?? twist rate

[gypsyman]

Veral, Thanks for making fine products. Have a few of your molds, and they always perform wonderfully. Now, I have a couple questions, although, both concern the same subject matter. I'm seriously think of getting some barrel stock, and have a couple barrels made. They would be for the .44 mag. caliber. I'm looking to get an 8'' barrel set up for my Dan Wesson, and possible, down the road, a Marlin 1894 in .44. I'm going to concentrate on bullet weight at 280 gr. and over. Any suggestions on twist rate and groove number. I believe there is a barrel maker that does barrels in a 1-20 twist, 5 groove. Would the twist rate on a rifle like that have to be any different, than what might work on a revolver? Since I'm thinking that the loads wouldn't be much different,(somewhere between 900 and 1100 fps) ,couldn't the twist be the same??  I have a 10'' Dan Wesson in .357, has a 1-14 twist, that with your 210gr. bullet, thats a tack driver at 200 meters. (knocked over alot of 50 meter chickens at that distance) Thanks for any suggestions!!  gypsyman

[Veral]

  You don't need to worry too much about twist rate if your bullets are fitted precisely enough that they don't get a wobble on takeoff.  The big concern with balancing twist to certain bullet weights is because the people having problems with poor accuracy, don't understand the importance of precision bullet starting, into the rifling.  When bullets are wobbling on takeoff, a spin rate matches to bullet weight and velocity can cause the bullet to 'go to sleep' as its called.  Which I believe means that the bullet yaws some, with a spin so lazy that they don't spread out into large groups.  If one  watches low velocity bullet flight, from eaxctly behind the gun, through a spotting scope, with the right lighting to make the bullet show up, you will see the bullet flying in a corkscrew type flight, with the circle getting larger as they move away.  In my experiance, precision bullet starting, into the barrel, along with precision grip inside the rifled part of the barrel, and the bullet flight will appear as a straight line through the scope.

  Some believe that an uneven number of grooves/lands makes the grooves fill with lead better because the opposing drive band presses  lead into the grooves.  No body has ever proven it to my knowledge. though.

  I would stick with standard twist rates as used by the manufactures, and for rifling, if I were ordering for myself, it would be 6 groove and relitively shallow, for minimum bullet deformation.

  I have shot 250 gr bullets out of a 30-06 at velocities as low as 1200 with excellent accuracy, and 240 gr out of all the 38 caliber revolvers I had, with excellent accuracy.  But don't recall trying it in a  the only 35 cal rifle I own, a 357 mag Marlin.  The point here is both those weights are commonly considered way over the weight which the twist rates they were shooting through could handle.  Yet they were very accurate becasue the bullets were fitted so they could not tip at all on takeoff.

  Rifles can handle quite a bit slower twist due to their higher velocity, than  handguns with their lower velocities, given the same bullet weights in both.   I mean by that, most rifles of a caliber shoot much heavier bullets than handguns of similar caliber.

[RIF]

Thanks Veral.  You boil pages and pages of stuff on Cast Boolits into a few paragraphs. 

I am a fan! 

[Veral]

  Thank you for the compliment.  I like it a lot.

  For the record, in case you haven't noticed.  If I say something it is fact because I've proven it completely for my self and through customers for 32 years.    If the above doesn't apply, I very clearly say that I don't know, but sometimes I make suggestions as to what I think might work.  I don't do this very often though, because my experiments are like everybody elses.  Some work, most don't, and when a 'don't work' idea goes into print and gets many people to try it with sorry results..  -----  Well, hanging is a bit severe, but their aught to be a low agin it!

[RIF]

Well let me humble you further, I have both your books (I found the first edition with a bunch of other reloading books, I liked it so much I ended up buying your 2nd edition a few years ago, I had you autograph it, someone who I dearly love accidentally dunked it in the sink, but I still love it...and it looks like an old one eyed rag doll now) 

Anyway, I have read quite a number of works from the various stages of reloading and casting going back to the early Ideal handbooks, Kieth, Sharpe, Farrow, Harrison, and some of the semi contemporaries like Ken Waters, Frank Marshal or Ed Harris. 

Do you know that you are the top of my list of cast bullet men, the guys that really know and can prove it, both then and now? 

Very impressive Veral.  I wish you well and I owe you a debt of gratitude for your work in this wonderful area of shooting.  This area might I add had a lot of hocus pocus surrounding it, held by just a few of the learned elite...and they would let you know they knew and that they were trade secrets...and then you come and change all that .

I am only tooting your horn because I know that you would never do it yourself.  Kind of like having Pope or here right now to talk with on the magic of the internet, it is pretty fantastic how the transfer of information takes place these days. 

Thanks again for everything Veral.