Loading 44 special with 44mag brass
- Thread starter luckey
- Start date
Well, the views expressed on this thread are all over the place. In other words, one can pretty well find whatever he wants to find.
However, I see people on here trying to create a problem, where none exists.
An example of this is the debate about using 44 mag or 44 Special brass. Regardless what the theories point out, in practical terms, which is you, your loading bench and the range, you will find absolutely no difference in whether you used 44 mag or 44 Sp. brass, in loading lighter loads in the 44 mag.
With full blown 44 magnum loads the case is mostly filled, like making it impossible to double charge. It seems the most common full power load is 24 to 25 grains of H110/W296 powder. When Elmer Keith designed the 44 magnum he dealt with one charge--22 grains of Hercules 2400 powder. This also is my favourite full power load with the Keith designed 240 grain bullet, the flat base (meaning no gas check) bullet, designated as #429421. Bullet weights will vary, depending on the lead alloy used, with 250 grains being a more common weight.
I shot in silhouette matches for a few years and in the course of that I had five different 44 magnum revolvers, three Ruger Super Blackhawks and two S&W, plus I also loaded and shot two different 44 mag rifles.
In my notes I distinguish between Ruger and S&W, but I don't say which individual gun. A revolver loses a lot of power by the gap between the cylinder and the forcing tube. Thus, the velocity will vary from one gun to another, having nothing to do with barrel length. A ruger with a tight gap and 7.5 inch barrel, had higher velocity than a Ruger with a 10.25 inch barrel.
24.5 grains of H110/W296 gave about 1350 fps., but this is a poor powder for reducing the load. Also, even at full power, the extreme spread was around 100 and dropping to 20 grains gave an average of 1126, but a es of nearly 200 fps.
An example I have here of 22 grains of 2400 gave a velocity of 1415, with a spread of 68.
Reduced to 20 grains of 2400, gave 1312 and an extreme spread of 41.
Reduced to 17.5 grains of 2400 gave 1120 fps with a spread of 45.
I did most of my silhouette shooting with 20 grains of 2400. I have a ribbon somewhere, showing I got ten straight rams at 200 metres with that load. It took about a load that high to be sure of knocking over the rams at 200 metres. Yes, we tried out the 357 magnum, but they didn't always knock over a ram and if the ram didn't fall, it was a miss!
Another theory to forget about is the space in the cartridge when using a few grains of fast powder.
Best powder I used for light loads was Winchester 231. They show 6.5 grains as giving 800 fps. (All my figures are with the Keith cast bullet, weighing 240 to 250 grains)
Winchester shows 8.2 grins of W231 for 1,000 fps.
I loaded five with 8.2 grains of W231 and got an average of 1018 fps, with an extreme spread of only 17.
For accurate loads, don't try to do as you would with a scope sighted rifle, shooting a group and making slight adjustments to the load, until you get a group you like and thinking presto, got my load.
With the sights on your gun only a few inches apart, the groups come too erratic to adjust your loads by.
I saved two practice targets where I was resting the 44 mag Super Blackhawk at fifty yards. One shows a five shot group of 2.1 inches. Was it a special load? Not really, it was made with 22 grains of 2400!
Another target I saved shows a five shot group of 1.1 inches at fifty yards! I didn't even bother to mark down the load, because all this proves is that miracles do happen.
If you have a chronograph, the loads that show a small spread should be the most accurate loads.
If I was looking for a good light load today, I would just use W231 powder and adjust the amount of powder to get a load that had about the amount of recoil I was looking for.
When we were shooting silhouette matches, the people who sold components were always giving us different bullets to try. They were always 240 grain, usually jacketed of various shapes and we used them with our same loads. I could never see much difference in the results I got and couldn't say that any were any better than the old Keith, 429421 cast!
Thus, save yourself some effort and treat all bullets by weight only, and not by their shape, or who made them.
To shoot down another myth, the brass cases won't last longer with light loads than they will with full power loads. They all wear out and eventually crack from expanding the mouth and crimping the bullet. To get long life flare the mouth a bare minimum. Also, annealing the mouth from time to time will greatly extend their life.
However, I see people on here trying to create a problem, where none exists.
An example of this is the debate about using 44 mag or 44 Special brass. Regardless what the theories point out, in practical terms, which is you, your loading bench and the range, you will find absolutely no difference in whether you used 44 mag or 44 Sp. brass, in loading lighter loads in the 44 mag.
With full blown 44 magnum loads the case is mostly filled, like making it impossible to double charge. It seems the most common full power load is 24 to 25 grains of H110/W296 powder. When Elmer Keith designed the 44 magnum he dealt with one charge--22 grains of Hercules 2400 powder. This also is my favourite full power load with the Keith designed 240 grain bullet, the flat base (meaning no gas check) bullet, designated as #429421. Bullet weights will vary, depending on the lead alloy used, with 250 grains being a more common weight.
I shot in silhouette matches for a few years and in the course of that I had five different 44 magnum revolvers, three Ruger Super Blackhawks and two S&W, plus I also loaded and shot two different 44 mag rifles.
In my notes I distinguish between Ruger and S&W, but I don't say which individual gun. A revolver loses a lot of power by the gap between the cylinder and the forcing tube. Thus, the velocity will vary from one gun to another, having nothing to do with barrel length. A ruger with a tight gap and 7.5 inch barrel, had higher velocity than a Ruger with a 10.25 inch barrel.
