unstable heavy 44spl

[Shadow9mm]

CAUTION: The following post (or a page linked to) includes or discusses loading data not covered by currently published sources of tested data for this cartridge (QuickLOAD or Gordon's Reloading Tool data is not professionally tested). USE AT YOUR OWN RISK. Neither the writer, The Firing Line, nor the staff of TFL assumes any liability for any damage or injury resulting from the use of this information.

Had an interesting day at the range, though I would share. based on the target the bullets appear to be unstable.

So I am shooing heavy 44spl loads out of my 44mag Henry big boy 20in barrel. The bullets are cast from a NOE mold, 284g wide flat nose, powder coated and gas checked. I plan to use them for deer this fall and was trying to build a subsonic load. Seeing as this is a some what uncommon load I had some help from some guys here with quick load to generate some data, hence the above warning.

I started out the day with some chronograph testing, 6rnds each. The berm is a little over 6ft tall and 100yds away. I had my rifle zeroed at 25yds. I began testing aiming at the center of the berm. I noticed a bullet skip off the ground around 80yds down range. I though it was a bit odd so I did some quick calculations and figured it should only have around 9in of drop. I began aiming 7/8 of the way up the berm and did not have any more issues.

mixed 44spl brass
CCI large pistol primers
Power Pistol powder, all weighed
NOE mold, 284g, powder coated, gas checked, sized to .430.
6rnds per test group
7.4g, avg 1040, SD 11.25, ES 33
7.5g, avg 1046, SD 4.46, ES 10
7.6g, avg 1058, SD 7.76, ES 21


Then I went to do the accuracy testing at 25yds, 4 roud groups. I had a few sighters, and I could not cover the group with my hand. I tested some of my 200g plinking rounds, they grouped decently well, so I decided to go for it and test the 3 loads. Velocities written on the target were not corrected for distance to chrono and BC. Load data above was corrected, thus the difference in velocities.

In any case several of the rounds did not go in straight. Combining that with my issues during chrono testing I'm pretty sure they are not stabilizing well. the Rifle does have a 1:20 twist, and per bergers bullet stability calculator it may be over stable. Im a bit stumped as to what is going on here. Only thing I can think to to is push the velocity up a bit more, as it seemed to like the 7.6g load and see if they start playing nice.

 

[Unclenick]

You've definitely got some oblong holes there, so these bullets are yawing badly. You say they are over-stabilized, but unless the bullet is spinning so fast it is physically distorted by the centrifugal effect, or it has internal flaws (inclusions that unbalance it) or your gun has a bad crown, extra spin, alone, won't cause that. If the casting job is poor, that will do it. If your muzzle crown is off, that can do it. If part of the coating is uneven or part of it is being blown off the bullet base, that can do it.

Have you got any holes made are 100 yards to see if the yaw is any less? If the bullets are stable, but just yawing initially, you can see, as F.W. Mann documented over a century ago, some pretty hellacious initial yaw that is mostly gone by the time the bullet is 200 yards down range.

 

[Shadow9mm]

You've definitely got some oblong holes there, so these bullets are yawing badly. You say they are over-stabilized, but unless the bullet is spinning so fast it is physically distorted by the centrifugal effect, or it has internal flaws (inclusions that unbalance it) or your gun has a bad crown, extra spin, alone, won't cause that. If the casting job is poor, that will do it. If your muzzle crown is off, that can do it. If part of the coating is uneven or part of it is being blown off the bullet base, that can do it.

Have you got any holes made are 100 yards to see if the yaw is any less? If the bullets are stable, but just yawing initially, you can see, as F.W. Mann documented over a century ago, some pretty hellacious initial yaw that is mostly gone by the time the bullet is 200 yards down range.

internal flaws, are possible, but these bullets were cast at the same time as the 200g plinkers I shot today and they shot fine. we did have some problems with the mold. it has pins so you can make hollow points, we had the flat in to make WFN. The bullets kept sticking to the steel pins. I wonder if they got warped while dropping.

crown, gun was grouping decently well with other bullets, nothing to write home about, but decent.

coating was as even as I could get it but I am no expert. Bullets are gas checked, so the base should have been ok.

I only shot at 25yds. only had a few loaded up for testing today. based on the way the one hit the ground before the berm, and the way they were grouping, Im not sure i could hit the target at 100. I will probably try at 50yds next time, if i can keep them on paper i will push it out farther.

not sure what to test though. I should be able to go up to 8.0g and stay subsonic. 7.6g shot the best for the day, also the fastest, wondering if that is a coincidence. I tested up to 10.0g, which are in 44mag range, I may load a few of those to test.

 

[44 AMP]

Have you considered that your desired goals with what you are using might not be achievable?

Starting with your bullet, which is nearly 40 grains heavier than the standard, traditional 246gr bullet for the .44 Special. Since the diameter is fixed, it must be longer. How much longer, and how much of that additional length is bearing surface makes a difference.

