11/02/02. More news on the .45 ACP "bear Gun" aka the .45-08 Armco. Have been popping out 200 grain hard-cast semiwadcutters at 1450 from a 5" barrelled Para Ordnance. The trick was to use Hodgdon Long Shot powder. I'll tone it down to about 1350 which is lots, but the hot ones were no problem to shoot, even with a stock 18# recoil spring. You NEED a shock buff in the gun! More testing this winter. Too bad the bears are hibernating... I've been reading a bit of Elmer Keith stuff, and have concluded that a good hardcast lead bullet with a flat nose and sharp shoulders is probably the best to use. Gee, that's the one we use for IPSC.
02/05/02. How about the new .45/08 ARMCO pistol wildcat cartridge! This is essentially a .308 case cut down to .45 ACP length and neck reamed to make room for a Nosler 230 grain FMJ flat point bullet (and as much powder as we can cram in behind it. Alternately a 200 grain hard cast SWC bullet beautifully cast and sized by Smart Bullets is used, at higher speeds, of course. Results? So far, almost 1200 FPS from the 230 grain bullet with a 4 1/4" barreled Springfield Armory Defender with a 2 port compensator and a 22 pound recoil spring. That will translate into well over 1200 with a 5" barrel (testing soon) and starts to get REAL close to what you get from a 4" Model 29 in .44 Magnum. 50% (at least) more rounds and twice the controllability. Recoil is absolutely nothing compared to the big magnums, although it IS noticeable! Testing is ongoing and will include a .40Super barrel with 200 grainers at around 1300 FPS. Should be fun. I still like the .45/08 version, and even at the speeds we've achieved, see no excessive pressure signs with Federal 150 (large pistol) primers, which are notoriously soft. The cases, of course, are made to withstand pressures we'll never encounter without actually blowing these pistol primers to smithereens! I really think that a standard 5" 1911 or Para Ordnance, set up with the heaviest recoil springs that Wolff makes, will push 230 grain bullets past 1250, without being anywhere near as punishing to shoot as a hot heavy bullet .44 Magnum load in a Redhawk, a much bigger and heavier gun.
The idea came from the need for a "Bear Gun" for the north where a lot of people who move about in the woods for a living are now getting licenses to carry a handgun. Traditionally it's been a .44 Magnum or bigger, but some of these are a pain to carry comfortably all day, along with a lot of other necessary gear.
I ran into a prospector who insisted on carrying a Colt Officer's Model loaded with 230 grain hardball! Another carries a Ruger Super Redhawk in .454 Casull and has a permanently disabled shooting hand and the biggest flinch you ever saw. Somewhere in between there has to be a gun that has the penetration and sheer bullet weight to take down a bear, even a grizzly, and still be shootable by the average person.
There are, of course, others like this, such as the .45 Super, touted by Ace Custom .45's out of Texas, the .451 Detonics Magnum of some years ago, and the new Triton .450SMC, as well as the .460 Rowland pushed by Clark, and sold only as a compensated gun. It gets to 1300 FPS, but probably needs the comp! All these, by the way, are the same overall length, although case lengths differ. The problem, as we've discovered, is to find a powder that will give us the velocity we want without compressing enough to start pushing the bullet back out. That lets out the old magnum standby, Hodgdon H110, and actually all its contemporaries, such as N110 Vihtavuori, 296, 2400, 4227 IMR, etc. N105 seems to compress at about 1200, so may be OK - and as is usual with this excellent powder, shows no more pressure than an ordinary IPSC load. Others hit the "wall" at 1050 and 1150, and we're currently playing with Tite Group, which is compact enough, and has shown nice results in some reasonable .44 magnum loads.
Forged steel Nork, I say go for it!