24.5 grains of H110/W296 gave about 1350 fps., but this is a poor powder for reducing the load. Also, even at full power, the extreme spread was around 100 and dropping to 20 grains gave an average of 1126, but a es of nearly 200 fps.
An example I have here of 22 grains of 2400 gave a velocity of 1415, with a spread of 68.
Reduced to 20 grains of 2400, gave 1312 and an extreme spread of 41.
Reduced to 17.5 grains of 2400 gave 1120 fps with a spread of 45.
I did most of my silhouette shooting with 20 grains of 2400. I have a ribbon somewhere, showing I got ten straight rams at 200 metres with that load. It took about a load that high to be sure of knocking over the rams at 200 metres. Yes, we tried out the 357 magnum, but they didn't always knock over a ram and if the ram didn't fall, it was a miss!
Another theory to forget about is the space in the cartridge when using a few grains of fast powder.
Best powder I used for light loads was Winchester 231. They show 6.5 grains as giving 800 fps. (All my figures are with the Keith cast bullet, weighing 240 to 250 grains)
Winchester shows 8.2 grins of W231 for 1,000 fps.
I loaded five with 8.2 grains of W231 and got an average of 1018 fps, with an extreme spread of only 17.
For accurate loads, don't try to do as you would with a scope sighted rifle, shooting a group and making slight adjustments to the load, until you get a group you like and thinking presto, got my load.
With the sights on your gun only a few inches apart, the groups come too erratic to adjust your loads by.
I saved two practice targets where I was resting the 44 mag Super Blackhawk at fifty yards. One shows a five shot group of 2.1 inches. Was it a special load? Not really, it was made with 22 grains of 2400!
Another target I saved shows a five shot group of 1.1 inches at fifty yards! I didn't even bother to mark down the load, because all this proves is that miracles do happen.
If you have a chronograph, the loads that show a small spread should be the most accurate loads.
If I was looking for a good light load today, I would just use W231 powder and adjust the amount of powder to get a load that had about the amount of recoil I was looking for.
When we were shooting silhouette matches, the people who sold components were always giving us different bullets to try. They were always 240 grain, usually jacketed of various shapes and we used them with our same loads. I could never see much difference in the results I got and couldn't say that any were any better than the old Keith, 429421 cast!
Thus, save yourself some effort and treat all bullets by weight only, and not by their shape, or who made them.
To shoot down another myth, the brass cases won't last longer with light loads than they will with full power loads. They all wear out and eventually crack from expanding the mouth and crimping the bullet. To get long life flare the mouth a bare minimum. Also, annealing the mouth from time to time will greatly extend their life.
I shoot .44 mag for cowboy action, both in my 92 and in my Blackhawks. I usually cast a 200 grain lead rnfp, with 4.8 to 5 grains of titegroup , it's a pretty mild load in my rifle and has a pleasant recoil in my SBH'S. I have also shot 240 grain hard--cast semi-wadcutters with the same powder charge and felt no real difference in the rifle and a bit more recoil in the revolvers, which is to be expected . I used to shoot 4.7 grains of clays with a 200 grain rnfp and loved it, but clays became difficult to come by. I use 296/H110 only for full-case hunting loads, and it works very well with my 250 grain cast bullets, Barnes 225 grain and 265 grain jacketed soft points. As an interesting note, I tried out some .44 Russian brass that I had loaded with the same 200 grain cast bullet and titegroup loading, and it seemed to shoot higher than the .44 mag brass in SBH. I'm not sure if it gets more pressure because of the significantly smaller case or if there was another factor at play (ie human error). Just a suggestion, but what about BP? If you have a stainless gun, it's a cinch to clean and BP in a .44 mag is alot of fun, recoil shouldn't be too bad with some 200 grain cast and with a good BP lube you can do a good amount of shooting before you have to swab the barrel. Not to mention the giant fireball.... 
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I have one caveat to add: Loading 44spcl loads in 44mag brass is similar to 38spcl loads in 357mag brass. I'll explain with a personal experience: I knew that (if memory serves it was Unique powder behind a HBWC) the larger case would result in lower pressure and lower velocity so I did some simple math to accommodate for the case capacity difference. I was looking for 38spec. standard velocities from the magnum case in a S&W 686 for an accurate target load... Well, it was accurate, and highly accommodating to the most recoil sensitive people to have ever lived which was a problem. I could see the bullet travelling quite often, nothing was remotely dangerous to the gun (pressure or chamber sealing issues), shooter or bystander... unless you consider bullets bouncing back. Yes, bouncing off the target board...not a ricochet, ~180 change in direction. I've never repeated that load despite it's virtues but one must be careful for not only that but several other factors unique to low pressure loads. The powder charge was a published 38spec. load for that bullet, plus a few tenths of a grain calculated for the extra brass capacity... which was still to low. There were no available loads for HBWC in a 357 case which trouble me: Occasionally I put full load through the gun, I wanted to close the gap in the cylinder left by 38spec cases and the fouling that left and explore any potential for accuracy gains I could see that no one bothered with in this world of adrenaline junkies.
Given conditions at the time, worst case scenario might have been a bruise to me as I was (and usually am) at the range during slow times... but still not desirable: C'est la vie... I'm happy to learn such things with low pressure, but I prefer things working beautifully and I'll pass on the alternative extreme.
Given conditions at the time, worst case scenario might have been a bruise to me as I was (and usually am) at the range during slow times... but still not desirable: C'est la vie... I'm happy to learn such things with low pressure, but I prefer things working beautifully and I'll pass on the alternative extreme.
