45-70 load

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In another thread, in the rifle forum of TFL I mentioned I decided on, a H&R Handi .45-70 for use during primitive weapon season here in Mississippi for deer. Also, sometimes I see a hog from the stand and if I do, I shoot it because the deer hunt is basically over for the afternoon or morning.

Anyway, I now need some 45-70 load info. As many on here know I'm an experienced hand loader, have Quickload, lots of manuals etc etc.
I just want to know what y'all like for a < or = 150 yard load with a good maximum point blank. 300 gr? H4198? Just curious what y'all are using... those who hunt with the .45-70 in a modern barrel/chamber.

Oh, also it is a single shot so that may help open up the bullet selection not having to worry about feeding or recoil in the mag tube.
 
Had at least half a dozen 45-70s in Sharps, High Walls, and lever guns. To date, none of them shot 300g bullets well enough to suit me. I prefer 400g and up for best accuracy. I'm reasonably certain you can easily get good enough accuracy with the 300g to hunt deer, but I try to get the most out of the gun. So far I've shot around a dozen deer with this caliber using Rem and Barnes bullets and none of them went over twenty yards after being shot and most dropped in their tracks. Rel 7 and 4198 are my best powders with any bullet used. I keep everything around 1400-1500fps and recoil is a non issue.
 
The first step is to recognize that there are, essentially 3 levels of load data for the .45-70. And they are based on the relative strength of the rifles used.

Group I (tier I to some folks)
is the standard factory loads and handload equivalents, that duplicate the original black powder loading's pressure and velocities.

These rounds are safe in all .45-70s, from the Trapdoor Springfield on up.

"Modern steels and chambers" get you a slightly increased safety margin over blackpowder guns, but not enough to change the power level classification of suitable loads. To change that, you need a different action design.

Your Handi Rifle, being a break action is in Group I for strength.

Group II is Winchester 1886 and similar guns
Group III is Ruger single shots and various bolt actions.

A fairly recent Hornady manual I have lists their 300gr jacketed bullet hitting 1900fps (AT MAX) using IMR 4198. Test gun was a 29" barrel Trapdoor Springfield. 29" barrel. This was also the fastest load listed, and the only one to hit 1900fps. The shorter barrel of your Handi-Rifle will, of course deliver somewhat lower speed.

Personally, if limited to Group I loads, I'm a fan of a 400gr cast slug, and the old Lyman "factory duplication load" of 38.5gr IMR 3031. This is NOT a "fast" load, its about 1300 or so in most guns, but it works, and recoil is not horrid, even in light rifles. It has also been accurate in every .45-70 I've owned (4).
That level load worked in the 1880s, it works in 2017, just as well.

The first thing you need to do, before going for the upper levels of what your rifle will take, is to find a bullet that you want to use, AND that will shoot accurately from YOUR rifle. Some guns simply don't shoot the lighter bullet weights (300-350gr) very well. Others do fine with them.

Start at the STARTING LOADs and work up, slowly and carefully in small steps!!! This is standard advice, but especially important with the Handi Rifle.

Some of them have "tight chambers" and will show pressure signs (usually a cratered primer) BEFORE you reach the max loads listed in reloading manuals.

EVERY gun is different, and be aware that yours might or might not be ok at top end load levels. Use factory loads for your comparison standard. If, during your workup, you get cratered primers, or case head expansion over what a factory load does, STOP!! You have reached the maximum for your rifle, with that bullet and powder. Even if the data goes further, you SHOULD NOT.

With the single shot, length to fit and feed from a magazine is irrelevant. Crimping is not needed (make sure, however that you have good neck tension on the bullet). You can load any length up to touching the rifling if desired. Sometimes loading long makes an improvement in accuracy, sometimes, not.

Handi Rifles are known to be decently accurate, sometimes amazingly so. The old saying is that they "put the money into the barrel, not the action & stock" often seems to be true.

They are NOT, however a rifle to "magnumize" what ever round you are shooting, in.

My experience is that while expansion is nice, the .45 caliber rifle doesn't NEED it to do a good job

Hope this helps, and good luck!
 
