What are you loading in your 450-400 3"

In my 450-400 3 1/4 I use 71.1 grains of RL 15 and 400 grain Woodleighs. I did shoot some rounds with 61 grains of 3031 and Kynoch cases, bullets and primers (Berdan corrosive)last Saturday. These were very accurate and were loaded by a friend of mine who shot them in his Daniel Frasier regularly. I take no responsibility for anyone else's load procedures and can only speak from my experience.

Dutch

Check out the Nickudu Files - there's an article by Elmer Keith hunting bears and he has a 450-400 double .

For an old British Double regulated for 55 grains of Cordite I use 62 grains of RL-15 plus either Dacron poly fill or foam pulg like Kynoch uses.

If you will send me your email addy I will forward you an article by Ross Seyfried "Reloading the Nitro Express"
You may reach me at the email addy below.
rkmojo@aol.com

For my Jeffrey 450/400 3" regulated for 60 gr. coridite:
78 Grains of IMR 4831
400 grain Woodleigh soft and solids
Federal 215 primers
RWS brass

I have had the "The Reloading the Nitro Express"
article posted on NitroExpress.com for several years.

Here is a link to the article. You can open and save each page so you can print and read them.

Reloading the Nitro Express" by Ross Seyfried"

Thanks a lot Rusty, I am a dumb ass with computers, but did know how to past to word and save the file
thanks
George

Go to the link provided then left click on page 2. It should open so you can see it. Once it is open put your cursor on the picture and right mouse click and a menu will pop up. Left click on "save picture as", you can save it with the current title or call it what ever you want to name it. Left click "save" and you have saved it to your computer.

Close that picture open the next page and repeat the above steps. Nothing to it!

quote:

Originally posted by Rusty:
For an old British Double regulated for 55 grains of Cordite I use 62 grains of RL-15 plus either Dacron poly fill or foam pulg like Kynoch uses.

If you will send me your email addy I will forward you an article by Ross Seyfried "Reloading the Nitro Express"
You may reach me at the email addy below.
rkmojo@aol.com

Where did you get your RWS brass for the 450-400, 3"???

Where did you see RWS .400 brass even mentioned? RWS has never made it.
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"Serious rifles have two barrels, everything else just burns gunpowder.

Look at Palmer's post above yours. He posts a load for the gun.

Ah, lb used the wrong quote. Palmer is simply mistaken, RWS has made .404 brass, but not .400.
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"Serious rifles have two barrels, everything else just burns gunpowder."

Opps I did not remember that right.

I am using HDS not RWS. Sorry for the misinformation. Everything else in my posted load is what I use however.

Thanks for correcting me Mark.

RWS must have made both 450-400 and 404 brass at one time or another, as I had some at one time..

My load for all the 450-400-3" guns I have owned has been with RWS, Norma, and Bell brass, 215 Fed primers, 71.5 grs. of RL-15 and 5 grs. of Dacron..It seemed to work best in all of them.

The no. of grs. of any powder in your 450-400-3" will simply be determined by the group you shoot...shoot it until it crosses over at 50 yards then back of a half grain at a time until it just shoots together...

Keep in mind that any double will only shoot as good as its "worst" barrel, so shoot some groups with each barrel and determine the barrel that shoots the "worst", that is what your striving for. If its not good enough for you then sell the gun or have it re-regulated.

Ray, do you mean, ( after checking each barrel ) that one works up for a given bullet and selected powder, until bullets are on at 100, or why do you suggest going up until crossing at 50 m appears, and then go back ( = down on powder ) until "on" at 100 m?

I don´t want to nitpick, I want to LEARN!

Please give me ( and others ) more info on regulation. I assume you mean the more velocity, the quicker the bullets will "cross"? Is this ALWAYS true?

Do you adjust seating depth after a special "pattern" ( in miniscule increments, or when using a lighter bullet than standard, for a reduced or Boar load ), or only after nothing else works for regulation?

Does a crimp change POI? ( LEE factory crimp )

Will powder weight ( = burn rate ) change regulation? In what direction? Quicker power = more acceleration of bullet = quicker recoil impulse = quicker crossing ( less "dwell time" ? ))

Thanks in advance, Hermann

Arminius,

I ment that one has to know how his gun is going to group before he does anything. The way to know how is gun will group is to know which barrel is the LEAST accurate, that is all the gun will do, so when he reaches that point in working up a load, its time to stop....the gun will not shoot any better than its worst barrel as the worst barrel will open the group out to that point. Am I clear. This is always true.

Now when you go to the range you know what size group the gun is capable off, that is what you strive for...

When sighting in I shoot at either 30 or 50 yards (POI will be the same) and I take a number of loads with 1 gr. increments up and down...I start shooting and when my loads get close I keep going up a grain at a time until they cross (unless I am getting into a pressure area), then I back off until they do not cross. This is fine tuning of a double, sometimes it gives you a little more.

I don't really have to do this because I know what my gun will do group wise, from shooting and knowing what size group my gun is capable of with its worst barrel, as previously stated..

Yes, I crimp all double rounds, I also trim them in a file trim die to be sure all my loads crimp in the cannalure, its more accurate with a file trim die IMO.

Powder weight will usually change regulation, but not always. As a rule if your POI is spread you need to shoot it faster by using more powder and if the group crosses you went to far. If it crosses to start with then cut back your load,

Double rifles do not understand the term "ALWAYS TRUE"

You don't have to worry about "regulation" your gun comes to you regulated, all you have to do is fine tune it and you do that as described above.

I see a lot of confusion on these boards as to what regulation means. Regulation is done at the factory with wire, wedges, an solder, with a certain load. A double can be regulated with any load so that all you have to do is sight it in and use that load. what we are talking about is fine tuning, changing loads, etc.

I hope I am clear on this, I do it better than I describe it apparantly..

If you have any particular problem just send me and email or post on this board and I or someone will try to help if we can....

My Searcy .470 shot 1 inch at 50 yards with 108 grs. of IMR-4831 at 2255 FPS. That was its regulation load. I played with it as described above and got 85 grs. of RL-15 with 5 grs. of dacron shot 1.5 inches at same POI, but at 2020 FPS. and this was my Buffalo hunting load...I also shot a lead bullet at 1600 FPS to the same POI..All this using the above method..

Hope this helps.