So I have the 416 Rigby and a 404 Rimless. Both are old enough. So my question is what is out there in 458 that was designed for the boltgun about the same time. The Win mag was newer. With the Lott Dakota Rigby and Weatherby newer yet I think the Wby the second oldest. Is there a 1900 to 1920 458 diameter bolt cartrige? I know of lots of rimmed but that doesn't work.
Thanks

No there is no vintage 450NE equivelent rimless cartridge. It is a curious hole in the Brit cartridges. Maybe they were so pleased with their 450NE, doubles and singles, that they never gor around to developing a bolt version.

JPK

So is the Win mag the oldest for a bolt?

noooooooooooo! Check the Remington-Keene, and the Winchester-Hotchkiss, and even the original 1879(?)Lee that Sharps rejected. Those three are all pre-1880 IIRC.

Rich
Buff Killer

So I don't have to buy a bolt 45/70 after all...

The 11.2 x 72 Schueler is pretty close, but with a ~.440 bullet instead of the .458

Think it was introduced some time after WW1, before WW2


Cheers
Tinker

At some point the brittish had a ban of sorts against .45 hunting rifles. Which is why we have the 470NE. I would assume that was a factor. I think with the 416 loaded with 400 gr and 505 loaded with 525 gr that pretty well covered the need after 1911.

11.35x62mm MMG
Close enough for a cigar?
You know how these things get muddled by some cartridge collector applying his calipers to a single specimen cartridge.
This one is said to be .459" bullet diameter.
Maybe it was truly .458" groove diameter for barrel?

This is a really neat short .458 Magnum, certainly way more powerful than the .458 WinMag
and about 30 years senior to the .458 WinMag.

The case is awfully close to .505 Gibbs shortened to 2.425" and necked down to .458.
The max spec for the .505 Gibbs may be .635" for head and rim,
but back in the 1920's, -.008" might have been within manufacturing tolerance for the brass.
Probably still is ... at Bertram.

The specs shown here may be the best that Fred could do with a single specimen cartridge and his calipers:



Above scan is an excerpt from page 69 of Fred A. Datig's
Cartridges for Collectors, Vol.II.

The 450 Watts Long predated the factory round by a long time ..

I have the 458 lott. I can load it down or at max volosity.I can also shoot the 458 Win. at 2108 fps.

According to Cal Pappas' book, as told to him by James Watts, James Watts got the idea to blow out the .375 H&H to ".450 Watts" in the spring of 1947.

But he also says he had written to Winchester, "just after the war" asking them to do it, (possibly as early as 1945?), and got a rejection stating: " They wrote back and said the British had the market on big guns and there was no market for anything bigger than a .375. For American hunting, this was true. But American hunters were about to discover Africa."

Anyway, Mr. Watts conferred with Harvey Anderson, gunsmith of Yakima, Washington, with Jack O'Connor and P. O. Ackley over the next two years, and Mr. Anderson turned out the first 450 Watts in 1949, on an FN Mauser action. So it is written.

Mr. Watts came up with the 450x2", 450x2-1/4", 450 Watts Short (2.5") and 450 Watts (2.85"), and winchester never was interested in any of them, supposedly, until they brought out the .458 WinMag in 1956.

Sounds like Winchester was in on it from the beginning, and let James Watts do the development gratis.

Seven years from first 450 Watts to 458 WinMag.

Now back to the search for an earlier rimless .458 ...

The classic large caliber magazine rifle cartridges are:

.425 Westley Richards introduced appx 1909
.404 Jeffery introduced appx 1910
.416 Rigby introduced appx 1911
.505 Gibbs introduced appx 1913
.500 Schuler/Jeffery intoduced appx 1920

The .458 (.450 British designation) had been outlawed in India and Sudan by the British Empire after introduction of the .450-3 1/4" (.450 Rigby double rifle) and before big bore magazine rifles due to uprisings. This is the reason there are no .458 classic magazine rifles. The .450-3 1/4" took the hunting world by storm.

Take a look at the .425 Westley Richards. It is a very nice cartridge.

IIRC, the 404 Jeffery was first in 1905.
It is the grandpa of all bolt action DGRs.
It was also the best of all.
Nobody ever improved on that, but they have had a lot of fun trying.

The British muckup over 450 caliber must truly be why this hole exists.

The 404/450 Jeffery Rimless Nitro Express would have been sweet. It had to wait over half a century for G&A to do the wildcat 450 G&A.

What about the 450 CERTUS ... I have seen several refrences to it ,and have seen at least 1 for sale in Gun List ,.. It was 15 years ago or so , but it was in a bolt action , it is supposedly a 3 1/4" case .....????