quote:

Originally posted by Rhodes:
Curious as to the naming of this cartridge if anyone can shed some light. Is the "404" meant to refer to the bore size and whoever chambered this thing just grabbed the nearest available barrel which was .405 bore?

Rhodes,
This is like why call the 404 Jeffery a "404" even though the bore diameter is about .415" and grooves .423"?
That is the usual now, and they were not far off previously, at time of origin.

Past discussions have suggested because it was a +40-cal 4-shooter, 3 in the mag and one in the chamber on a standard Mauser: "40-4"
Or it was a +40-cal conceived first in 1904 ('04) then debutted in 1905 for sale: "40'4"
Certainly not close to either the bore or groove diameter of the barrel, or caliber of the bullet.

The 404 Express F. N. Barnes, is much closer to reality, by naming, if the barrel bore is .404 bore but it was lapped smooth to a .405 bore,
and shoots a .411-caliber bullet.

It is also a +40-cal-4-shooter, in a standard M98/FN Mauser: 40-4

Wildcat names do not have to be strictly rational.

I don't care why they named it 404, it's mine, and I like it!

404 EXP FNB all the way!

cheers RIP. When I first openned the thread I thought it was going to be a .423 cal chambering but further in it became obvious that it was no relation. Who knows what goes through a wildcatters mind when they develop a new cartridge hey.

Karl, yes, I always did like the classic mauser features, glad you're sticking with them. I think I would be happy with 400gr @ 2250fps in such a light, handy rifle rather than chase 2400 but it's your baby. Thanks for sharing.

quote:

Originally posted by Rhodes:
cheers RIP. When I first openned the thread I thought it was going to be a .423 cal chambering but further in it became obvious that it was no relation. Who knows what goes through a wildcatters mind when they develop a new cartridge hey.

Karl, yes, I always did like the classic mauser features, glad you're sticking with them. I think I would be happy with 400gr @ 2250fps in such a light, handy rifle rather than chase 2400 but it's your baby. Thanks for sharing.

We'll see if I can endure the punishment of a 400g bullet at 2250, before I go searching for that mystical 2400 fps benchmark!

Alrighty - ordered 50 Hornady Belted Mag Basic and 100 400g Woodleigh .411 bullets from Huntington and a copy of QuickLoad from NECO!

quote:

Originally posted by Quick Karl:
Now, how to calculate the height of the front sight (someone needs to work this in to Sierra ballistic software)!

If I use a 400g @ 2250 it will drop 4.14" @ 100Y.

Using a 16" sight radius, If I mount a .550 - .610 high rear sight (barrel diameter .835), and I want to use NECG Universal screw on front sight and a patridge style front sight blade (barrel diameter .707), What the heck height sight blade do I order???

A 4" elevation change at 100 yards with a 16" sight radius requires 0.0178" of front sight height correction.

Or, same as, 0.00445" of front sight correction for each inch of elevation change at 100 yards with 16" sight radius.

Your info above for calculating a front sight patridge height does not include the height of the chosen NECG Universal screw-on ramp.
My Brownells catalog shows four heights available:
.385"
.455"
.525"
.595"

I would say use the lowest front ramp height (0.385") and get a patridge blade height of 0.374" to go on top of that.

center of bore to top of rear sight:
= (.835/2) + .610 = 1.0275"

center of bore to top of front sight:
= (.707/2) + .385 + .374 = 1.1125"

That is close enough to file the patridge down to zero.

It is impossible to say for sure what front sight insert height you are going to need until you shoot it and see where it is hitting.

The muzzle will rise in recoil while the bullet is traveling down the barrel, so the barrel needs to be pointing below the centerline of sight.
That means you need a little taller front sight than a perfectly calculated one that matches the front and rear distances from center of bore.

After you make a stab at it like I did above, you must shoot it,
and then it is easy to say what change in height of the front sight you need by calculation.

Verifying what front sight ramp heights (Universal screw-on):
.385"
.455"
.525"
.595"
and this link says there are five heights but lists only those 4 ... ???
http://www.newenglandcustomgun...%20Ramp#.Uui7A_ko7rc

and what patridge heights for that sight are available from NECG:
High: .355"
Med.: .350"
Low: .345"
http://www.newenglandcustomgun...Inserts#.Uui5y_ko7rc

You know, I actually deleted that post because I thought maybe I had published it in the wrong place!

