Fireforming .303 British brass into brass .410 shotshells...

[grelmar]

NB to mods: This might need to move to the "reloading" sub forum, but I thought it might be of more general interest here, as it is becoming something of a lost art.

So, a while back my curiosity was piqued on the subject of fireforming .303 brass into .410 shotshells. It has to do with my milsurp "issues". A great many Enfields were converted into .410 muskets in India for use by prison guards, and I had always wondered "why .410" ??

It turns out the reasons were economics. .303 brass, it would seem, was quite easy to convert into .410 brass. The case head is the right dimensions, the brass is the right length. It was really a matter of blowing the taper out of the .303 brass into the straight tube of a .410. For a country with perpetual "budgetary issues" this was an economical way of arming prison guards with some firepower that at the same time would be of little use to criminals.

Anyway, what pushed me over the edge is the cost of commercial .410 shells. At $0.75 to $1.00 a shell most places, this makes for a pricey cartridge that I mostly use for popping gophers close in - I've taken to bringing a short .410 single shot with me when varminting, because it's hard to put glass on a gopher within 10 yards.

So I took it on as a project last summer, and decided I might as well film what I was doing as I went along. The end result is I now have a nice supply set aside of 2&3/4" full brass .410 shells, that should be reloadable almost indefinitely, and I can reload them at half the cost of 12 gauge target loads. Given the current cost of good quality .22 ammo, this means that .410 now costs me not much more than .22 per shot.

Sorry if the videos are a bit long. I was making it up as I went along, over multiple filming sessions. I managed to cut it down to 2 x 25(ish) minute videos, from over 3 hours of source video. Which is why, even though I finished filming all this in August last year, just the though of getting around to editing out all the crap took until the past couple weeks.

Part 1:

Part 2:

 

[Pete04]

Thanks for sharing.
Reloading for .410 is the only way to go. IMHO

 

[grelmar]

Thanks for sharing.
Reloading for .410 is the only way to go. IMHO

Yup.

Great cartridge for varminting up close. Just so freaking expensive to buy commercial ammo.

Kind of developing a better appreciation for .410 over the past year or so. More versatile and useful than it tends to get credit for. I want to expand out with it and start doing some slug testing with it now as well. That poor little $150 break action is getting put through its paces.

 

[ducksarewet]

That's pretty cool. I don't have the skills or need to do this, but it's neat to see

 

[Tharjoe]

Just as a thought to consider: .444 Marilin brass also works very well as .410 shotshell brass, no fireforming required (although it does cost more than .303 brass). I loaded some many years ago and ran them through a Winchester model 42.
Worked like a charm :~)
Thanks for doing this work, though, as it's always good to know of alternatives for the small bore shotguns!

 

[grelmar]

Just as a thought to consider: .444 Marilin brass also works very well as .410 shotshell brass, no fireforming required (although it does cost more than .303 brass). I loaded some many years ago and ran them through a Winchester model 42.
Worked like a charm :~)
Thanks for doing this work, though, as it's always good to know of alternatives for the small bore shotguns!

Yup, and so does 45-70, and 45 Long Colt. There's a good historical reason for this. At the time they were coming up with all these new cartridges, it was economical to use stampings and draws that were already in production, and then cut the case to length, or neck it down, or both. There was a lot of riding the fine line with patents involved.

The difference is case length. .303 British is just a bit longer, and allows you to end up with the same internal volume as a 2 & 3/4 shell. With 45-70, 444 Marlin, and 45 Long Colt, you end up with a shorter shell.

But they all work. .410 is a pretty interesting cartridge, lots of history behind it, been used for a lot of things over the years.

p.s. I loaded up another batch of 10 .303 cases this weekend, hope to form them over Easter Long Weekend. I'll post pics of results, if I think of it. Going with my final choice of 1/2 powder load from 12 gauge target shells, and tumbler media. If I get all but a couple to form without splitting the necks, then I know I've definitely got a solid formula in place.