Old Army bullets?

H

happyhuntr

Inactive
hello all,
i am fairly new to the firing line and BP revolver shooting.

i am looking for a CONICAL lead bullet to shoot in my ruger old army.

i cannot find them anywhere.

i have read about the lee mold for the old army ruger, but i really don't want to start casting as i will only be hunting with this pistol.

do you know where i can get these conical .454 dia. bullets?

do you have a lee mold and willing to sell me some?

thanks

happyhuntr
 
I have some I got at a gunshow so I don't know who made them, but they resemble the Dixie bullets. They have a slight taper towards the rear for loading and grease grooves.
 
I have a batch greased up somewhere, and would, at some point in time make some for ya. The LEE is a .456 for the ROA on the front two driving bands, but the base band is about .452 or thereabouts to allow it to seat just to the second band to let your plunger rod puch it straight down. Pretty hard to get conicals to drive straight unless you get them partially started into the cylinder, and the LEE reduced band is just for that.
 
ROA Conicals

happyhuntr:

I have been doing a lot of research myself looking for a hunting bullet for my ROA. From what I have found your choices for store bought are limited.

Firstly you need .456" dia. bullets not .454" dia.. depending on the size of your chambers of your gun the .454 may walk/jump under recoil. Also you should stick to pure lead bullets.

Second by shooting conicals which are typically heavier than round balls you'll probably need a taller front sight to still impact at point of aim as the ROA was designed to only shoot 144 gr round balls.

Available at an ebay store called "cheapshotstore" ebay item number #230224356013 are some 200 gr conicals for the ROA.

Dixie gun works does list the 190 gr conicals from Buffalo Bullets however supply is limited as Buffalo Bullets is no longer producing bullets.

It's to bad you don't want to cast your own as there are lots more bullet choices available to you then via Moulds. With that said I'll also pass on what I have learned from that aspect.

Lee reloading: Makes a 220 gr conical mould #90384 specifically for the ROA.

Ballisiti-cast is now making a replacement Hensley-Gibbs mould for a 165 gr conical P/N# 962.

NEI Handtools makes a 250 gr conical mould #332

Lee reloading is also making a mould for the DD/ROA 210 gr Big Lube Bullet.

So far I have experimented with .45 acp bullets 200 and 225 gr Dropped from the mould at .455" dia. and just the bottom band of the bullet sized to .452" dia.. Accuracy was better in my gun with the heavier bullet and 30 gr of 777 but they walked under recoil. Incidently they were cast of wheel weights. Kind of hard to get them rammed into the chamber.

Since then I purchased the Lee conical mould mentioned above 220 gr double cavity and modified the front cavity by running a 5/16" end mill down there and putting a flat spot on the front of the bullet. Went down .070" to kind of take the shoulder off of the conical. I casted up about 25 of each modified 230 gr and unmodified 220 gr. pure lead. I should have a range report buy the end of the week.

I'll post results and pictures if I can figure out how... LOL :D
 
old army

you guys are great!!!

this is some good info.

Dixie gun works is out of stock on the Buffalos

Cowboybullets.com and Powder Inc. seem to only have hard cast for cartidges.

I am not too sure about using the Cheapshot store bullets as they have solid bases.

thanks for the all the info, especially azwizard. i am looking forward to your range report on the 220 gr Lee bullets.

happyhuntr
 
Range report

Went to the range this week end with the 220 gr conicals lee mould and the modified 230 gr with the flat tips...

220 with 30 gr 777 powder over lubed wad cci #11 caps @ 25 yds = 6"+ sized groups.
220 with 35 gr 777 powder over 5 gr corn meal cci #11 caps @ 25 yds = same results. Poor in my opinion.

230 gr modified lee mould with 30 gr 777 powder cci #11 caps @ 25 yds = again 6" + sized groups?:confused:

Didn't bother to increase the powder charge as I didn't think it would have changed anything.

Did change the caps from the cci #11's to Remington #10's and repeated the above charges. and groups shrunk by 2" :mad:.... Still not good enough for me though...

Just to make sure I hadn't made any mistakes I loaded up with 25 grains 777 and 12 grains of corn meal and a Hornaday swagged round ball Rem. #10 caps and it wasn't me. 1 1/4" groups at 25 yards. Backed the target up to 50 yds and was still under 3".

So it's back to the drawing board for a usable conical for now. Still need to try the H&G 165gr. and maybe the DD/ROA 210 gr. conicals before I end up making a custom one for my self.
 
I noted the following in a recent thread about shooting conicals in the ROA:


1. One person state that:

My Ruger Old Army owner's manual specifies .457 ball or .454 conical bullet.
Click to expand...

2. Another person stated that:

I have that Lee mold....doubtful you will be disapointed just use as pure lead as you can get. mine likes the hot loadings with the slug.
Click to expand...

3. Another person stated:

I HAVE BETTER ACURACY WITH THE CONICAL THEN THE ROUND BALL.
Click to expand...

4. Others reiterated about using pure lead [cast] bullets, a felt wad and hot loads. :)
 
When I first started shooting ROA, I was all over the conical. It seemed so much more powerful and looked cool compared to loading a round ball.

Now I have a few boxes in my basement that I will probably only shoot hunting big game close distance. They are a pain to load and not that accurate. At least for me the round balls have worked out much better.

Try them if you want, lots of on line sources. But don't count out the good old roundball. Unless you are going for hogs!
 
robhof

I believe the twist rate of the ROA barrel is slow for the round ball and fails to stabilize the conical. I too get 1' to 1 1/2' groups at 25' with round balls. The best I've got with conicals was 4" with some conicals I got on Ebay with a mixed bag of B/p stuff. I've got the Lee ROA conical mold, surprisingly they shoot 2" groups out of my 45 Kentucky flinter with a 1 in 60 twist.
 
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