I have some Hornady .44/180 grain xtp bullets and want to know some powder charges for this bullet that might work for my gun. I will be shooting these in a TC Pro hunter with the 28" barrel. These will be for plinking, but if accurate will be used for hunting.

Seems to me a fella could use the same charge he uses under a heavier bullet, all other things being equal. I wouldn't use a 180 for anything bigger than coyotes though. A 209x50 using saboted pistol bullets falls somewhere between a 44 magnum carbine and a 444 Marlin. In those cartridges a 180 is varmint/vermin/bad guy medicine, not first choice for deer killing. Please let us know how they shoot though...

I will agree on the 180 for smaller game/varmints.

I have used 240 grain Hornady XTP bullets on deer with 80 to 100 grains of Pyrodex RS depending on the firearm used on how much powder to burn.

It will be a while till the snow melts and it gets a little warmer out. I'll keep you posted.

quote:

Originally posted by northwoods39:
I have some Hornady .44/180 grain xtp bullets and want to know some powder charges for this bullet that might work for my gun. I will be shooting these in a TC Pro hunter with the 28" barrel. These will be for plinking, but if accurate will be used for hunting.

For just plinking, I'd start at 40 grains, and maybe go up as far as 60, of GOEX FFFg or 777 FFFg size.....

I have tried the 44/180 out of a knight,ruger and tc encore but didn't get them to shoot too well.Used to use a nosler 185 gr (.452 )in the ruger and it was a very good deer bullet on deer here and very accurate,but since the deer are bigger where you live I would use at least a 200 gr bullet.
I sold my encore but the 40 cal sst or shock wave were tough on deer.Haven't tried the 200 xtp 40 cal on deer but it shot some one hole groups at 100yds on paper.
For larger deer I would go with the 250 sst,SW,or 240,250 xtp,but you would have to try which powder your rifle likes best,pyro select allways came out on top for me in different rifles.I found that the reg cci 209's worked the best with pyro in the encore.
I never tried any load less than 90 grs with the 44/180's but as Deguello said you may try less powder and find a very good plinking load with them.