Please help a new 44Mag reloader

mississaugagunnut

mississaugagunnut

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I am an experienced re loader having reloaded 9mm, 45acp, 38spl and 357.

I have just picked up a Super Black hawk in 44mag and a Marlin 94 in 44mag.

I want to load a round that can be used in both. It will be strictly for plinking. I have purchased a bunch of 240g jacketed flat point bullets and am planning on using 800x (I know, it's all I can get up here).

When I search the Hodgdon website for loads it doesn't list 800x as a rifle powder.

Should I load according to their pistol loads and use that in my rifle?

Thanks for your help.
 
Yep, pretty much.

Unless you're loading up mouse fart pistol loads, and since you're using jacketed stuff I'd guess you're not, you're good to go
 
I can't recommend 800X - I had the devil's own time getting 700X to meter uniformly, and the one comment I read about it went "People who complain about 700X being hard to meter have obviously never tried 800X"... - although I had a very nice .357 load for it, 5.5gr 800X behind a 168gr GC SWC if I recall. No idea the velocity; that was in my Chrony-less days, but they were warm, not overly hot.

The good news is that lots of other powders will work just fine, and meter just fine. You might try VV N320; I use a lot of N310 but exclusively for pistols, and the slower-burning N320 might work better in rifles while still acceptably in pistols. Don't load too squib with N320 though; it'll leave granules behind.

The other good news is, if you're just plinking, why waste the money on fancy boughten bullets? Get a bullet mould and some scrap lead, and you're off to the races! If you're going to load them "warm", get a gas-check mould; I've never seen lead fouling even out of hot .357's when I use gas checks.
 
Thanks for the replies, I went to the supplier today to grab my 800x and was delighted to find that someone did not want their order of H4227, so now I have that powder. From what I have read it is much more suited to magnum loads. I will start researching a couple of loads and run them over a chrony.
 
H4227 is my second go-to powder for 44 Mag.......the first being H110/W296 (if you can get them).

When I was cross checking my load data, I found nearly all were identical for rifle and pistol.

(E) :cool:
 
Yes, you can use the same load in either the Super Blackhawk or the Marlin Rifle.
The Marlin 44 magnum has a very slow twist, only one turn in 38 inches, thus 240 grain bullets have to be moving right along, or they won't stabilize. Your light plinking loads may not be very accurate in the Marlin.
 
H4831 said:
Yes, you can use the same load in either the Super Blackhawk or the Marlin Rifle.
The Marlin 44 magnum has a very slow twist, only one turn in 38 inches, thus 240 grain bullets have to be moving right along, or they won't stabilize. Your light plinking loads may not be very accurate in the Marlin.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure if that is 100% true in all cases. In my example I have a M94 Winchester in 44 Magnum. I can take my accurate handloads for my 44 special S&W Model 624 (X gr's of Red Dot) 240 PB and shoot them through the Winchester carbine. They are highly accurate @25 and 50 yards from the longer barrel as well as the revolver.

H4831, my Winchester has the same rate of twist as your Marlin.
 
I just re-read the OP's post more carefully. In his situation I would consider a slightly cheaper comprise with his choice of bullets.
Myself I would purchase 240 grain cast bullets (at slower velocities) versus more expensive copper jacketed factory bullets.
I think it will be much easier and cheaper to find a lead bullet hand load that is a touch slower in velocity, while being satisfyingly accurate, in both the shorter and longer barrels for merely plinking sessions.
If you are willing to compromise on paper targets versus wild beasts, it will be easier on your wallet and numerous past examples, have been very positive with this chambering.

