45 COLT: Please tell me what I am missing...

B

Biff Tannen

New member
According to one of the most objective ballistics authorities, Ballistics By The inch, 45 colt seems somewhat inferior to the 44 magnum and 45 ACP, because it is several hundred fps slower.
http://http://www.ballisticsbytheinch.com/45colt.html
And so, can you guys (and gals) please clear up for me why 45 LC is such a popular handgun round? What am I missing here?
Thank you much and stay safe!
 
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It is heavier than .45 ACP (I shoot 255 gr bullets). For that reason, it may have more stopping power, even at slower speeds. It does not have the speed of .44 Mag but it can be cranked up pretty high in Rugers and other reinforced revolvers. And the bullet is a good deal bigger than the .44 mag (which is really 429 compared to .452).

The only reason I bought one is because the cartridge is huge! The cartridge is fun to hold in your hand and kicks like a mule, even at low velocities. I don't shoot it much but when I do, I enjoy it. Until it starts to hurt....

If you are into cowboy action shooting, it's the only way to go.
 
In it's original loadings for the old style Colt's and replicas it is definately slower, altho I wouldn't necessarily call it inferior. Hand loaded up to use in Blackhawks and other beefed up modern guns it is as good or better power wise.

The first time I ran some hand loads thru my Ruger it drew blood. I was in love. Bought a set of Pachmyers and that never happened again. For an old originally Black Powder cartridge it can do anything a 44 mag can do and more IMO.
 
I load a 300gr bullet to about 1300 fps. Would not call that inferior.

Most of its popularity is with reloaders because of flexability and cowboy action shooters who want to be period accurate.

Taurus Judge has not hurt popularity either
 
According to one of the most subjective ballistics authorities, Ballistics By The inch, 45 colt seems very inferior to the 44 magnum and 45 ACP, because it is several hundred fps slower.
http://http://www.ballisticsbytheinch.com/45colt.html
And so, can you guys (and gals) please clear up for me why 45 LC is such a popular handgun round? What am I missing here?
Thank you much and stay safe!
Click to expand...

Velocity is only part of the story. The .45C is usually loaded with heavier bullets and they are always larger diameter (.452" v. .429"). Both are huge differences -- if you look at the TKO equation, weight, expanded bullet diameter and velocity all weigh in at the same level. So slower velocity but greater weight and larger bullet means higher knock-down.

The Colt really excels, though, for reloading. You can load up the .45C (for SOME revolvers) to greater than .44Mag+P energies.
 
Heritage.

I want to get a 45 Colt someday. It is a large bore cartridge and it has a heritage from the old West. I am sort of a history enthusiast. I am told it is easy to handload with a variety of different power levels. I have shot 45 Colt before, a few times, and I thought it was awesome. One day I will get one, maybe.
 
I traded it off a few years ago :mad: but I used to love shooting my Ruger SA .45LC six shooter.

It was especially fun at dusk and even when it was dark, . . . pull the trigger and light up the whole yard with the "unique" hand loads we had in it.

Nahhhhhh, . . . it may be less popular than the .44 mag or .45ACP, . . . but inferior is a word I would never give it. Heck, . . . the thing might just take offense to a statement like that,............

May God bless,
Dwight
 
A 200 gr. ACP bullet traveling at 900fps or a 255 gr. LC bullet traveling at 900fps. No, I don't think I would call it inferior. Shoot a 255 gr +P load in an original Ruger Vaquero and decide for yourself.
 
Biff Tannen said:
What am I missing here?
Click to expand...
Garbage In, Garbage Out.

You have almost NO data for .45 Colt. Two odd-ball rounds from Cor-Bon, and a LSWC target round do not, to me, provide a suitable basis for comparison.
 
.45 Colt isn't what I would call a very popular handgun round. Ammo isn't all that common and the only handguns that you will commonly see chambered for it are single action revolvers. It pales in comparison to other revolver cartridges such as the .44 Magnum or the .357 Magnum.

However, the .45 Colt is popular today among hand loaders. It's a very versatile round and there are a lot of different bullet types available for it. You can load really light rounds for plinking or sports like Cowboy Action Shooting, and you can load some really hot rounds that will give a few .44 Magnum loadings a run for their money.

There are a lot of people out there who could care less what a few commercial loadings will do against a block of ballistics gel. For them it's not about how effective the round is when it comes to killing, it's about how much fun it is to shoot.
 
Some like to take the .45 Colt to the max in Rugers or other similiarly build revolvers. Loaded like that I don't think the shooter or beast being shot at could tell the difference between the .44 or .45.