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So do I understand correctly:

The Handi Rifle WILL handle the more powerful loads? (or will not?) Because I have looked at the load dtat already and they have the lever, modern, and Trap door, categories. I know all the "every rifles different " stuff, but I also know some modern loads have too.much pressure for older steels/designs. Like old .38's using plus p ammo or old shotguns with demascus barrels

Also, the one I got is the SB2-S57 which is the polymer stock and heat treated steel frame rather than the older SB1 cast iron frame.

I just want to be clear on this.

And I will probably buy some factory ammo for familiarizing myself, and because I need brass anyway.
 
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Ill let a more experienced person answer the category your handi rifle would belong in as im not familiar with them. Me personally, i load 44 gr of imr 4198 behind a 325 gr ftx bullet out of my 1895 marlin. Best bet if u cant figure out which load to use is to load for the trap door loads. On that i would recommend using rl-7.
 
"...in a modern barrel/chamber..." Last I heard Handi rifles use Trap Door loads. They're not as strong as you'd think. And at 7 pounds, you really don't want or need a hot load. Any jacketed 300 grain bullet with any TD load your rifle shoots best will kill Porky or Bambi with no fuss.
I think Hodgdon used a universal receiver for their TD load tests. They used a 24" barrel that neither the PBI rifle or the Carbine had. Only difference would be the velocity anyway.
And a Modern Rifle is stuff like Ruger No. 1 and 3. Not a Handi rifle. A Ruger can handle loads that come very close to .458 Win. A Handi-Rifle cannot.
QuickLoad is a computer program written by some programmer who very likely has never seen a real firearm. Far too many variables for any computer program to be reliable.
 
The Handi Rifle WILL handle the more powerful loads? (or will not?)
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I believe it is in the "not" category. Even the Encore (which is quite a bit more robust than the Handi) isn't recommended for the highest class of loads (which I find kind of strange since people shoot .460 loads out of it without apparent harm).
 
your Handi Rifle is NOT SUITABLE for loads heavier than standard factory (Trap Door level /black powder equivalent).

Its not just the modern steel, or the heat treating, its also the way the action locks up. And its not just ultimate blow up strength, either. It's about the way the pressure acts on the locking mechanism, hinge pin, and the action in general. (too much pressure "stretches" things, and that's not good.)

The "every rifle is different" part comes in when working up loads. Your rifle may, or may not take loads at or even slightly above listed maximum trap door levels, it MAY show pressure signs before this. Only shooting and working up your loads from SAFE starting loads will tell you.

If you get more than 0.001" case head expansion, stop. If you get cratered primers, stop. If fired cases don't eject normally (and you have to pull the empties out, STOP. back down a grain, or two and call it max.

One friend of mine had a Handi Rifle in .223. He got cratered primers with factory loads, from day one. Turned out his chamber was a tiny bit too tight, in the neck. He got it reamed slightly and the cratered primers went away.

Still not a rifle to push the envelope with. Good solid budget rifle, and accurate, but not a bolt gun, or a Ruger single shot.

Black powder .45-70 load levels have been dropping game (and horses and hostile savages) since 1873. still works just fine on game today, and would work on hostile savages, if any were to be found. :D

Find a load that shoots accurately, and learn its trajectory. Put the big bullet where it needs to go, and it WILL work.

DO NOT use the data for lever guns or modern single shots & bolt actions!
Even though your rifle is modern made, it is an old design, and not as strong as the modern (Ruger) rifles. Plenty strong enough for what it was made for, just doesn't have the extra strength different designs do.
 
I called H&R

So,

I tend to like the Ronald Reagan mantra of "Trust, but Verify". So I called H&R. Of course, they said never use handloads, like every single other rifle maker always says. But, they said the Handi absolutely cannot handle Ruger #1 type loads, and some of the Marlin lever type loads would be too hot for it.
Also, given the light weight of the rifle, and the opinions on here, the "Trap Door" load info is what I will work off of.