my 2 bits only
 
Brutus, it is confusing.
This is the second Marlin 44 I have had, plus I used to shoot silhouette competitions with big pistol and I have owned and shot five different 44 magnum revolvers.
For years I shot the Marlin with a Williams Fool Proof aperture sight. I thought if shot great. I even taught two grand sons to shoot centre fire rifle with the Marlin, starting when they were at the most, ten years old, with very light loads. Our first targets were at 25, then 50 yards, and everything seemed accurate enough. I was using poured bullets of the Keith type, weighing about 250 grains.
Later, I put a scope on the Marlin and shot on the bench at 100 yards. I found the cast bullets, whether flat base or the same Keith designed bullet in gas check, all made about a 4 inch, five shot group at 100 yards, when loaded full power and going around 1750 fps.
The Speer 240 grain jacketed bullets made about the same, about 3 1/2, to 4 inches for five shots.
During the silhouette competitions we were given different makes of bullets, designed for silhouette shooting, to try out. All were 240 grain and all were jacketed.
I tried three types out in the Marlin. Two made the same size group, but one kind, which was hollow point, made between 1 and 1 1/2 inch, five shot groups!
So there you go.
One thing I can say for sure, there was no difference in accuracy, or anything else, whether the full power 250 grain cast bullets were flat base or gas check, in either the Marlin or any 44 revolver I had.
Full power 250 grain loads, either 22 grains of 2400, or 25 grains of H110, got around 1375 to 1475, in the various revolvers and about 300 fps faster in the Marlins.
 
Brutus said:
Thanks H4831. Your posts are always a great read of times past that most of us, never had the luck to experience in the wilder & interesting rural places of this country.

Cheers
Click to expand...

Thank you very much, Brutis.
And yes, times were so different, going back to when I was a young boy growing up on a bush homestesd in northerly, bushland Saskatchewan in the heart of the great depression, that it is getting harder to write about all the time. Not that I forget anything, it is too deeply impressed for that, but because the young generation can't get their mind wrapped around what it was like, in other words, can't imagine it.
Try putting your mind to this, and think of a long Saskatchewan winter and being a member of a large family living in a big log house with no electricity, no radio, no telephone, one, or at the most two, kerosene wick burning lamps supplying a dim light, water brought from the well in a pail and if you had to go to the bathroom you donned a coat and took off for the little out house fifty yards away in the trees. The only sounds in the house were made by the people living in it.
The bitter cold could find dozens of ways to get into the house and if the fire in the heater stove went out at night, or even burned too low, ice would form thick on the water pail by morning.
About the only sounds outside would be the train going by once a week a mile away, or neighbors going by with a team and sleigh.
An eerie sound we quite often heard at night was the dying gasps of a snowshoe hare, as an owl, coyote, fox or something like that, had their supper.
Our grand kids think it would be impossible to live like that. It is just too far from their modern life style for them to comprehend what it was like.
After WW2 it was a different world, and I think then were the great times you regret missing and I wish would have lasted longer!
 
H4831 said:
Thank you very much, Brutis.
And yes, times were so different, going back to when I was a young boy growing up on a bush homestesd in northerly, bushland Saskatchewan in the heart of the great depression, that it is getting harder to write about all the time. Not that I forget anything, it is too deeply impressed for that, but because the young generation can't get their mind wrapped around what it was like, in other words, can't imagine it.
Try putting your mind to this, and think of a long Saskatchewan winter and being a member of a large family living in a big log house with no electricity, no radio, no telephone, one, or at the most two, kerosene wick burning lamps supplying a dim light, water brought from the well in a pail and if you had to go to the bathroom you donned a coat and took off for the little out house fifty yards away in the trees. The only sounds in the house were made by the people living in it.
The bitter cold could find dozens of ways to get into the house and if the fire in the heater stove went out at night, or even burned too low, ice would form thick on the water pail by morning.
About the only sounds outside would be the train going by once a week a mile away, or neighbors going by with a team and sleigh.
An eerie sound we quite often heard at night was the dying gasps of a snowshoe hare, as an owl, coyote, fox or something like that, had their supper.
Our grand kids think it would be impossible to live like that. It is just too far from their modern life style for them to comprehend what it was like.
After WW2 it was a different world, and I think then were the great times you regret missing and I wish would have lasted longer!
Click to expand...

You see again I'm reminded of the hardships experienced by western settlers. You describe almost perfectly the prairie farm ordeals of the recent movie: The Homesman starring Tommy Lee Jones and Hilary Swank. Of course, but barring the Indian attacks.
We watch it on widescreen and you lived through nearly identical situations. Makes you wonder if some folks were literally driven mad when overburdened by personal daily hardships of breaking the land, combined with the very sad early death(s) of their children due to malnutritian and illness?
 
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