I shoot the .45 Colt in my Ruger Blackhawk simply because I enjoy using a round that's got almost 140 years of history behind it. It's as relevant and useful today as it was "back then". I tend to stick with 255 grain LSWC's at 900 fps +/-. In the unlikely event that I ever need more power I can obtain it. Those who want more power in a readily available factory round would be better served with .44 magnum.
 
In 1989 I worked for three months on a movie shoot in Houston in which the production company used off duty HPD officers for security. I became pretty friendly with an old school flat foot that carried a 6" S&W N frame in .45 Colt. I asked him why he carried such a heavy weapon and he answered that when he shot someone, they dropped like a sack of potatoes, game over. Probably a little bravado in his statement but it illustrates a point.
 
There is adequate strength in virtually all modern .45 Colt revolvers to come very close to the 1,000fps mark with a 255gr bullet in 6" or longer barrel. And thats where the old loading manuals max out, using Colt SAA as test firearm.

Even the old original blackpowder load was 900fps with the 255gr bullet.

Thats a significant edge on the .45 ACP whose specs originally called for a 230gr at 850fps +/- 30. The ACP can hit 1,000fps with light bullets, but not with the heavier ones like the .45 Colt.

In strong revolvers (Ruger Blackhawks and some others) the .45 Colt can be loaded to rival .44 mag performance.

Some of what you are missing is the history and nostalgia of the round. From 1873 until 1935, the .45 Colt was the most powerful handgun round commonly available. And even after the .357 arrived in 1935, the .45 Colt was still the big bore champ. The .44 Magnum took that title in the later 1950s, and keeps it still, even though there are more powerful rounds on the market today.

One thing the .45 Colt does is perform well in the field. Both in defensive shootings and in hunting, it works pretty well.

I've been shooting and loading the .45 Colt for 30 years, and my pet load pushes a 250gr SWC at just under 1100fps, doing everything I've ever needed a handgun round to do, without the punishing recoil of the .44 Mag.
 
45 Colt= Fun, yeah that's the ticket. Big old bullet that can be made from mild to wild when reloading. It puts a grin on my face everytime I bring it out to shoot. It don't shake the ground like the magnums do, but it puts a thump on what you hit.
 
I have taken a couple of new shooters (both women) to the range in the last year. Without exception, the biggest grins on their faces came when they got to shoot a single-action revolver chambered in .45 Colt.
 
As has been stated, a great cartridge to hand load.

I have a box of 20 Winchesters that I bought at Walmart about a year and a half ago the price tag was $17.97. Yesterday I was looking at ammo at Walmart and the the same box was up to $22.97. :eek:
 
The thing the OP missed here is that he took a single source that listed only three somewhat specialty .45 Colt rounds against a broad range of .44 rounds. Sportsmans Guide lists velocity and muzzle energy in their ammo pages. We need to remember, first, that .45 Colt today encompasses both "Cowboy" ammo (loaded light, for safe use in old revolvers) and modern, full-power loads.

Ammunition|Muzzle Velocity|Muzzle Energy
Magtech 250 gr. LFN (Cowboy)|..761..|..232
Magtech 200 gr. LFN (Cowboy)|..705..|..220
Ultramax 200 gr. RNFP (Cowboy)|..765..|..290
Ultramax 250 gr. RNFP (Cowboy)|..750..|..300
Federal Champion 225 gr. LSWC|..830..|..345
Winchester 250 gr. LFN (Cowboy)|..750..|..312
Winchester Silvertip 225 gr. JHP|..920..|..423
Winchester Super-X 255 gr. LRN|..860..|..420

You can see there's a considerable range. These are standard, over-the-counter choices, and the muzzle energy ranges from 220 ft-lbs to 423 ft-lbs ... almost double. I'm sure with a bit of searching you can find more powerful factory loads in .45 Colt. Does it surpass .44 magnum? No ... but it's a lot closer than the original post would suggest. And it's easily right up there with .45 Automatic ... which should not come as a surprise, because the whole point of the .45 Automatic was to replicate the ballistics of .45 Colt in a semi-automatic firearm.
 
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In Blackhawks and some others designed for it you can safely load .45 Colt to .44 Mag velocities/energies. The .45 Colt is a superior round, especially when compared to the .45 ACP as others have stated.
 
I cast for some of my pistol rounds and reload for all my pistols. For putting huge holes downstream the Colt .45 is by far my favorite and I shoot from my Great Grandfathers 1902 build Colt .45 SSA Pictured below from left to right....
.32
9mm
.38 Special
.357 Magnum
.44 Magnum
Colt .45
reloads001Small.jpg
 
Tradition has a lot for for the 45 Colt being as popular as it is. The "cowboy" gun. But as others have pointed out, it can be loaded up to pretty impressive levels. Even with most factory loads, it makes a big hole with a relatively heavy slug when hunting.
 
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