The .45 Long Colt at 200 yards.

pharaoh2

pharaoh2

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Could it be the ultimate sheep and antelope rifle??? :cool:

I recall from various discussions from not long ago and others from awhile back on loading the LC close to .45-70 performance levels. Camp Cook I believe was one who spoke of it and a few others. Has anybody tried the cartridge in a carbine out to 150-200 yards on game? I'm curious what powders, bullets etc were used and how the cartridge performed.
 
The 45/70 does well at those ranges with heavier(longer) bullets that retain momentum better then anything in the .45 L. Colt, where bullets(cast) to 360 grains make great close range smackdown but, twist and instability would hamper longer, heavier bullets in the .45 Colt's.
 
what type of gun did you have in mind ?

there are alot of lever actions out there in 45 colt , but are they built to handle pressure needed to reach 45-70 levels ?

i bought a rossi in 454 casull just for the fact i was designed to handle very high pressure .
this also gives me the option to seat the bullets in 45colt rounds out to the same length as the casull round , creating the same internal case volume as the casull round and same potential for equal power . ( the case heads i cut apart had brass of similar thickess , i was told the colt rounds could be made of thinner brass ) .

a friend of mine has a similar rifle and out of a 20 inch barrel with 300 grain hornady 454 casull rounds he is getting 2200-2300 fps .

hornady was making a 300 pointed bullet for tubluar magazines ( it apears they aren't right now ) but that combination might make for something that shoots flat enough for a accurate 200 yard shot .

i just use the iron sites on my gun because i consider it to be at most a 100 -150 yard gun . this is more to do with bullet drop than anything else , due to the flat nose bullets .

i'm surprised that no one is chambering a lever gun in 460 s&w / 454 casull / 45colt , it's the same case , just stretched out , like the 45-70 / 45-90 / 45-120 .
 
here's a video of Gatehouse shooting at the 300 meter gong with his open sight 45 colt trapper. I wouldn't want to be standing out there! :eek:

 
I shot my Marlin .44 mag with .44 special loads, with 245 grain cast Keith bullets I could break a clay one out of three shots at 150 yards. I think you could definitely do better with the .45colt given heavier bullets driven faster however, I found it was the gun and sights were the limiting factor.
 
todbartell said:
here's a video of Gatehouse shooting at the 300 meter gong with his open sight 45 colt trapper. I wouldn't want to be standing out there! :eek:

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Well it's good to see that program was brought to us by Jebus and meth. :D

With those short little rifles I know how hard it is to judge hold over at that range. He probably was shooting at the robin at the top of the tree. Good shooting though.
 
Teh gong is at 335 yards, I was shooting offhand. Pretty fun. I havent' worked too much wiht this rifle, but if I put my mind to it, I think that gong is in trouble.:p
 
Gatehouse said:
Teh gong is at 335 yards, I was shooting offhand. Pretty fun. I havent' worked too much wiht this rifle, but if I put my mind to it, I think that gong is in trouble.:p
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If you are using open sights that is actually pretty good shooting.
 
pharaoh2 said:
Could it be the ultimate sheep and antelope rifle??? :cool:
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Its not exactly what comes to mind when I think of hunting animals in wide open spaces but then again Im an Easterner and those conditions are foreign to me ;).......I think it would he the bees knees for black bears in the Boreal Forest that I know.
 
I don't see why it wouldn't work well at 200 yards. In my case, I've got a Winchester Trappper that I'm loading to 1600 fps with 300 grain cast bullets. Now I haven't shot it past 100 yards but it is accurate and a .45 calibre 300 grain bullet at 1600 fps essentially duplicates the original blackpowder loadings of the .45-90 which was considered to be a fine long range round in its day.

As for Pathfinder's comment about using the .45 Colt for bears in Eastern boreal forest, I can say for certain that it does that job very well.
 
the question is , is the person carrying the rifle ABLE to take a long shot for the rifle he has in his hand WITHOUT half a dozen siting shots .

my personal feeling is , it is unethical and inhumane to not try your absolute best to take the animal down in one shot .

shooting at a gong at a known range is one thing , shooting at a animal at a distance that is estimated is a completely different story .
 
I just put together a 14" MGM 45 Colt barrel onto my Contender carbine just using existing loads that were made up for my handguns it gives me around 2 1/2" groups @ 100 yards using a 4X scope...

I haven't had a chance to shoot it more than 20 times since I received the barrel a couple weeks ago though, I have no intentions of hunting with it at distances over 150 yards.

I'm planning on hunting black bear with it this spring... :D
 
A few years ago at the local range I watched a guy shoot a 45LC revolver at the 200 yard ram, and it made a hefty and respectable thump!

Quite the holdover though. :D
 
i've done it with my old army at 250- got minute of milk jug after 3 siting shots- once i got an idea of how much elevation to add, it became rather easy to add a full cylinder into that jug- and it explodes straight up when hit, not just a big leaky hole
 
X-fan said:
If you are using open sights that is actually pretty good shooting.
Click to expand...

XS Ghost Ring sights. When I get around to it I will shoot at some paper at various distances and find out proper holds for various distances.

Once that is done and if I sat down and used some shooting sticks I would have a bit more success maybe....:p
 
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