.458 winchester cast bullets in the Ruger #

[Ron LeClear]

Pat
I have a Remington 700 in .458 Win. Mag. I use a Lee 500 gr. RN with reduced loads (it's about 465 gr with linotype), but never tried to drive it over about 1300 due to the punishment on my old shoulder...But I think it would go to the max without any trouble at all.  My normal load for 500 gr. Hornady JRN is 74 gr. of H4895 at 2050 fps with CCI LR primers which gives almost a one hole group at 100 yds. with a scope but it hurts too much to get more than a 3 shots group in any one range session.
The reduced load gives about the same accuracy at 50 yards with a Lyman receiver sight with a lot less punishment.

Ron

[Nobade]

I agree with Ron - The Lee bullet will likely work as well as anything, and the moulds are cheap if you don't like it. The .458 is kind of less than optimal for cast bullets due to the taper all the way to the case mouth, but it'll work OK if you're careful about flaring the mouth and setting the seating die. Cast the bullets hard, use Hornady gaschecks and good lube, and it'll run up to full .458 speeds with no problem though you'll likely get better accuracy a little below that. For fun cast bullet loads, just call it a 45-90 and use the data for that if you don't need full power. Oh, make sure you clean every bit of copper out of your bore first or you won't get very good results with any cast bullets.

[Castaway]

Try patching a 500 grainer.  Would have to run the bullet through a 0.452 sizer first, but it's not that hard to do, just clean the lube off before putting your patch on.  You can get up to 2,200 f/s with pure lead, and more with a harder bullet.  Don't know about you, but my shoulder starts to complain way before that point.

[Aladin]

First, I just want to say thanks for the responses to my post.  I have a lot of wheel weights and IMR 3031 in my garage to start loading the .458.  I have casted a  lot of pistol bullets but never for a rifle.  Again thanks...

Pat your first job is determining throating on your gun-- dia and length. Match the dia with your slug and try to seat that slug as far forward to the rifling as possible. Some 458's have long throats.

For hardness-- drop the slugs hot right otta the mold into a pail of cool water. That'll harden them to the range of linotype. Most likely sizing isn't going to be needed.

3031 is good powder for the 458 for sure. Another tac is a caseful of slow fuel just mildly compressed. THat stradegy is something slower and possibly easier on the shoulder. Those 500's don't have to go 2000 fps to do the job-- the 45/70 is an excellent killer at 5-700 fps slower.

[captainkirk]

I use a 450 grain Lee plain base, unsized and hand lubed with Lyman Super Moly (boy is that hard to get off of your fingers) and a light load of SR 4759 for mild 45-70 level loads.  I have a redfield 4x on the gun and often 3 of the 5 shots at 100 yards will be touching.  I just use straight wheel weights quenched in water.  The #1 is a lot of fun with these loads, plenty of thump, mild recoil with the heavy barrel and very economical.  Do make sure you get all of the copper out of the barrel before shooting cast bullets though, JB bore paste seemed to work well for me.

Good shootin'

[Rocky]

CaptainKirk,

What's the fastest you've driven the Lee plain base 450 gr/Super Moly lubed bullets?
Are you getting any barrel leading at higher velocities?
Thanks.  

[captainkirk]

Rocky,

Sorry it took me so long to get back, I've been out of town.  To answer your question, I would guess the velocity was in the 1250-1350 fps range.  I have not yet gone higher.  After 30 rounds of this in one sitting, no lead whatsoever...