a local gunshop has a witchita bolt handgun in 458 win mag. ported, stainless, leupold scope. asking around $950.00 I am considering picking it up. I have owned a 458 and loved it. was wondering if anyone has shot something like this. recoil must be brutal. is it worth buying for actually shooting? will it cause some type of medical emergency? I currently shoot a ruger SRH in 454 casull. that is ok.

When you owned your 458 did you ever imagine taking that recoil with only your hands and not your shoulder?

What do these handguns weigh? 20lbs?

No, recoil will not be brutal, it will be impossible. Unless you load it down with 350gn bullets or something in which case why not just buy a 45-70 instead.

They call it a 458 Win mag but it should have '458 Win Greatly Underloaded'stamped on it.

I'm honestly looking forward to hearing if anyone does fire these things myself.
Good luck doc.

Karl.

The recoil shouldn't be that much worse than your Ruger. True, in a rifle the .458 generates far more recoil than the Casull. However, factory ammo is designed for all the powder to burn in about a 24 inch tube. That means that in a pistol, not nearly all the powder will be burned. That should lower the recoil significantly from that generated in a rifle. I may just be crazy, but I would love to have a .458 pistol.

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"Those who would give up essential liberty,
to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve
neither liberty nor safety."
Benjamin Franklin

Recoil is much easier to deal with in your hands than against your shoulder! My arms have at least 12 inches of travel but my shoulder does not. I have shot many large handguns and love it. I've had both a 45-70 and a 12 gauge pistol. Three inch mags in a handgun was a handful but very controllable. The same shells in a shotgun would leave me bruised. I have seen one guy on this site who has a .416 Rigby handgun. I hope he will respond to your post.

I say go for it! The fire ball from the ported barrel will make you forget all about the recoil!

" recoil is much easier to deal with from the hands!".

When we are talking about baby recoil maybe.

I fired my 460 weatherby from the hands as a stunt and nearly broke my hand.The rifle went backwards taking skin off my hand with it.

I don't think you will find many people on this bigbore forum going out of their way to give their 458's etc. 'a good 12 inches of travel'as you said.

I would like to hear what velocities these handcannons acheive though.
1750-1800fps? What is the barrel length Doc?
A 500 grain bullet at that pace will still have a fair kick.
I might look at importing one myself

Karl.

[This message has been edited by Karl (edited 04-27-2001).]

Doc, I find the opposite to be true, I can handle much more recoil from a rifle than from a hard kicking handgun. You can always wear a Past Pad on your shoulder to help with the recoil of a hard kicking rifle, but even the past gloves do little to help tame the recoil of a hard kicking handgun. I shot my friends Contender chambered for the 45-70, the load pushed a 400 gr. bullet at 1750 fps. from a 14 inch barrel. The recoil was tremendous, I felt the recoil clear back to my elbow.

Ok guys I should have said, recoil is much easier for ME to handle with my arms. Everyone is different. The 12 ga 3" mags I used in my Serbu pistol threw 820 grains of lead at 1000 fps with 36 gr of HS-7 powder from the 6.5" barrel. My 45-70 was the same as the one Mitch mentioned. Now I shoot a Magnum Research .308, I think it kicks more than the others.

I know I use at least 12 inches of travel to stop a hard kicking handgun. My normal two handed grip puts the rear site about 20 inches from my eye. Under full recoil it gets mighty close to whacking me. There is not much I can do about it except to hang on. I have never been hit though...yet.

Check out the Maadi-Griffin .50 BMG handgun. Their web site says it's recoil is "manageable". One source I found said it will generate about 7750 ft lb of muzzle energy from it's 12" barrel.
http://www.prairienet.org/guns/big/mg.htm

Ya just got to love those big bores.

These stunt handguns are silly. Great caution and effort could pull it off, but relax a bit and a wrist or carpal bone may may be broken. A navicular/scaphoid non-union fracture could end your shooting fun and bring a lifetime of arthritic pain.

I know of a guy who relaxed too much and broke his wrist firing a pistol-grip shotgun with one hand...wicked radius and ulna angulated fracture, no bone poked through the skin though.

I know of another guy that got too relaxed with his .454 Casull and buried the spur of the hammer in the middle of his forehead...skull fracture and trip to the CT scanner and neurosurgeon.

What fun! Such pipsqueak things as a .454 and 12 guage can wreak havoc on the wreckless. A .458 handgun or .600 (gasp) would be tempting fate too much.

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Good huntin' and shootin',
Bwanawannabe, Daktari Ron

Dr. John:
I have a 458X2" T/C handgun. I normally shoot cast bullets from it,however I load the
350gr. jacketed bullets to over 2100fs. The recoil is severe, but managable. It is fun to shoot and has serious power. I don't think the 458WM would be much different. I would suggest taking a few shots with it before I bought it though. Mark

Well, John is a doctor, so if he gets into a bind, he can set the fracture, and if he messes up his eye, he can call Dr. Berry
If you like it, go for it. You might want to keep it downloaded a bit. I know you could get a 45-70, but you seem to like this piece, so get it!!

Daktari Ron said a mouthful. I've been living with a wrist that healed -after a year- for the last 20yrs.My father broke his in 1929 and it never healed. X-rays of his wrist bear no resemblance to a human wrist. I saw a bunch of them in my motorcycle racing days. I've also seen friends do the "hammer spur smile". John Taffin wrote a piece about this kind of thing after his orthopod asked him what he was doing to wreck his wrists. It's not worth the aggrivation after the novelty wears off.

Dr. John: I'd buy the damn thing just to have it! It sure sounds like an intresting piece. If you handload it down with 300 or 350 gr. bullets at first, you can then work your way up slowly, until you reach your own personal limit of recoil. I listned to all the horror stories when I bought my .460 Weatherby Magnum Mark V, and the rifle IS managable. Grant you it's no .22-250, but it's not the brute that everyone makes it out to be. Especially with the Accubrake. Sure it's loud, but what do people expect when you touch off 125 Gr. of powder? I say if you like it, and you want it, go for it! Bill T.