ues enough gun
Member
I saw an old thread about 45/90 earlier in the week and I started thinking about my experiences of going down that rabbit hole.
Back in the early 90's I bought a Winchester 1885, (built in 1888). All original, #3 octagon 29" barrel. Originally chambered in 32/40 but had rebored to 45/120 with a 1-16" twist. Still had the original wood, terrible drop to the stock with it's narrow steel crescent buttplate. The only mods I did was to bush the firing pin down. I wasn't a big black powder fan and so I started developing smokeless loads for it.
I ended up working up to 90 grains of IMR 4064 under a 300 grain jhp. At 15ft from the muzzle it clocked in at 2778ft per sec and 5142 ft lbs of energy. The rifle weighs in at 9-1/4lbs, it got your attention when you touched to trigger. I tried some other powders as well such as 2520 which reached even higher velocities but above 2800 ft per second bullets didn't reliably reach the target. I settled on 4064 because it had a higher fill density .
I also wanted to mainly shoot cast bullets as to not wear the barrel out so I got Dave Farmer to make me up a pp bullet mold. The mold was a nose pour .448 dia that throws bullet of 596/605 grains depending on the alloy mix. I tried a few different smokeless powders but they all left some air space. This whole time I used Homer Powleys math formulas to calculate chamber pressures. The down side was his formulas were only designed for some of the older IMR powders.
I ended up calling him up and picking his brain and he was very helpful. I tried some R-22 which worked well but only filled half the case and eventually it spooked me into going back to bulkier powders. I finally went to a duplex load of 12 grains of 4759 over a federal magnum primer with 108 grain of ff black topping it off. I might add that the top velocities I achieved with smokeless and the 596 pp was 2100 ft per sec. The recoil was horrendous to say the least, it generated 5838 ft lbs of energy and 120 ft lbs of recoil. Shooting off the bench was a eye opening experience to say the least. I would shoot 3 rounds go home for a couple hours and then come back and shoot 3 more. I could accurately shoot 12 rounds a day.
The 300 jhp load was the most devastating varmint load I've ever shot out of anything. Back in the 90's we were overrun with red fox, it obliterated them. Lots of fun, I was young and developed a high tolerance for heavy recoil. The 596 loads would shoot through anything with ease. The recoil would result in the muzzle nearly vertical and turn me half around. I'm a lot older now and the rifle sits in the rack and hasn't been out in a few years now.
Back in the early 90's I bought a Winchester 1885, (built in 1888). All original, #3 octagon 29" barrel. Originally chambered in 32/40 but had rebored to 45/120 with a 1-16" twist. Still had the original wood, terrible drop to the stock with it's narrow steel crescent buttplate. The only mods I did was to bush the firing pin down. I wasn't a big black powder fan and so I started developing smokeless loads for it.
I ended up working up to 90 grains of IMR 4064 under a 300 grain jhp. At 15ft from the muzzle it clocked in at 2778ft per sec and 5142 ft lbs of energy. The rifle weighs in at 9-1/4lbs, it got your attention when you touched to trigger. I tried some other powders as well such as 2520 which reached even higher velocities but above 2800 ft per second bullets didn't reliably reach the target. I settled on 4064 because it had a higher fill density .
I also wanted to mainly shoot cast bullets as to not wear the barrel out so I got Dave Farmer to make me up a pp bullet mold. The mold was a nose pour .448 dia that throws bullet of 596/605 grains depending on the alloy mix. I tried a few different smokeless powders but they all left some air space. This whole time I used Homer Powleys math formulas to calculate chamber pressures. The down side was his formulas were only designed for some of the older IMR powders.
I ended up calling him up and picking his brain and he was very helpful. I tried some R-22 which worked well but only filled half the case and eventually it spooked me into going back to bulkier powders. I finally went to a duplex load of 12 grains of 4759 over a federal magnum primer with 108 grain of ff black topping it off. I might add that the top velocities I achieved with smokeless and the 596 pp was 2100 ft per sec. The recoil was horrendous to say the least, it generated 5838 ft lbs of energy and 120 ft lbs of recoil. Shooting off the bench was a eye opening experience to say the least. I would shoot 3 rounds go home for a couple hours and then come back and shoot 3 more. I could accurately shoot 12 rounds a day.
The 300 jhp load was the most devastating varmint load I've ever shot out of anything. Back in the 90's we were overrun with red fox, it obliterated them. Lots of fun, I was young and developed a high tolerance for heavy recoil. The 596 loads would shoot through anything with ease. The recoil would result in the muzzle nearly vertical and turn me half around. I'm a lot older now and the rifle sits in the rack and hasn't been out in a few years now.