Additionally, I bought the gun to hunt the primitive weapon deer season here in Mississippi. I may also shoot a hog with it if an opportunity presents itself (otherwise when I am specifically hog hunting I use an AR-10). So, there is absolutely no reason for me to get a .458 Win Mag wanna be, or load to those specs. The Trap door load will be just fine....heck I almost got the .44 Mag version anyway which at its max is still weaker than a .47-70 on any given day.
 
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Mississippi, I wouldn't dwell on there being any downside to using Trapdoor loads in your gun. I shoot them in all of my 45-70s and they shoot very well and perform fantastic. I have yet to recover even one bullet from a deer I shot with my "anemic" 45-70 loads, regardless of the angle or the distance. The bullet goes through them like a hot knife through butter. If I'm sitting and watching an area where I can shoot "a ways", I always use a range finder and note the distances to a couple of physical reference points. Fact is, I've never gotten to shoot anything where I had to do any calculating. Out to a hundred or so I don't have to do any adjusting. Just in case, I know the trajectory if I do get the chance for a longer shot. From what I've read about them, your rifle should shoot very well and I'm sure you're going to like the caliber after you connect a few times. Good luck with it.
 
Mississippi, I wouldn't dwell on there being any downside to using Trapdoor loads in your gun. I shoot them in all of my 45-70s and they shoot very well and perform fantastic. I have yet to recover even one bullet from a deer I shot with my "anemic" 45-70 loads, regardless of the angle or the distance. The bullet goes through them like a hot knife through butter. If I'm sitting and watching an area where I can shoot "a ways", I always use a range finder and note the distances to a couple of physical reference points. Fact is, I've never gotten to shoot anything where I had to do any calculating. Out to a hundred or so I don't have to do any adjusting. Just in case, I know the trajectory if I do get the chance for a longer shot. From what I've read about them, your rifle should shoot very well and I'm sure you're going to like the caliber after you connect a few times. Good luck with it.
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Hey, Im not concerned with respect to performance or anything. As has been said, just ask the American Bison how those ol black powder .45-70 trap door loads work. I just want to make sure i don't damage something...and I was making the point that a .458 win load is great for Cape Buffalo, and if you have a Ruger #1, it is possible, but in this gun, because of the action, it would be beyond the safety limits.

Also, there is no way I would load to that spec because the rifle is too light and would be painful to shoot. Again, I just like to know the acceptable range to work in before I start. I might find that a 300 gr bullet going 1800 fps shoots sub moa and has a not so unpleasant recoil...if so, that will be my load.
 
One thing I can pass along to you about the Handi is from an experience my hunting buddy in Fl had. The grandson of the guy who's cattle lease we hunted had one that suddenly started shooting bad groups. Since my buddy is a very good garage gunsmith, he took a look. What he found was that the barrel was all coppered up. After cleaning the copper out, he found the cause of the fouling. It had extremely rough (and shallow) rifling. He couldn't do anything about the depth but he used Flitz to polish the bore to help prevent the jagged rifling from shaving so much copper. When he was done, it went back to shooting reasonable groups again.
 
I bought some Federal ammo with the Speer hot cores, Winchester Super X, and Remington Core Lokt, well see what the gun likes. Also, since I bought 40 of each, I'll have some brass to load it with.

As for the pressure the Handi Rifle can withstand, this is straight from Buffalo Bore Ammunition.

All Marlin 1895 (1895 Marlins are all model 336 actions, chambered in 45-70) iterations made since 1972, all Browning 1885 and 1886 copies, Rossi Rio Grande, New England Arms Handi Rifle, T/C Encore, ALL falling block actions made of modern steel such as Ruger #1 and #3, Shiloh, Christian and Persoli Sharps, all Winchester 1886 iterations made since 1915 and all Siamese Mauser bolt actions.


This blurb is on Buffalo Bore 2350fps 300 gr JHP's.

So if the Handi can't take hot loads....why would Buffalo Bore claim it will? And it isn't like it just happened, these rounds and guns have been around a long time.

