Cut down 45/70 idea

[stimpylu32]

Has anyone ever run this idea through their head , take a standard 45/70 and cut it down to 1.600 and neck it down to either ,452 or even .429 .

Should make a nice close range deer round or even black bear for that matter and would meet the rules for places like Indiana were the case must be more than 1.160 and no more than 1.625 .

For that matter you could stay with a .458 bullet and shoot it in a 45/70 chamber like a 38 spl in a 357 mag . Any ideas or am I looking for something too weird . 

stimpy

[BBF]

Many years ago my gunsmith mentioned something called( he did anyway) a 458 US
It was a 458 Win Mag case cut down to 2.00 lenght. He said that basically all belted magnum cases with the same size head could be used  for this. I never did this but also recall he showed me a case that was loaded up with a cast "boolit" This would look similar to a shorter 450 Marlin case

[Lone Star]

At least one silhouette handgun cartridge was made this way, I believe it was called the .45 Silhouette.  It is in COTW but I'm not near my copy right now.  I don't remember exact bullet diameter or length, but it was very close to what you propose.

Because the .45-70 case is tapered, shooting a shortened version in a standard chamber would not be a great idea.

Update: The .45 Silhouette is 1.5" long and fires a .458" bullet.  It was designed to fire 300-grain bullets at ca. 1200 fps out of a 10" barrel.


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[Nobade]

My 1894 Marlin rifle, chambered for 45 Colt, has such a big chamber that it properly fits .458" bullets. Using light 45-70 bullets in the 325 - 350 grain range and stiff charges of AA5744 allows it to do what you are describing. Recoil is a bit stout but it is very accurate.

A cut down 45-70 case blown out straight ought to work with a .475" bullet. You could make essentially the same thing as a 480 Ruger or 475 Linebaugh depending on how long and how hot you loaded it.

[StrawHat]

I believe Gary Reeder has done something similar for use in his revolver conversions.  The 450/400 perhaps.

[Catfish]

Wouldn`t that be real close to the .460?

[stimpylu32]

As it turns out this was not one of my better ideas , no major blowups or anything like that but the groups or should I say PATTERNS were real bad .

Trail Boss was defiantly not the powder for this round, the Unique did somewhat better , yet still not real well .

I still have one dummy round that will go in my What Were You Thinking Box just for S&G's .

Leason learned . 

stimpy

[243dave]

Stimpy, If I was you I'd just chamber a 445 super mag in a encore(or contender) barrel and be done. Its a 44 bullet with a 1.600" piece of brass, no trimming or anything, starline makes the brass. 44 mag and special rounds can also be fired through it. Sierra says they can achieve 1800fps out of a 14" barrel and 30.7 grains of 296 powder. Maybe take a 460s&w trim it from 1.790 to 1.600 seat the bullet long and probably keep the same powder capacity and not have to buy a custom barrel. You can also shoot 454 and 45colt through it.  I don't think you could ever get the accuracy from a 45-70 chamber with a cartridge as short as you want, that is a long jump for the bullet. My brother had a contender barrel chambered in 45colt/410 and couldn't get it to shoot. Being the pro I am I told him I'd get it to shoot the 45colt accurately , long story short, he traded it for a 30-30. The chamber was too long for the kind of accuracy we knew a contender was capabile of. From what I've read lots of people has this problem with the 45/410, this is what I think you'd run into with a real short 45-70 in a regular 45-70.   Dave