Anything .45 colt can do that .357 can't?
- Thread starter Jacket67
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HighValleyRanch
New member
SUE me!
It is very helpful in helping the OP to determine his options, one he might not have thought of.
I could have wrote:
The .45 colt CAN not fit into a pocket like the .357 can. This would according to your critia fit the OP's question of what CAN a .45 Colt do that a .357 cannot do.
Six of one, half dozen of the other, glass half empty or glass half full criteria.
Jeez....Edited to fit into the requirements of the staff criteria.
A .45 colt revolver CAN require the pocket size of godzilla versa a Kimber K6 6 shot .357 magnum which can fit into jeans pockets. There, I fixed it.
It is very helpful in helping the OP to determine his options, one he might not have thought of.
I could have wrote:
The .45 colt CAN not fit into a pocket like the .357 can. This would according to your critia fit the OP's question of what CAN a .45 Colt do that a .357 cannot do.
Six of one, half dozen of the other, glass half empty or glass half full criteria.
Jeez....Edited to fit into the requirements of the staff criteria.
A .45 colt revolver CAN require the pocket size of godzilla versa a Kimber K6 6 shot .357 magnum which can fit into jeans pockets. There, I fixed it.
Last edited:
Ruger4Life
New member
45 colt (Ruger only +p+) loads can, in Ruger RedHawks, Super RedHawks, and Super Blackhawks, approach the power of the .480 Ruger and .454 Casull cartridges. Loaded with heavy hard cast hand loads at near maximum loads, the 45 (long) Colt has been used to dispatch every dangerous game animal on the planet. .357 can’t do that. I know the OP doesn’t need that kind of power, but it’s there in the 45 Colt
Pathfinder45
New member
I am under the impression that the calculations used to come up with foot-pounds was discredited years ago as being biased in favor of velocity while discounting bullet weight.
Since Elmer was brought up, quoting from his Sixguns book:
"The .44s and .45s will do anything the [.357] magnum will and will do it better, with their 250 grain bullet loads at 1000 to 1200 feet per second velocity. The 250 grain slugs will cut a larger hole and will allow more haemorrhage... We prefer the .44 Special and the .45 Colt to the .357"
At the time of that writing the .44 Magnum wasn't in the cards yet.
"The .44s and .45s will do anything the [.357] magnum will and will do it better, with their 250 grain bullet loads at 1000 to 1200 feet per second velocity. The 250 grain slugs will cut a larger hole and will allow more haemorrhage... We prefer the .44 Special and the .45 Colt to the .357"
At the time of that writing the .44 Magnum wasn't in the cards yet.
TruthTellers
New member
I don't think anyone is trying to make the argument that .357 is better than .44 Mag and .45 Colt equivalent pressure loads in performance. It's a question of what they do that .357's not doing and it would all basically come down to hunting game of a certain size and the distances involved.
To me you have to look at two perspectives, power and platform. The 45 Colt is more powerful and would be better suited compared to the 357 Magnum in case of animal threats, that was simple enough.
Platform though, I know there is a coolness to the 45 colt + 45 acp convertible Rugers and I've had at least a half dozen of them, but you will get undersized cylinder throats and a barrel constriction in every single Ruger .45 colt blackhawk (even the Redhawk has this). It's detrimental to accuracy, now I'm not saying it won't be mildly accurate, but rarely are they tack drivers. These flaws can be fixed, for a price, but I have to question why they're there in the first place. Regarding platform, a 357 Blackhawk is going to be more accurate.
If you want power and accuracy, I'd get a 4 5/8" or 5 1/2" Super Blackhawk in 44 Magnum, I've never had one that wasn't highly accurate.
Platform though, I know there is a coolness to the 45 colt + 45 acp convertible Rugers and I've had at least a half dozen of them, but you will get undersized cylinder throats and a barrel constriction in every single Ruger .45 colt blackhawk (even the Redhawk has this). It's detrimental to accuracy, now I'm not saying it won't be mildly accurate, but rarely are they tack drivers. These flaws can be fixed, for a price, but I have to question why they're there in the first place. Regarding platform, a 357 Blackhawk is going to be more accurate.
