500 S&W Ammo

Has anyone got their reloads to match Hornady factory ammo. My 42gn Lil'Gun and H110 with 350gn HRN XTP bullets don't produce the kick nor the fireball like HRN factory ($80 for a box of 20).

Henry at Budget Shooting Supplies is great to deal with, got all my Starline brass, HRN and Berry bullets from him. Notice price has gone up steadily over the last year.
 
Burnaby, are you using Magnum primers? That's going to produce a more energetic ignition and burn. And if you're not using them it could be the problem.

My Lyman book specifies that the H110/296 loads must use magnum primers. Oddly enough the Hodgdon website makes no mention of it in the reloading data.

My own reloads with 42gns and the Magnum primers felt VERY similar to the Hornady factory ammo. And the fireballs from my loads were easily bigger than the Hornady loads. Yeah, even I bought ONE box. My dies hadn't arrived yet.
 
BCRider> Using reg. LR CCI and Fed primers. The HODGODON site list Win LR primers (for 350GN HDY XTP, 42Gn LilGun or 43Gn H110 ) which I expect to be similar to reg CCI and Fed.

Need to get a box of Mag primers? What brand are you using? I like Fed softer primer as I shoot mostly double action, CCI often FTT in double.


What die are you using, I got the LEE die. Finding shell plate for the HRN LNL was a pain.
 
I've been using Federal LP Magnums that I got a few years back. I'm not sure that these would be good for a revolver. I shoot my .500's from a single shot TC Encore and the primers are "fire formed" hard out to the edges of the primer cup and have the tooling marks of the receiver imprinted neatly in the cup's face. All of which are serious pressure signs. For me it isn't an issue as it's a single shot. As long as the primer doesn't actually bust open it's all good. But such nonsense on a revolver can easily lead to the cylinder locking up. So in your case it might be best to shop for some Magnum Large Rifle.
 
i use CCI LRM, but i only use it in single action at the moment. i need to learn better trigger control and not to flinch before i swtich to double action. i do use double action in my 586 though as i am more accurate that way.

actually using the 500 makes my 357 seem like such toy!
 
Will pick up some Fed LR Mag primer as suggested. Looks like BCRider ran into the reason S&W move from pistol to rifle primers with all the pressure signs on pistol primers at max load.

Spawn-Inc> 500 makes the 44Mag feel like a toy, no comparison with 357. Using titegroup 44 max is about 50% more powder than 357; half of 500. The double action on my S&W performance center 500 is really smooth but even with 6.5" barrel it is front heavy; get tired real quick shooting max load. Find Double action on the 629 and 686 way more fun than single. With wadecutter on 686 my grouping is better in double than single as I don't have to break my grip to #### the hammer.
 
burnaby said:
Will pick up some Fed LR Mag primer as suggested. Looks like BCRider ran into the reason S&W move from pistol to rifle primers with all the pressure signs on pistol primers at max load.

Spawn-Inc> 500 makes the 44Mag feel like a toy, no comparison with 357. Using titegroup 44 max is about 50% more powder than 357; half of 500. The double action on my S&W performance center 500 is really smooth but even with 6.5" barrel it is front heavy; get tired real quick shooting max load. Find Double action on the 629 and 686 way more fun than single. With wadecutter on 686 my grouping is better in double than single as I don't have to break my grip to #### the hammer.
Click to expand...

Actually, that move was more because of inadequate ignition that was sometimes experienced with heavy loads using powders like H110 for example. That was my experience. I still use some of the earlier production brass made to accept LP primers for light loads with powders like Unique.
 
Maybe some day Canada Ammo will stumble upon a huge crate of Chinese .500-Magnum ammunition for dirt cheap.

Until that day comes, reloading is the only way to go.
 
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