375 Dan Wesson

[rick w.]

I have an eight inch Dan Wesson 375 Supermag. I have never shot it since purchase. I have read that 375 Winchester or 30/30 can be used for the parent case, with the 375 winchester brass being perferred. I have a small stash of 375 Winchester brass and have the 375 winchester dies.

Is shortening the 375 winchester dies in a lathe useable for reloading the 375 supermag Dan Wesson ammo?

Regards,

Rick W.

[Pinkerton]

yes I believe so, I had a 375 Super mag barrel for a contender a few years ago, lucky for me the previous owner had plenty of brass to pass on with that barrel and I never formed any, some where made from 30-30 and 32 special brass but most the 375 Win. If you search around I think there may be some cutoff dies to make this case, but I think you should be fine doing it on the lathe.

let us know how it does I'd love to find a DW in this round that I wouldn't have to sell one of my kids to afford.

[rick w.]

thanks for your comments.

In looking at the case overall length specs of the 375 supermag and the 375 Winchester; that I have, it appears that the 375 Winchester dies need to be reduced by 0.410".  I am not too sure what the neck dimensions will look like with the shortened die, but probably can get an estimation by the body taper notes. One might just have to try it out and see. The 375 Winchester dies were fairly inexpensive and I have carbide tooling; so hopefully; something usable will come about. I have not seen the actual 375 supermag dies, I suspect if I did, I could not afford them.

Regards,

Rick W.

[gypsyman]

Rick, have had and shot a .375DW for a few years. Just a couple suggestions. I've been using Redding dies, which will run around $100, as they are a custom die. The case is actually a tapered case, so the taper of the .375sm  is a little more than the standard .375Win. case. I use a Redding Profile crimp die, as it works pretty good to keep the bullet from ''walking'' out of the case under recoil.
You can use .375Win brass, as it's a little heaveir/thicker brass than 30/30. It's more expensive than 30/30. Again, Redding makes a 30 to 375 tapered expander, so if you want to make a bunch of brass for the gun, you can use 30/30 brass. Depending on how you load it, that brass will normally last 6-8 reloads.   gypsyman

[dougk]

I have the 375 and purchase my ammo from Reeds who is a sponsor of this site.  Here is the link for the .375 SuperMag ammo http://shop.reedsammo.com/category.sc?categoryId=146

[rick w.]

I appreciate the time, folks have spent on their responses to my 375SM reloading die query. Custom dies are a bit out of the slush fund range right now; hopefully the cut off 375 Winchester dies will work out, if nothing else will be an experiment.

regards,

Rick W.

[David Carey]

Rick I purchased dies last year for my 375SM (375USA) same caliber the were only $75.00 new let me know if you are interested and I can send you the info on where to purchase.

Dave

[rick w.]

Dave,

Thanks for the offer on a source for 375 supermag reloading dies, but looks like I am going down the route with the cutoff die attempt. Trying to find time to get out to the lathe and shorten them up and see what happens.

Regards,

Rick W.

[David Carey]

You still need to reload the brass, what dies are you going to use after you cut them off?

Dave

Dave,

Thanks for the offer on a source for 375 supermag reloading dies, but looks like I am going down the route with the cutoff die attempt. Trying to find time to get out to the lathe and shorten them up and see what happens.

Regards,

Rick W.

[rick w.]

Hi Dave,

I guess I got the idea about cutting off 375 Winchester reloading dies(RCBS) for use with the 375 Supermag by looking at the maximum  case length of the two cases, ie 2.020" and 1.610"(only reference I have access to) respectively which shows a 0.410" difference. So I thought about cutting off some 375 Winchester brass and some RCBS 375 Winchester reloading dies and see if the result could be used with a 375 supermag revolver.

In looking at the body taper/inch rate numbers on both cases with the shortened 375 Winchester case(cut down to 1.610 to begin with); it appears that the slightly larger diameter numbers of the 375 Winchester parent case at the base and at the shortened area will get close to the supermag dimensions when run thru the shortened die. The brass thickness at the shortened 375 Winchester case is something I have no information about yet, but guess one could always ream if necessary, I just do not know how the thickness will really turn out yet.

I believe that 38-55, 30-30, and 32 special(as others commented on) could be candidates for parent brass(due respect to pressures) to be run thru the shortened dies if the 375 Winchester is scarce etc. By shortening the 375 Winchester dies by approximately 0.410", the taper of the die will constrict based on the linear? taper of said die, and hopefully retain the roll crimp if the die has it. Probably need to research(just casual so far by me) the dimensional numbers on the two cases/die set some more to get more confidence in the approach, but so far looks kinda feasible and these 375 Winchester dies/brass are expendable in my situation here.

So just trying to use what I have to get a pistol shooting. I have shot a 10" 445 and a 8" 357max, but not a 375.My 375 supermag pistol is a 8" model, which I suspect is the common variation during those years.

regards,

Rick W.

[David Carey]

That would be good information for those that want a 375SM but are afraid of never being able to shoot it. Please let us know if the 375 Winchester dies work.

Dave

[dougk]

I choose to defer this to Ron Reed, who has kindly started providing .375SM ammo.  Given the amount I shoot, purchasing the ammo from Ron was cheaper than me reloading, I currently dont reload becuase it has not proved to be cheaper than buying ammo. 

I might need to convince Ron to make .41SM ammo when I get my .41 SuperMag. 

[rick w.]

I finally got around to cutting down a set of 375 Winchester dies for intended use with a 375 Supermag Dan Wesson. I used the 410 nominal  number for the seater die to get hold of the die's crimp function but the FL sizer die and expander dier were cut down with a lessor dimension. The expander die body was soft and cut easily, I just cut it down until I could expand/bell the shortened case properly. The FL sizing die and seater were surface hardened, so had to use some carbide tooling to cut them down. I did not cut down the FL sizer die the full 410 length , but rather went until I got the sized O.D.'s that I thought would be ok.

I ended up making up some rounds using 30/30 brass. I used a 357 Herrett expander followed by the cutdown 375 diameter expander. I used some 235 gr jacketed bullets and a starting load from a manual. Looks like will have to look into a lead mold for a 38/55 sometime, as these jacketed bullets are kinda hard on the wallet.

So anyway, I wanted to see if something usuable could be done without custom dies etc. Hoping to shoot it in the coming weeks, guess that will be the proof of the pudding of how well the shortened dies will work out.

Rick W.

[Reed1911]

Rick,

Feel free to shoot me a line if you need data or factory ammo to balance your loads against. I'd really like to put the 225g JSP's I have as a production round as well as the 245 and 265 lead but unless I can secure a source for factory brass properly reamed (yup guys it really is in the works) then they will have to wait.