I have long played with the idea of buying a Pedersoli Kodiak Mark IV in .45-70 and converting it to 450 NE or something similar. There have been some conversions mentioned in past posts. I would like to get an up to date idea of who has done what.
What caliber did you convert to?
Did you do your own work or which gunsmith did you use? If you're a gunsmith have you done this for someone?
Any particular snags you encountered or tricks that might be helpful for my project.
And lastly knowing what you know now, would you do it over again?

Thanks for theinput,
Eric

Belarus,

Me too. I bought one and am still thinking about it. I solicited the same information 3 or 4 months ago. MacKool's firearms in Tulsa has done at least two of the ones for folks on the board. They were both happy. He does it in .450 NE #2. Mac (I think) had his done in .450 RCBS, but was going to have it re-done by MacKool's in .450 NE #2.

Both guns regulated okay in the new caliber.

I called MacKool's and JJ at Champlin Arms. MacKool's said he'd had no problems, had done several in .450NE #2, and recommended a new recoil pad and a ghost ring sight setup.

JJ said he'd do it in either caliber. He thought the rifle was strong enough either way (though the #2 gives lower pressures). He prefered the plain old .450 NE to the #2 in that it required reaming less material out of the barrel chambers. His advice, though, was to buy a gun chambered and regulated for the desired round. Apparently, the rib is soldered differently by the Italians (and Spanish) making re-regulation of the barrels very difficult.

Mine is still a .45-70. It shoots pretty well (4x6 index card) at 50 yards with the Winchester 350 gr ammo it was regulated for. It shoots the Remington 405gr stuff almost as well. Both load are under 8" at 100yds, too.

Shooting the British Double Rifle gives lots of info on regulating the rifles with reloading, and I'm fairly confident I'll be able to get double rifle accuracy with either .450 NE cartridge. I haven't done it yet, though.

I like it, and it might be a neat gun for pigs the way it is. I'd hate to have it rechambered and have a very expensive wall-hanger.

If I do it, though, I'm leaning towards the plain .450NE due to the difference in the price and availability of loaded ammo and of even just brass. Also, with the smaller cartridge, I'm hoping I wouldn't have to use pillow stuffing or kapok filling to reload.

The bottleneck case, impressiveness of the cartridge, and lower pressures of the #2 are neat, though.

Steve

Crazyquik,

Basically the exercise centers on "correcting for" the movement of the rifle while the bullet is in the barrel. The longer the bullet is in the right barrel after ignition, the higher and more to the right the bullet will go because of the effect of recoil on the rifle. And the left hand barrel plots the projectile further left and higher the longer the bullet's in the barrel. Since the two barrels are soldered together with a convergence point that compensates for the gun movement using a certain weight bullet and a certain velocity, you compensate by speeding up or slowing down the loads until they converge. In a nutshell.

Of course, that's oversimplified. All the usual variables apply with EACH barrel potentially liking different powder/bullet combinations differently. Also, heat transfer between the barrels sometimes affects the convergence and grouping, so test with a set time between the two shots, and shoot the barrels in the same order.

Like I said, though, my rifle seems to be pretty forgiving. The book indicated that slow loads tend to regulate over a wider velocity spread than fast loads, FWIW.

Steve

Gentlemen,

PWN375 of this forum has already done that with a 45/70 double he owned. You might look up the thread or better yet send him a email. His conversion seemed to be very nice and did not require the rifle to be re-regulated.

I had one done (458 RCBS Magnum rechambering) about 8 years ago.

I was lucky in that if anything, my rifle was more accurate after the conversion (about 3 inches apart, right and left at 100 yards).

Cliff Labounty did the rechambering.

I shoot mainly 400 grain Hawk (.065 jackets) in mine, but it will regulate with 500 grain Speer Grand Slams as well.

I think my most accurate loading is 67 grains of IMR-4064 with Pufflon over that, 400 grain Hawk. (Let me reconfirm that because I am work now, and away from my reloading records).

I took mine to Africa, but didn't shoot it there as it was left on the tarmac (literally) for almost a week in Miami.

I have taken a moose with it....it's a fun rifle.

Garrett