I'm not trying to be argumentative, but this is the first semi-official info in what a newer SB2 Handi Rifle can take in terms of pressure.... implying it will handle at least as much as a lever action Marlin, and I wouldn't, if I wanted, be relegated to trap door loads.

Again, im not saying what I will do, only what is safely possible. However, the Handi will not handle the .458 win mag--like loads that a Ruger #1/#3 will.
 
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My chronoed (if that is a word) Guide Gun loads with a 350 grain Hornady RN bullet are averaging 1960 fps. Powder is a near max load of H-4895. With the Burris FF II BDC scope, loads zeroed at 100 yards hit target center first tick down at 150 yards and target center second tick down at 200 yards.
 
I've done a lot of loading for .45-70 trapdoor pressure guns. If you can find Lymans old 330gr hollow point bullet, it's good. I would agree that the 400/405gr bullets are probably easier to load. More data out there. Trapdoors normally have data to around 1500 to maybe 1600. Any of these from 1350fps and up are good killers on deer. They are a lot more effective then we think they should be. I took out a thousand pound Hereford for a friend at about 100yards, through and through penetration taking out the heart. I say again it's a great game cartridge.
 
This blurb is on Buffalo Bore 2350fps 300 gr JHP's.

So if the Handi can't take hot loads....why would Buffalo Bore claim it will?
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The devil is in the details, I think. And in this case, the detail I think you are missing is that Buffalo Bore is NOT saying the Handi Rifle will handle heavy loads. What they are saying it that is will handle THEIR ammo.

Bufflao Bore has earned a good reputation for telling the truth about the velocities they get with their ammo, and what guns it is safe to shoot their ammo in.

They do NOT tell anyone HOW they get such high speeds. They do not tell anyone the pressure their ammo produces.

Buffalo Bore's ammo is proprietary. I believe they do something no one else does, and they are keeping it to themselves. A very sensible business attitude, I think.

What I suspect (but have no proof) is that Buffalo Bore uses powder(s) that are made for them, ones we cannot get. I believe Buffalo Bore ammo gets the speeds they get, and are safe in the guns they say they are safe in, because BB loads generate less pressure than would be created by reloader's canister propellants at the same velocities.

In other words, to match the BB speed with regular reloading components, the pressure would be higher, and in this case above the "trapdoor" Table 1 load levels, and into the "lever gun" table 2 levels. And that is why BB says your Handi Rifle can shoot their loads and the people who make the Handi Rifle say stick to Table 1 trapdoor levels.

I SUSPECT a modern Handi Rifle is probably able to handle beginning loads in the lever gun class, but is regulated to the lower level loadings to ensure safety.

its your gun, carefully work up loads until you start showing pressure signs, or your shoulder gives up, or stick to factory level stuff, Buffalo Bore being considered among the best these days.
 
Ken Waters's pet load for the .45-70 was a 405 grain (more or less) RNFP cast bullet pushed by 38.5 grains of IMR 3031. This works out to about 1200-1300 fps, depending on barrel length and time of the year. On the one hand, it is suitable for Trapdoor Springfields; on the other hand, it is generally considered to be more than adequate for anything that walks in eastern United States.
 
What I suspect (but have no proof) is that Buffalo Bore uses powder(s) that are made for them, ones we cannot get. I believe Buffalo Bore ammo gets the speeds they get, and are safe in the guns they say they are safe in, because BB loads generate less pressure than would be created by reloader's canister propellants at the same velocities.
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That is quite possible... While i do not have access to special powder, I have an F-CLASS .300 wm load that will safely reach 3000 fps with a 225 gr bullet and 28" barrel. But that round is seated 1/3" beyond saami, using Norma brass Which has more volume than any other brand of brass and a tight chamber.

I appreciate the answer, it makes perfect sense. We shall see how much thump these factory rounds have...I'm sure a 300 gr Speer hot cores at 1880 fps will be enough for deer/hogs and gray squirrels.
 
FWIW, 57.3 gr Varget under 300 gr Hornady JHP (not the plastic tip), 1660ish fps. Minimal squirrel tracking. 1" high at 100 zero is the top of the 4-plex at 200 with a Nikon.
 
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