it when you post up the old articles.

Mike,

Guns, Space Program, and Baseball for me!
Ted "Thumper" Williams is my hero.

I found a 1967 Herter's catalog a few days ago, at Biff's on Dixie Highway. Biff is Old Man Sumner from the defunct "Guntucky" TV show.
His sons operate Knob Creek, where they do the "world infamous" Machinegun Shoot twice yearly, at IRS tax time and Halloween time, spring and fall.
Perfect match of "holidays" for shooting machinegun salutes.
Anyway most of the stuff at Biff's is his old stuff. He let the Herter's catalog go for $5.00.

We have 358 pages to go, so some more old stuff will surely show up here, interspersed with the new stuff about the hottest new wildcat around,
the .458 WIN LongCOL.

Rip ...

Bob is interested in the 450-grain TSX in his .458 WIN.
Perfect bullet for Bobbarrella and hBN, next for me too.



The 500-grain TSX is seated on its fifth (last) cannelure for 3.780" COL.
The 450-grain TSX is seated on its fourth (last) cannelure for 3.680" COL.
The ogive ahead of the cannelures is identical on both those bullets.
Amazing how that works out, like Barnes planned it that way.

Rip ...

From Barnes No.4 of 2008:

The starting loads for the 450-grain TSX in the .458 WIN LongCOL are derived from the .458 Lott loads found in the Barnes No.3 manual (2001):

Of course, the .458 WIN LongCOL when loaded to same, higher pressure as the .458 Lott MAP,
and loaded longer than 3.600" COL,
with 450 to 600-grainers, will outdo the .458 Lott.

The above data is very close to what I have been getting from my 25" or shorter-barreled (by 1/8") .458 WIN LongCOL loads.
Note that the Barnes No.3 .458 Lott loads were tested in a 26" barrel.
The date for Barnes No.3 was 2001.
Same data as in Barnes No.2 of 1997, for the .458 Lott, same 26" barrel.
The SAAMI homologation for the .458 Lott was established in 1995, though A-Square was loading commercial ammo for it by 1989, IIRC.
I assume the Barnes No.3/Barnes No.2 .458 Lott was SAAMI and handicapped by short throat.
Hence the 26" barrel on the SAAMI .458 Lott with 3.600" COL limit,
so that it did not look so bad against the 24"-barreled SAAMI .458 WIN with 3.340" COL limit.

Rip ...

I thought a 400-grainer at +2500 fps (+5551 ft-lbs) was cool.
Ditto a 350-grainer at +2700 fps (+5665 ft-lbs).
So, a 450-grainer at +2400 fps (+5755 ft-lbs) is bound to be cool.
That the 500-grainer at +2300 fps (+5873 ft-lbs) is cool from a .458 WIN LongCOL goes without saying.

.458 WIN LongCOL rifle Bobbarrella will prove this, and not at proof load pressure, just .458 Lott Service MAP, or less.
That's my SWAG and I am sticking to it.

Rip ...

Then, to relieve the boredom of the jaded shooter,
try long range supersonic loads on 1000-yard targets with sporter-weight rifle:



That Lehigh Subsonic Controlled Fracture .458/465-grain bullet launched at +Mach 2, will be well stabilized in a 1:14" twist.
It would be a great magazine filler for Bobbarella the Sixshooter at COL of 3.800" or less.

Rip ...

This .458/520-grainer can be fired as slow as 2000 fps MV for accuracy in a 1:14" twist:



Maybe faster would be better.
Or would it?
It is designed for subsonic use with BC = 0.883 at 1,050 fps MV, in a 1:10" twist.

This Lehigh Match/Target bullet weighs 528 grains,
is only 2.200" long, and has BC of 0.828 at 2600 to 3000 fps.



It is designed for MV greater than 2800 fps in a 1:15" twist, in a .460 Steyr.
If it could be gotten up to 2300 fps in my 1:14" twist it might fly well, single-shot loaded in Bobbarrella.
However, I do have a 1:12" .458/.338 Lapua Magnum aka the .450 Thumper, which would surely do for relieving "big boredom" caused by the .458 Lott.

Rip ...

Yesterday was a sunny but freezing day at the range.