If you want power and accuracy, I'd get a 4 5/8" or 5 1/2" Super Blackhawk in 44 Magnum, I've never had one that wasn't highly accurate.
maybe mine is like this, I don't know, never bothered to measure. What I do know is that it puts 5 shots in one hole and one shot next to that hole at 50ft, and 5 of six will reliable ring the 200yd gong with #6 being about a foot off. From my hand, offhand, not a rest.
A gun may be more accurate than that, but I'm not, so I don't care.
FoghornLeghorn
New member
That's a really, really bad idea. The acoustic trauma produced by the .45 Colt is more than adequate to harm your hearing. You might not recognize it immediately, but it's cumulative. And irreversible.
Mike Irwin
Staff
"I am under the impression that the calculations used to come up with foot-pounds was discredited years ago as being biased in favor of velocity while discounting bullet weight. "
That's the first I've heard that, and I can't find anything on the web to indicate that.
The standard formula also doesn't discount bullet weight, it most certainly is part of the formula.
That's the first I've heard that, and I can't find anything on the web to indicate that.
The standard formula also doesn't discount bullet weight, it most certainly is part of the formula.
The ft-lbs of kinetic energy calculation is a standard engineering formula, and as such just calculates the kinetic energy of the projectile. Nothing, absolutely nothing, tells you how effective it will be in killing an animal, 2-legged or 4-legged. There have been various formulas proposed over the years that tried to account for bullet weight and frontal area (Taylor Knock-Out or TKO comes readily to mind), but the industry had to decide on ONE measure of a cartridge's effectiveness and they chose kinetic energy. That doesn't mean that a 223 kills as well as a 44 mag because it has similar kinetic energy, it's just something standardized that folks within the firearms industry agreed to use. But ultimately it comes down to how well the bullet kills, and while empirical evidence may not be repeatable and formulaic it does tell what works. So, typically, bigger bullets kill better.
There’s a bunch incorrect here.
First, kinetic energy is a good measure of how hard a bullet strikes a hard surface, like steel. I have shot a lot of plates in competition, including swingers, and there’s some wives tales out there about how momentum and heavy bullets work better on steel. No, they don’t. The best predictor of whether a plate will fall is kinetic energy. A 223 round with 1000 ft/lbs knocks a plate down just as hard as a 44 mag with 1000 ft/lbs. The physics is the same.
It’s when you get to soft surfaces that kinetic energy doesn’t tell you everything. In that case, bullet construction and sectional density also matter. The bullet has to stay together and also have some sort of repeatable timed release of its energy (ie reliable expansion, but not breaking apart, or a flat meplat cutting a large hole). Kinetic energy doesn’t tell you how the bullet will release its energy, it only tells you how much energy the bullet has on impact.
So when someone says 223 doesn’t kill as well as 44 mag, that’s not really accurate. A well built 223 bullet is plenty deadly, as is a well built 44 mag.
Conversely, 223 55 gr fmj will kill just as badly as a LRN 200 gr 44 mag. One will tumble, break apart, tear up organs and not penetrate very well. The other will cut a clean small hole all the way through without dumping much energy in the target.
Getting back to 357 mag and 45 Colt, in order for a 357 to approach the kinetic energy of a 45 Colt, the bullet typically has to be going a lot faster to make up for the lower mass. Small light fast bullets that still have a .357 diameter are not going to have the tough construction and sectional density of the 45 Colt. Thus, 45 tends to perform better on soft targets.
However, if you were to shoot steel plates with 357 mag and 45 Colt, each having the same kinetic energy, the knock down effect on the plates would be identical.
I hope that clarifies things.
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As you can see by the attached chart the SD between the two is so close as to be a moot point. Bullet construction varies by manufacturer and intended purpose so is really a moot point as well.
As to performance of "soft" targets that depends on what role you are asking it to perform and how well you can place your shot. Bullet construction is critical here as well. For example the 125 grn 357 mag JHP @ 1400 fps is more effective against humans than the 225 grn 45 Colt @ 850 - 900 fps. The 45 Colt would be my choice for buffalo when comparing the same two bullets, but we don't have to, we can match the bullet and load to the task.
https://www.chuckhawks.com/sd_handgun.htm
Exactly
Not sure with the not and not here, what you really meant to say ... But, In any revolver you can go as slow as you want. Of course, there will come a point where the bullet sticks in the barrel... That's too slow
. Shoot, when firelapping we want the bullet to just 'clear the barrel' slow. Light load of trailboss works fine for this application.