44-40 Winchester, the first magnum?

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Mello2u

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I never really looked at the performance of the 44-40. I always dismissed it as an old black powder handgun cartridge which had long been obsolete. The 44-40 Winchester was created in 1873.

I use magnum very loosely here. I am thinking of performance not size.

"In 1895 Winchester switched to a 17-grain loading of DuPont No. 2 Smokeless powder with the 200-grain bullet for 1,300 fps [for 751 ft/lbs], and
in 1896 U.M.C. followed suit with a reintroduced 217-grain bullet @ 1,235 fps [for 735 ft/lbs.]" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.44-40_Winchester
Today Winchester loads a .427" diameter 200gr bullet to 1190fps for 629 ft/lbs.
These figures are really impressive for a cartridge that is now 138 years old. SAAMI pressure is listed at only 13,000 CUP. I think this is lower than the .44 Special at 15,500 psi. I don't know how to compare CUP to psi.

The original 1935 .357 Remington Magnum load was 158gr. bullet at 1515fps for 805 ft/lbs. (from an 8 3/8" barrel)
Many people regard the 10mm auto as a magnum in all but name with an original loading of a 200gr. bullet at 1200 fps for 640 ft/lbs.

I imagine in new modern handguns with hand loads work up in a reasonable manner a lot more performance can be attained. I know that some Ruger Blackhawks have been chambered for the 44-40. I imagine that a safe pressure handload could be worked up for such a gun launching a 200 gr. bullet at 1400 fps. One post I found referred to a load of 14.5gr of 2400 for a 200gr. bullet and a velocity of 1230 fps at 12,500 CUP.

As a defensive handgun cartridge, the 44-40 would seem to be quite good compared to all others available in 1935. It is certainly fairly equal to the 10mm auto (.400" diameter), maybe a bit superior with its .427" diameter.

I now wonder why (other than ignorance and lack of availability; yes, big road blocks) the 44-40 does not have a huge fan base and a number of users equal to the users of the .357 magnum.

Food for thought . . . .
 
I'm not sure what barrel length those velocities are taken from, but you need to bear in mind that .44-40 was a very popular dual-purpose loading available in both revolvers and lever-action rifles, so the velocities you're looking at may not be from a handgun.

The original loadings of the .45 Long Colt (40gr black powder) could propel a 250+gr bullet at near or slightly over 1000fps from a handgun (SAA with a 7 1/2" barrel) but the powder charge was quickly reduced due to what was considered at the time excessive recoil. When smokeless powder came out, the .45 LC was watered down even further due to fears that the ammo would find it's way into older black powder frame SAA's and similar "weak" guns.
 
Webleymkv said:
I'm not sure what barrel length those velocities are taken from, but you need to bear in mind that .44-40 was a very popular dual-purpose loading available in both revolvers and lever-action rifles, so the velocities you're looking at may not be from a handgun.
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The .44-40 was not originally a dual-purpose round. The .44-40 was originally a carbine round, while the 1873 SAA revolver was introduced in .45 Colt. It wasn't until some years down the road that Colt began selling 1873 revolvers chambered in .44-40, and they did it to accommodate the wishes of cowboys 9and others) who saw the advantages of a common round for their sidearm and carbine.

Mello2u said:
I now wonder why (other than ignorance and lack of availability; yes, big road blocks) the 44-40 does not have a huge fan base and a number of users equal to the users of the .357 magnum.
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One reason the .44-40 isn't more popular is that it's comparatively difficult to reload. The combination of thin brass coupled with the slightly bottleneck case results in a lot of cases getting crushed when seating the bullets. Both .44 Special and .45 Colt are straight-wall cases and much easier to reload.
 
the 44-40 was a well loved and respected cartridge in both carbine rifle and revolver. However it is not a magnum even by 1878 standards.

in period pistol loadings, with a 7+ inch barrel, the 44-40 was only listed as creating 350 pounds of energy at the muzzle. period loadings for the 45 colt from same barrel length was typically 100 fpe higher.


however, its still in the same ballpark as it was then, good power good control under recoil. just more expensive to purchase ammunition for.
 
Ag,
I've found that "hard to reload" thing about the .44-40 a total myth.
Pay attention to what you're doing & you don't lose a "lot" of brass.

Just as easy to reload as a .45 Colt, except you can't use a straight-walled carbide sizing die.
Also done a few thousand .32-20s, same deal.
Denis
 
Back in the late 1800s and early 1900s, 44-40 was a common round for shooting deer. The difference between reloading 45 Colt and 44-40 is that the 44-40 has to be lubricated while reloading since the brass is bottlenecked. I don't think that Starline brass makes their 44-40 brass as thin as the brass was made in the 1800s. The thin brass also use to cause reloading problems if not belled and aligned properly. I don't have any problems reloading 44-40 now. And then there's also 38-40. A couple of my 44-40s.

Pair4440-1.jpg
 
I've also never seen 1235 FPS out of a handgun-length barrel in the .44-40, I think those figures would have been through a rifle.
Denis
 
There were eventually different loads for the .44-40 and I believe the .38-40 (and possibly even the .32-20). One came to be termed a "high-speed" load that was presumably intended only for rifles, the regular load was for revolvers also. The term hi-speed was also applied to some loads for other cartridges but it is largely an obsolete term now, though I'm not sure that "plus-P" would amount to the same thing or not. At any rate, production of .44-40 rifles and carbines continued well after better cartridges, like the .30-30, were available.

Cowboys probably didn't do much shooting and reloading.
 
In 1903 Winchester began offering a higher performance version of the loading called the W.H.V. (Winchester High Velocity), boasting a velocity of 1,500 ft/s (460 m/s) with a 200-grain (13 g) jacketed bullet from a 24-inch (610 mm) barrel length, U.M.C. and Peters Cartridge Company soon introduced equivalents.
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Found this about high speed loads for rifles at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.44-40_Winchester

So the previously listed 200gr loads at near 1200fps might have been produced in handguns. Unfortunately, I can find an authoritative source for that conclusion.
 
one of very few cartridges I don't yet have or reload for... my buddy has a custom single action built on an H Schmidt 357 action, that he's been trying to talk me into... in a strong revolver, what can one expect to get out of the cartridge ??? maybe just better than 44 Special velocities ???
 
S&W actually made some N-frame revolvers in that caliber as a commemorative for a while.

A lot of the velocities quoted in the old catalogs were on the optimistic side.
 
There were eventually different loads for the .44-40 and I believe the .38-40 (and possibly even the .32-20). One came to be termed a "high-speed" load that was presumably intended only for rifles, the regular load was for revolvers also. The term hi-speed was also applied to some loads for other cartridges but it is largely an obsolete term now, though I'm not sure that "plus-P" would amount to the same thing or not.
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Probably more like the "Ruger" only loadings now produced by Buffalo Bore and others. The "high-speed" loads were listed as for use in certain guns only '92 winchesters and the like were OK but older '73s were not.
 
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