.45 colt carbine chamber size

[yankeeapple]

I am thinking of finding a 45 colt barrel/ gun and then possibly reaming it to .454 casull. My question for those of you who have a 45 colt barrel is what is your chamber size? I have two ruger revolvers in 45 colt, manufactured about 15 years apart. The chamber sizes are about .008 different with the newer gun being tighter. The expansion of the brass in the looser gun seems to maker resizing more difficult from the limited reloading I have done. I would like to know what I am getting for a chamber size before I act. Thanks in advance

[cwlongshot]

I have 6-5 revolvers and four rifles chambered for the 45 Colt. One Marlin is very bad, I dont think any are the same, altho the Cassull's brass will go right in the Rugers. ALL of them shoot just fine.
That one Marlin gets its own Brass, for exactly the reason you mentioned. I could not care less for the extra effort, My AmmoMaster has plently of leverage to load a 50 BMG, there isnt a 45Colt case made that will not get resized. BUT that brass does get "worked" harder and for that resson I keep it seperate. I go one more step, years ago Midway marked there own brass head stamp, I bought some and keep all Midway headstamped brass for that one Marlin 1894.
 
Long story short, Dont worry about it, rechamber to 454 and have fun. My own 45COLT H&R is now a 454 and it shoots very well. The loads it liked before as a 45COLT dont shoot as well, but new loadings shoot just as well and even better and 454 loadings have been most excellent.
 
CW

[petemi]

Until just recently, we've had 3 Handi 7mm-08s.  All the chambers were different.  I had to separate the fired brass by respective rifle or full length size it.  For this reason, I don't think you can get a cut and dry answer.

Pete

[gendoc]

6 or 7 unlike chambers is reasonable.  when ya got several hundred a year pass thru your
test lab you will think....is this a problem !!!!  no its normal. try some forensics search'n fora
suspect 45 colt .............its crazy and country wide

[keith44]

.45 Colt is perhaps the best know culprit due to someone changing the standard bore size from .454 down to .451 each having a tolerance plus or minus those values you could very well end up with an extra tight chamber / bore of .4499, to a very sloppy loose .4550


All chambers and bores are allowed variance from nominal and I believe this is part of why every gun shoots different loads with varying success.


If ya wanna build a .454, find a .45 colt, slug the bore, cast the chamber and see if it will work for you, if not, find another slug it, etc.  You can re-sell the one(s) that do not meet your standards

[tacklebury]

Well, I had a very similar desire to load for both my New Model Blackhawk in .45 Colt and my .45LC Classic Carbine.  The first one I got  made the brass look like a football and blew out the side walls .025 or so every shot.  I was a bit peeved, but luckily since I had purchased it from Davidson's, I activated their lifetime warranty process and returned it for a new one.  This one did nearly the same thing, with the exception that it had a .010 high spot at the rear, so it would barely eject even on light loads.  I literally only shot 4 bullets through it and wanted to return it, but Davidson's ask me to try to get H&R to review it first, so I sent it to them.  They called me and said the barrel couldn't be fixed so I had to pick a different caliber.  I was like NOT HAPPENING!  So finally, they said the only thing they could do was return this gun to me as is, and I said do it.  The final chapter was that I contacted my Davidson's dealer again and he said it was all or nothing.  They would try to find one that was decent, but since it was a discontinued model by H&R that they couldn't keep swapping them.  I got the 3rd one and FINALLY, all was good.  This one is even tighter tolerance than my Blackhawk and shoots good and had the best wood of them all.  Right after I received that one, Davidson's took the listing off their site.  So moral is do what you can to check it, but there is a chance you'll get a big one.  The good news was that after purchasing a Lee carbide deluxe die set, I was able to get them back into shape and I'm still shooting that brass.  I couldn't get it to load using the Lee Loader, which is how I was loading then. 

[Hit or Miss]

The chamber on my carbine is definitely tighter than the one on my Blackhawk.  The Blackhawk is downright sloppy.

[dpe.ahoy]

My first one was so loose, I had to open the mouth of the extractor to allow the brass to come all the way out of the chamber.  It would drag so bad, the brass was being scratched pretty good at the end of the extractor.  Some careful work with the dremel took care of the problem, and the brass comes out just fine now.  DP