Nevertheless, my crude calculations came up with a .385 h Universal Screw On front ramp, with a .197 h blade (should get me on paper?)

I found the ramp height on NECG and the insert heights at Brownell's, and, I based my rear sight height dimension on the NECG Classic Adjustable 2 Screw Rear Sight - but I really want a quarter rib...

If I understand the information from NECG and Brownell's correctly, the front and rear sight each have .060 of adjustment available added to the above numbers??

Well, you know the drill, just get something where you have the option of filing down the patridge.
You might want to go with a .455" front ramp and a .355" patridge, and have plenty to spare.

But first make up your mind on that rear sight!

You can file down, but you cannot add height after you have the part from NECG,
unless you return it for an exchange, before filing.

Gotta shoot it to see what you need.
Shoot ... file ... shoot ... perfect

I see the patridge of .374" height is available for a CZ, but not the Universal screw-on.

Yep, the patridge insert adjusts that 0.060" just like the beads:

"The Universal Ramp features a unique design which provides .060" of elevation adjustment with each of the three bead heights. This all steel ramp attaches with a single 6-48 screw. The hood attaches from the rear and is secured with a screw lock. 5 ramp heights available. Bottom radius is made to fit a barrel .562" and can be contoured to fit larger barrels. Ramp comes with a blued finish."

hmmmm I think I've figured out one way to make a quarter rib... (hope posting here isn't bad juju)

Get chunk of steel


Bore it


Chamfer it


Slab it


Chamfer it


Drill & counter bore it, if you want to!


Always wondered how they did that - I guess this is one way!

CAD-CAM-Karl,

Neato.
Screw it, pin-it, and solder it.

I think I am going to try this... I may have to wait for some free time on a client's CNC lathe, but I think I can do it.

I can't think of any other way to make it and I've seen a few posts on other forums that describe the same idea.

My rough guestimate by 10x magnified eyeball is a 3.340"-3.350" OAL with the 400g Woodleigh if I line up the cannelure with the neck - my magazine is 3.400" long.


Funny thing - there's no "H" stamped on my brass...

How long is the feed slot in the bottom of the action Karl. Maybe you could squeeze a bit more COAL with a bit of work to the magazine box.

I dunno... It seems about perfect to me just as it sits?

Yep, perfect, I like +0.050" of inside-box length beyond COAL as a rule of thumb.
The latest Hornady basic has no "H" on the bottom? That is a plus,
won't interfere with your custom headstamp if you ever get a custom bunter and hydraulic jack to press your own.

That one piece of brass lying on top of the reloading block looks like it is annealed more than half-way down the case.
Are they all like that?

Yep, they all look about the same in the annealing department - is something wrong?

Well, the old ones with the "H" headstamp did not look like they had been annealed at all:



If they were annealed at the factory, then they were polished shiney all over afterward.

The new batch of Hornady seems to have eliminated the "H" headstamp as well as any polishing off of the annealing,
if that was previously done.
Or they eliminated the headstamp and added the annealing to the newest product ...

Shouldn't be a problem as you are going to be cutting off about a third of an inch of the soft end, eventually,
and then running them into a Hornady Custom die,
for one-step forming.
The lower half of the case will be full hard.
The upper half will be eventually hardened by repeated firings, and re-sizings.
After 5 firings anneal again, but you won't want the annealing to go anymore below the shoulder area than possible:



I have just never seen factory annealing go that far down the case.
I would never do it to a case myself like that.
Might be a minor QC booboo.

Finger-spinning the case on 0000/finest steel wool makes them shiney, sometime before the next annealing:

I bought em from Huntington's, same place I bought the Woodleigh's. I hope that wasn't a bad idea?

The Hornady box sure looks authentic, and it looks like it was perfectly factory sealed, but a strange thing I noticed when I opened the box - the zip lock bag the cases came in, wasn't zipped closed.

My first thought was I was going to be short one piece.

I'm phoning Hornady...

quote:

Originally posted by RIP:
Yep, perfect, I like +0.050" of inside-box length beyond COAL as a rule of thumb.

And, a 400g Woodleigh loaded to 3.500" OAL leaves a .065" jump to the rifling!

I'm starting to like this rifle and cartridge, more and more! But something tells me it's going to sting when it goes off...

Got my pillars made today and hope I can bed it this coming week!