I'd loaded some 350 TSX's with 80 grs H4198, WLRM primers at 3.45" COL. Corrected to muzzle of my 24" #1 Ruger, avg MV = 2707 fps/5694 ft-lbs.

Also fired one (1) 450-X loaded as per #3 Barnes for the Lott: 80 grs H335, corrected to MV = 2345 fps. Barnes shows 2373 fps from a 26" at 3.6" COL.

WLRM primer and Win brass (used) for my load at 3.76" COL. I had another loaded at 83 grs but didn't shoot it (yet).

For anyone interested, my Winchester brass trimmed to 2.496", and full-length sized, holds 91.6 grs H2O. Remington, one grain less, and 1-grain heavier.

I also fired some 400s over 84 grs H335 at 2401 fps for the Hawk and slightly less for the Barnes Original SP.

No load showed any signs of excess pressure.

Bob

www.bigbores.ca

quote:

Originally posted by .458 Only:
Yesterday was a sunny but freezing day at the range.

Good to see this. Great data.
Do you have a heater for your chronograph?
I avoid sub 40*F whenever I can, but very glad to see your experimental results are repeatable in many conditions.

I'd loaded some 350 TSX's with 80 grs H4198, WLRM primers at 3.45" COL. Corrected to muzzle of my 24" #1 Ruger, avg MV = 2707 fps/5694 ft-lbs.

Verified! Again! Real science!

Also fired one (1) 450-X loaded as per #3 Barnes for the Lott: 80 grs H335, corrected to MV = 2345 fps. Barnes shows 2373 fps from a 26" at 3.6" COL.

So, your load in a 26" barrel would be near identical to the manual velocity.
This shows again how good Barnes No.3 is, for use of the .458 Lott data as starting loads for the .458 WIN LongCOL.

WLRM primer and Win brass (used) for my load at 3.76" COL.

That is longer COL than the 3.680" crimped length I have chosen for the 450-grain TSX. So you were seating it without a crimp over the H335?

I believe that MV can be beat with mildly compressed AA-2230 and a crimp at 3.680".

I had another loaded at 83 grs but didn't shoot it (yet).

Should be good.
H335 and AA-2230 are very close to same burn rate and charge weights used.
I have used 83.0 grains of AA-2230 with the 500-grain TSX and got 2342 fps MV (2332 fps 5-yard) at 46*F, 24-7/8" CZ barrel.
That was with Hornady brass case trimmed to 2.495", GM215M/F215 primer, and COL 3.780".
I will have no problem substituting the 450-grain TSX at 3.680" COL.
Hope to get over 2400 fps MV with the lighter 450-grainer.

For anyone interested, my Winchester brass trimmed to 2.496", and full-length sized, holds 91.6 grs H2O. Remington, one grain less, and 1-grain heavier.

Sounds right.
I have found Hornady and WW cases to be about identical in weight and case capacity.
I measured them once-fire-formed and got 93.4 grains of H20 gross, before resizing.
Some old RP brass I measured decades ago was smaller internally and slightly heavier than WW.

I also fired some 400s over 84 grs H335 at 2401 fps for the Hawk and slightly less for the Barnes Original SP.

No load showed any signs of excess pressure.

Bob

www.bigbores.ca

Of course there were no signs of excess pressure,
much to the dismay of the NAYSAYERS!

The .458 WIN has a generous chamber length of 0.020" longer than 2.500" maximum brass length.
The .458 WIN LongCOL wildcat maximum brass length might be allowed to go to 2.510" maximum, trim to 2.500" minimum.

Rip ...

For the voluntarily SAAMI compliant .458 Winchester Magnum (3.340" maximum short COL) shooters:

Unfortunately, no 450-grain TSX loads are listed in the table below.
With TSX bullets, 450 grains is where it starts getting better than the SAAMI .458 Lott, with the .458 WIN LongCOL wildcat aka ".458 WLC."

Varmint and moose loads below, for the .458 Winchester Magnum, are nothing to sneeze at however, considering 22" barrel and 3.330" COL limit.

