.45 auto rim in a .45lc revolver?

The 45 Auto Rim has an extra thick rim. It was designed to fit a cylinder that was cut to allow firing 45 acp in half moon clips, only rimmed to allow firing and ejection without the use of easily bent half moon clips. The S&W 25-2 and 625 chambers allow doing this. But those guns chambers won't allow use of the 45 Colt, with a regular thickness rim and longer chamber. You can shoot the 45 Schofield aka 45 S&W, which will shoot in cylinders chambered for the Colt since they are shorter but otherwise similar dimensioned version of the Colt. Now if you are talking a single action revolver, fitted with an acp and a colt cylinder, there seems to me to be no reason not to have the back of the ACP cylinder turned down to accept the Auto Rim ctg. Actually, if you insist on firewalling the acp/ar case, it's insurance you won't stick a round loaded to 45 super power levels into your Gold Cup. The AR was loaded to near 44 mag power in the "old" days of the 50's and 60's when handloaders measured pressures by eyeballing visible effects ( primer flattening, case lengthening, stretching where web and case sides met, etc. ).
 
So .45S&W is ok?

Rusty,

Thanks for the reply. I have a S&W 625 .45LC, and if I understand your answer, I could also shoot .45S&W in it, but not any of the other .45 cartridges (aside for the lc, of course)?

Canuck1911
 
I just re-edited my response to make it a bit clearer. with a 625-5 you can shoot 45 Colt ( aka 45 Long Colt ) or 45 S&W ( aka 45 short ) which is the same as 45 Schofield ammo. The term "Long" Colt is semantically incorrect as there is no "Short" Colt. The 45 S&W/45 Scofield is the shorter 45 round. The short round could be fired in the Schofield or the Colt SAA, but the long round wouldn't work in the short Schofield. Of course this meant the soldiers of the day who ended up with Schofield revolvers, got shipped the long ammo. So then the army went to issuing the short round only, and I believe they then pulled all the Schofields, leaving the Colt revolvers with the downloaded power short ammo.

Theoretically you could have a gunsmith fit a 45 acp/ar cylinder to swap for the 45 Colt cylinder. It has been done, but seldom. Reason for that is the lug at the rear bottom of the cylinder window on the left side. It has to be cut so it supports the back of the cylinder when you push on the ejector rod, which pushes on the ejector star, ejecting the cartridges. The proper index depends on the rear edge of the cylinder which depends on rim thickness (isn't this fun? ). The one example I saw with two interchangeable cylinders had the rear edge of the 45 Colt cylinder turned down to match the lug made for the other cylinder. This reduced the strength of an already nearly overly thin cylinder. Arrgh! As you can tell, I once dreamed of having this done to my matched set of 41 mag M&P's by swapping barrels and rechambering cylinders.
 
Right, Canuck1911. I'd probably never have mentioned the 45 S&W aka Schofield round ten years ago. With cowboy action shooting, though, they are producing Italian Schofield replicas that are incorrect because they did what S&W really ought to have done way back when. They lengthened the cylinder and frame so they can now fire the longer Colt round.

Of course now that the replica Schofields can fire 45 Colt ammo, the cowboy shooters decide that the Schofield round is just right to use as a reduced recoil round so they can shoot their replica SAA's chambered for 45 Colt faster! So I'd guess that today they are probably making more 45 S&W ammo right now than in the heyday of the blackpowder cartridge! To sell to what were the Yuppies of the 80's and the Cowboys of the 90's! Hey, I can make fun of them, cause I is one, and have been the last 20 years.

ROTFLMAO.
 
Note that almost none of the above applies to single action revolvers like the Ruger .45Colt/.45ACP convertible, since those guns use an ejector rod, so lack of a rim on the case is not a factor in ejection, and moon clips are not needed. The .45ACP cylinders have a shoulder in the chambers just like the auto pistols, to provide headspace and case support in firing.

Jim
 
True, Jim, but though I see no reason a Ruger 45 acp cylinder could not be chucked into a lathe and the rear of the cylinder relieved for the the AR's rim without changing the acp headspace, it isn't done at the factory. So the AR cartridge is dying. The Ruger is capable of handling higher pressures than are safe in either AR or Colt cases.

But I guess that I'll have to break down and get a 45 Blackhawk convertible. Cause the acp cylinder is fine for 45 Super, and the Colt cylinder can handle the Colt cartridge loaded to magnum velocities, and both 45 (magnum) Colt and 45 Super can be bought factory loaded.

Oh, Lord, here I am talking myself into a new gun again....
 
other .45's

and if you happen to run across some older ammo, you can also shoot the .455 Webley cartridge in you .45LC. george nonte use to make .455 cases by facing off the rims of the .45AR
 
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