Ask Hornady if they have stopped using the "H" headstamp on all their belted basic cylindrical brass.
Pete Cardona at Quality cartridge used to get it from Hornady without any headstamp, and he used it to headstamp custom wildcat orders.
So he told me.
My custom brass for the .395 Tatanka and 500 Mbogo (aka "The Mobogo") were supposedly made from Hornady blank basic cylindrical Rigby.

So you have some free-bore. It does not seem to be excessive.
I will go look at your chamber cast again and see how much throat is showing there ...



Your measurements of the chamber casting for parallel-sided free-bore length and diameter are probably accurate enough.

Looks like less than caliber-length, parallel-sided free-bore leading up to the "Leade" where the rifling marks start.
That is excellent.
Looks like PS-free-bore is only about 0.375" long, by eye-balling this photo.
The Woodleigh nose is all ogive and sub-caliber, so not surprising there is still a small amount of jump to lands, where it hits in the leade, when loaded to 3.5" COaL.

Was the parallel-sided free-bore diameter about 0.412" on the chamber cast?

My guess on your throat, a most excellent throat:

Parallel-sided free-bore: Length .375", diameter .412"
Leade angle: 1.5 to 2 degrees


If you really want to study the throat, you can do a soft lead slug of the throat.
Measurements of that will be more accurate than from the chamber casting.

Veral Smith of LBT requests you do a throat slug if you want him to make a mould for cast lead bullets matched to your rifle.
He supplies caliber specific slugs, or you can make your own kit.
You need a soft lead cylinder about 2.5 to 3 bullet-calibers long and just under bullet-caliber in diameter.
A 0.4"-diameter X 1"-long cylinder of pure lead should do nicely.
That is the throat slug.

Here's how to "slug the throat":

Get a steel rod of near caliber diameter inserted all the way into the case, to base of case.
The common 3/8" (.375") diameter steel all-thread or cold-rolled steel rod is big enough.
Cut it off flush or barely below the level of the case mouth.
Load this case containg steel rod into the chamber, with a soft lead slug ahead of it, muzzle up with rifle,
slug slightly below caliber diameter can be dropped down the barrel or fed in through chamber ahead of the case.
Then with muzzle up, insert another soft steel rod long enough to protrude from the muzzle,
a 2.5-foot piece of 3/8" soft steel rod will more than do for a 24"-long barrel.
Then with a mallet/hammer, tap the muzzle end of the steel rod firmly a couple of times to squash the soft lead slug in the throat.
Then remove the long steel rod, the "ramrod," from the barrel.
Then extract/eject the case.
The throat slug is then carefully pushed out of the throat, back into the empty chamber, with steel rod, cleaning rod, or 3/8" wooden dowel.

The slug will have an imprint of your case mouth and beautifully show the throat for measurement,
both parallel-sided free-bore, and leade, as accurately as you can measure.

My QuickLoad STILL isn't here!

Ahh it's here! Now for a few weeks of figuring it all out

No worries, Sir RIP, I'm not doin' anything without your prior approval!

Quick Karl,
I'll bet you are soon doing more tricks with QuickLOAD than most of us.
Just jump on it and ride that bicycle!
I am still on training wheels, so can only offer low speed tricks.

It would take a long while before I could even come close to your level of competence, RIP - presuming I had the inherent capability to do so in the first place... Something I do seems always to give people a wrong impression about me; I wish I knew how to turn whatever that is, into tangible assets, or even just a job! Nobody wants to hire you when you're old - it's the stupidest thing I've ever seen.

Alright, back on topic. My first foray...

Differences from mine on page 3 of this thread:

XS bore area: 0.130820 sqIn by me, yours: 0.132669 sqIn (probably biggest difference between us)

cartridge shape weighting factor: 0.5 for me, yours: 0.55 (yours might be better)

brass length: 2.580" for me, yours: 2.550"

COaL: 3.123" for me, yours 3.125"

bullet length: 0.963" for me, yours: 0.960"

MV: 2529 fps for me, yours: 2456 fps

pressure: 49,965 psi for me, yours: 47,773 psi

How did you select or calculate the bore area?

.411/2 - squared the result and multiplied by pi. I haven't read the instructions in depth enough to know if that is a good number (do you deduct for the lands?) but it got me a first try!

My math could be bad, I will double check, this time on my TI nSpire CX CAS

EDIT: OK found it! I'll have to get serious and measure my bore again!

