some interesting Chrono work related to dustins bear hunt

[Lloyd Smale]

Buddy AL anderson did this after dustin killed the bear with his .475 at 176 yards just to see what kind of velocitys he had at impact. Al is one of the few that could pull off chronoing a handgun at that range.

1. With the .475 even though Dustin and I have the same guns built at the same time 10 years ago mine runs the load he used on the bear almost 100 FPS faster, but my bullets were cast with harder alloy (probably by Lloyd) so they were 5 grains lighter. At any rate with 24 grains H 110 and a 420 LFNGC they started out at 1223 and at 176 yards they were going 1008 for a difference of 215. So at Dustins velocity they would have been going 925 when they hit the bear. When I started out the same bullet over 20 H 110 from a .480 Ruger at 1190 they were going 973 at 176 yards for a difference of 217 FPS.

3. .475 and 400 RCBS Keith Style bullet started out at 1136 and at 176 yards were going 956 so they lost 180 fps.

4. With my 4" .500 Linebaugh built by Dustin and a 440 Keith of MT Baldy design over 28 grains of H 4227 they started out at 1083 and at 176 yards were going 908 for a difference of 175, this gun and bullet were used on a black bear and I will have a short story on Dustins web site about it.

5. Last .500 Linebaugh I checked yesterday was a 480 grain LFNGC over 16 grains of HS6 and started out at 984 and at 176 yards were going 847 for a difference of only 137 so these big bullets may start out slow but don't slow down much.

And velocities can vary greatly from gun to gun as I was shooting 5 different .500 linebaughs recently and one would be around 60 fps slower than two others with the same barrel length.

Well thats it for now have to get outside and shoot between the heavy snow coming down.

Take Care,

Al

[bigbore442001]

Very interesting stats. I love it when I see in some of the magazines ( which I really don't buy but read at Barnes and Noble) on how you need an 8mm Rem Mag or one of the new short mags otherwise you will waste time,  money and the game.

[Camp Cook]

Good read thanks for posting.

I have two consecutive serial #ed stainless steel 5.5" barreled Ruger Bisley Vaquero's that are chambered in 45 Colt that I would love to have converted to either 454 Casull, 475 or 500 Linebaugh.

Soooo.... to hear reports like this is great...

[lutefisk louie]

very interesting. we did some crono work like that some years back. used 2 cronographs and measured muzzle and 100 yd down range. tested 44, 45, 454, and some 500 linebaugh.
found that the b.c. given in books is sometimes not even close.
also found not much diff in cast designs and jacketed if weight was similar.
did find that high velocity bullets sometimes slow down even more than thought (44 and 454)
even light for caliber 400 gr. bullets in 500 were kind of impressive compared to say a 240gr. 44.
found that some expanding jacketed types were going slower than i thought at ranges that i have shot game at. but these bullets when recovered still were expanded.
b.c. seemed to be more related to sectional desity than shape or any other factor, at least in the loads we were testing.
bottom line--  heavy bullets always held velocity better no matter what design.

[shilo]

Great information. That's a pretty impressive feat chronograph at 175yds without hitting the screens or chrono.