"All three types of test bullets grouped very well, especially the 350 TSX and 300 TTSX out to 400 yards from a 9-pound .458 Winchester Magnum (and the prodigious .469-inch funnel-shaped throat) with a 2.5x scope."



Rip ...

About the higher BC's of the older bullets in Barnes No.3 vs. lower BC's of the newer TSX bullets of same weight in Barnes No.4:

This was explained by Mike Fairbanks as due to the switch from the TANGENT ogive of the older X-Cannelured Barnes bullets,
to the SECANT ogive style of the TSX and TTSX bullets.

"This creates a very slight shoulder at the junction of the shank and nose radius, and while it robs a little bit of aerodynamic efficiency,
it was done in the interest of improving accuracy. If my rifle is any indication, that goal was certainly met."

Rip ...

General Hatcher lived from 1888 to 1963.
One memorable accomplishment of his was the "Hatcher Hole" gas vent of the M1903 Springfield:

Hatcher was later instrumental in developing a solution to the vexing problem of brittle metal in early M1903 receivers built by Springfield and Rock Island Arsenals. His solution to the "grenading" of receivers when shell cases failed catastrophically was to drill a gas vent hole in the left side of the receiver adjacent to the breech. This hole would allow gases escaping from a ruptured case to be exhausted safely and away from the face of the shooter. Dubbed the "Hatcher Hole", the modification was typically added to receivers at overhaul.

The 1957 GUN DIGEST might have been the last one for his annual gun review.
Excerpt below is for book review purposes.
Book review: Excellent. 1957 was a very good year. Back then, Marlin bolt actions were FN Mausers.



...

...




...

Hatcher conveniently neglects the 378 Weatherby Magnum of circa 1953 in foot-pound comparisons,
also the .375 WbyMag circa 1945. Ol'Roy was cutting edge.
Oh, those were just boutique proprietary cartridges back then,
and of course Hatcher could not cover every wildcat like the Watts and Ackley and Barnes Supreme, and Buhmiller wildcats.
Snubbed like that, Ol'Roy just had to boutique a .458/378 WbyMag, after John R. Buhmiller beat him to it.

IIRC, the .458 WIN African was originally 4 + 1 like the Pre-'64 M70 .375 H&H.
But feeding issues caused it to be changed to 3 + 1.
Hatcher evaluated the AFRICAN M70 prototype in November 1955, and found some feeding issues, as reported in HATCHER'S NOTEBOOK, 2nd Ed. of 1957.
Maybe the fix was still in the works when Hatcher wrote the above in 1956, for the 1957 GUN DIGEST.

Rip ...

The 1958 GUN DIGEST was the first time the .458 WIN showed up in the catalog section.
That would make it a 1956-1957 specimen for the picture.
All the fixes for the bugs were not in yet.
They would soon start putting 2 visible crossbolts through the stock. I see only one in the poor quality picture above.
The rifle still screams DGR.
Even Weatherby used the WISNER copy of the AFRICAN rear sight on their Mk V DGR early in this century:




But, alas, no more:



However, I am sure Mike could still use one of those for .458 WIN LongCOL. Nice, long magazine box could be had for 3.8" COL with Lehigh bullets.
Don't forget the long bipod on the forend.

Rip ...

The Bizzarro lug is still Bizzarro. Right side:

Left side:

Back side, smeared with J-B Weld over the sides and behind, after getting the front face perfectly bedded:



Anybody want to see the front face?
OK.
Here is the complex shape of the CZ 550 Magnun receiver ring rear face, mirrored in J-B Weld:

It is amazing that the ring spacing for the Nikon SlugHunter/Inline is almost too close for the Leupold 2.5x:

The 2-piece Reverse-Seyfried-Schtick would allow use of 3 rings to mount the unsung hero scope, the Sightron 4-16x40mmAO pictured below.
It survived a .500 A-Square, from a sitting position off a long bipod, and now resides on a .510/.338 Lapua Magnum Weatherby Mark V "Non-DGR":



The full Picatinny with integral recoil stop would accept all 4 rings of a cross-slot circus on Bobbarrella.