Quick Karl,

Yes you have to deduct for the lands.
So that makes it complicated to calculate.
What I do is select a cartridge with same barrel and bullet, and use the QuickLOAD default calculated bore area.
IIRC, I started off with the 400 Whelen when modeling your cartridge.
Same bore area, same bullet diameter.
Then I used the bore area for that barrel, which was .411"-grooved.

Beware using a 405 WCF bore area because it might be for a .413"-grooved barrel, etc.

Actually there is an application in QuickLoad that calculates the cross-sectional bore area for you - based on dimensional inputs.

Load,Save/Case caliber data/Change data record in active file - in the middle of the window that pops up you will see "Cross-sectional Bore Area" - click the button immediately to the right!

A very good program indeed!

I told you you would be finding tricks I don't know.
What is your new bore area?

Bore area, start pressure of bullet, and case shape "weighting" factor of the case are main areas where you can go wrong, or go right.
Those are the most significant factors in getting at reality that are not easily measured from case and bullet at hand,
besides powder lot, of course, which is impossible for me to do much about.
Have you gotten into measuring boat tails instead of flat base bullets?
That is another "measure bullet at hand" thing, a minor thing.

.13158

.411 grooves .403 lands (6) that are .050 wide each.

Oh great! Now I need to measure width and number of lands in addition to bore and groove diameters!


Hey! I thought your barrel was 24", what I calculated with.
You are using 22" barrel, I had not noticed before.
Is your barrel 22" long?
You'll probably add 50 fps with a 2" longer barrel.

22"

I'm pretty sure I'm not going to miss 50 fps with this lil pea-shooter...

OK, looks like you are getting as good as it gets with QuickLOAD prediction.
Let us see what you get with the 400-grain Woodleigh, whenever you get the time ...

I wish I could estimate what the H2O capacity of the fired case might be - I went with 96g H2O just for fun.

quote:

Originally posted by Quick Karl:
I wish I could estimate what the H2O capacity of the fired case might be - I went with 96g H2O just for fun.

Go shoot a few of your cases, then you can measure the water capacity. Is the rifle bedded yet?

In-Progress!

I never had to bed a barrel with a recoil lug before. Also, I had to relocate the barrel lug; it was too far forward to work with the Boyd's stock - now it is perfect.

I'm sure it's covered elsewhere in the thread but I'm to lazy to look it up. Commercial FN M98 action. Hornady' new belted basic brass. Both are easily good for more than 62871 psi (the new-modern cartridge CIP limit) so why is the cartridge being limited to 50000 psi?

That long neck makes it look like the 400 HH. 404 HH?

quote:

Originally posted by RIP:
Well, the old ones with the "H" headstamp did not look like they had been annealed at all:



If they were annealed at the factory, then they were polished shiney all over afterward.

The new batch of Hornady seems to have eliminated the "H" headstamp as well as any polishing off of the annealing,
if that was previously done.
Or they eliminated the headstamp and added the annealing to the newest product ...

Shouldn't be a problem as you are going to be cutting off about a third of an inch of the soft end, eventually,
and then running them into a Hornady Custom die,
for one-step forming.
The lower half of the case will be full hard.
The upper half will be eventually hardened by repeated firings, and re-sizings.
After 5 firings anneal again, but you won't want the annealing to go anymore below the shoulder area than possible:



I have just never seen factory annealing go that far down the case.
I would never do it to a case myself like that.
Might be a minor QC booboo.

Finger-spinning the case on 0000/finest steel wool makes them shiney, sometime before the next annealing:

quote:

Originally posted by capoward:
I'm sure it's covered elsewhere in the thread but I'm to lazy to look it up. Commercial FN M98 action. Hornady' new belted basic brass. Both are easily good for more than 62871 psi (the new-modern cartridge CIP limit) so why is the cartridge being limited to 50000 psi?

To keep everything on the safe side while I fire form 10-pieces of basic brass (kindly formed and given to me by MR. RIP), for the first time, ever, in my life!

I don't have a fire formed case yet so the H20 capacity of 96 is just a guess (but I do suspect a fire formed case might be slightly larger). Here is the cartridge at 62871.



Really is a great program - I can't wait to use to tune a load for my 6mm Remington (I haven't even fired the thing since it came back from Douglas with a new XX premium barrel) - I shoulda stained the Boyd's stock before I Tru-Oiled it. Oh well, there's always next time...:



For those that are going to ask - so I can take the scope off and rest in on a shelf, and get more guns into my safe without knocking them around.