But now that I see a way to mount any scope I want on Bobbarrella the .458 WIN, when needed, I am satisfied.
I will be using the OEM CZ 2-ring circus with long-tubed scopes first on Bobbarrella.
350-,450-, and 500-grain TSX load testing in the .458 WLC: +2700, +2400, and +2300 fps respectively is the plan.
Maybe even the hero Sightron will be mounted with 2 CZ rings when I get around to the Lehigh bullets.
Those high-BC bullets are also known as Le High bee see booleets.
That is a little French lingo.

Rip ...

quote:

Originally posted by RIP:

quote:

Originally posted by .458 Only:
Yesterday was a sunny but freezing day at the range.

Good to see this. Great data.
Do you have a heater for your chronograph?
I avoid sub 40*F whenever I can, but very glad to see your experimental results are repeatable in many conditions.

I'd loaded some 350 TSX's with 80 grs H4198, WLRM primers at 3.45" COL. Corrected to muzzle of my 24" #1 Ruger, avg MV = 2707 fps/5694 ft-lbs.

Verified! Again! Real science!

Also fired one (1) 450-X loaded as per #3 Barnes for the Lott: 80 grs H335, corrected to MV = 2345 fps. Barnes shows 2373 fps from a 26" at 3.6" COL.

So, your load in a 26" barrel would be near identical to the manual velocity.
This shows again how good Barnes No.3 is, for use of the .458 Lott data as starting loads for the .458 WIN LongCOL.

WLRM primer and Win brass (used) for my load at 3.76" COL.

That is longer COL than the 3.680" crimped length I have chosen for the 450-grain TSX. So you were seating it without a crimp over the H335?

I believe that MV can be beat with mildly compressed AA-2230 and a crimp at 3.680".

I had another loaded at 83 grs but didn't shoot it (yet).

Should be good.
H335 and AA-2230 are very close to same burn rate and charge weights used.
I have used 83.0 grains of AA-2230 with the 500-grain TSX and got 2342 fps MV (2332 fps 5-yard) at 46*F, 24-7/8" CZ barrel.
That was with Hornady brass case trimmed to 2.495", GM215M/F215 primer, and COL 3.780".
I will have no problem substituting the 450-grain TSX at 3.680" COL.
Hope to get over 2400 fps MV with the lighter 450-grainer.

For anyone interested, my Winchester brass trimmed to 2.496", and full-length sized, holds 91.6 grs H2O. Remington, one grain less, and 1-grain heavier.

Sounds right.
I have found Hornady and WW cases to be about identical in weight and case capacity.
I measured them once-fire-formed and got 93.4 grains of H20 gross, before resizing.
Some old RP brass I measured decades ago was smaller internally and slightly heavier than WW.

I also fired some 400s over 84 grs H335 at 2401 fps for the Hawk and slightly less for the Barnes Original SP.

No load showed any signs of excess pressure.

Bob

www.bigbores.ca

Of course there were no signs of excess pressure,
much to the dismay of the NAYSAYERS!

The .458 WIN has a generous chamber length of 0.020" longer than 2.500" maximum brass length.
The .458 WIN LongCOL wildcat maximum brass length might be allowed to go to 2.510" maximum, trim to 2.500" minimum.

Rip ...

There was a small window of agreeable weather (though very cold -- below freezing), so I took it, which meant not a lot of shooting.

The 350 TSX's gave good results considering the temps and from a 24" ported barrel. My CZ, of course, had a 25".

The 450-X was the original without any place to crimp, so I seated them .256" and ran them into my Lee crimp die -- it makes a slight "ring" around the shank. In any case, I never had a problem with this procedure in using them this way in the CZ. When I get some 450-TSX's, I'll crimp into the bottom cannelure.

These 450-X Bullets predate the 450 FXB with a moly coat and a single groove. I figured the results ought to be similar. Compared to the results in Barnes #4 for the Lott, they used 81 grs (max) of H335 for an MV of 2349 fps at 3.6" COL from a 24" Wiseman barrel. So 80 grs producing 2345 fps at 3.76" COL isn't bad at all. I think 83 grs should give around 2430 fps/5900 ft-lbs. Hope to give that a try this Spring.

No, I don't have a heater for my Crony. But I was quite certain that the results were within expectations.

Bob

www.bigbores.ca