I'm not arguing with stability calculators, but I do want to point out that calculations state what things are expected to do, what they should do, but only testing reveals what a given combination WILL do.

Another factor is your self imposed velocity limit (subsonic). Can't and won't say it is what's actually going on, but I think it could be possible that all the different factors, your bullet, your barrel and your velocity might possibly just be a combination that doesn't play well together.

If I remember correctly in another thread you said your desire to stay subsonic was to keep the recoil down. If that's right, I wonder why you would choose a much heavier than standard bullet, which increases the recoil?

If the goal is deer at the shorter ranges your rifle and cartridge are best at, the standard 240-ish .44 bullets have been doing it for well over a century.

Accuracy, allowing precise bullet placement is more important than a handful of ft/lbs energy. A heavier bullet will give more energy at a given speed, but if it won't shoot well, its not a net gain.

 

[Shadow9mm]

Have you considered that your desired goals with what you are using might not be achievable?

Starting with your bullet, which is nearly 40 grains heavier than the standard, traditional 246gr bullet for the .44 Special. Since the diameter is fixed, it must be longer. How much longer, and how much of that additional length is bearing surface makes a difference.

I'm not arguing with stability calculators, but I do want to point out that calculations state what things are expected to do, what they should do, but only testing reveals what a given combination WILL do.

Another factor is your self imposed velocity limit (subsonic). Can't and won't say it is what's actually going on, but I think it could be possible that all the different factors, your bullet, your barrel and your velocity might possibly just be a combination that doesn't play well together.

If I remember correctly in another thread you said your desire to stay subsonic was to keep the recoil down. If that's right, I wonder why you would choose a much heavier than standard bullet, which increases the recoil?

If the goal is deer at the shorter ranges your rifle and cartridge are best at, the standard 240-ish .44 bullets have been doing it for well over a century.

Accuracy, allowing precise bullet placement is more important than a handful of ft/lbs energy. A heavier bullet will give more energy at a given speed, but if it won't shoot well, its not a net gain.

There are several factors or limitations at play, not all of which are self imposed.

Desire to stay subsonic was for noise purposes. As when hunting we may not have time to put ear protection on.

I do want mild recoil, but that can be done in the supesonic range, so its not really linked.

I am mostly limited by my powder and bullet selection. I was using 240 xtp however they are close to $40 per 100 and i could not justify the cost. So i started using my friends mold. I have since gotten 2 molds, a 240g swc, And a 200g round flat. I am still debating whether the 200g is suitable for hunting, it left a nice wound channel in my ballistics gel block, but it was also cruising along at 1300ish fps. I have not had a chance to work up a load with the 240swc in 44spl, but it seems to do ok in full power 44mag loads, and it cycles in the rifle.

My main limitation is primers. I only have 300 that are magnum rated. I have 1800 standard large pistol. Meaning i have to use faster burning pistol powders. So far 44spl has had more loads with those powders, and used less powder to get the job done.

Sometimes loads just work. Sometimes they fight you. Im willing to tinker a little longer to try and figure out what is going on at the very least, if im lucky i will get a nice load out of it. If not i will hopefully have some other loads worked up by then that will get the job done.

 

[Shadow9mm]

Also, doing some reading. Apparently 44 rifles are generally cut to .431, vs the .429 for handguns. My bullets sized at .430 might be under sized. Contacted Hendy to ask the groove diameter.

Gonna try and find some pure lead, slug the barrel.

 

[Unclenick]

In addition to that, can you measure how long these bullets are and how long the 240s are that do well for you? People have purchased and shot 325-grain WFNs in the 44s without stability issues, though their shape is nearly cylindrical, so the yaw is curious unless you have an extra-long design to accommodate the hollow points. The difference in length matters more than the difference in weight to stability.

 

[Shadow9mm]

In addition to that, can you measure how long these bullets are and how long the 240s are that do well for you? People have purchased and shot 325-grain WFNs in the 44s without stability issues, though their shape is nearly cylindrical, so the yaw is curious unless you have an extra-long design to accommodate the hollow points. The difference in length matters more than the difference in weight to stability.

Bullet length 0.785. the nose is longer than normal. It will not fit/feed in a 44mag case, its for 44spl cases only. loaded its about the same as a 44mag.

 

[44 AMP]

slug your bore, use bullets properly sized for the barrel they will be shot from.

If this were "normal times" I'd tell you to get a good 240/250gr SWC, load 7+gr of Unique, standard primers and adjust from there.

That would most likely still be subsonic from a 20" carbine and within its effective range will drop any deer just fine, if YOU put the bullet in the right place.

These are not "normal times" and I realize you can only use what you can actually get. Sucks but it is what we're stuck with, for the present, at least.

For what you are looking to do, I don't think slow powders & magnum primers are the way to go. I also don't think uber heavy bullets (for caliber) are the way to go, either, but that's just my personal opinion.

I think medium rate powders, standard primers and lighter (standard for caliber) bullets will give you acceptable, if not better, results.

I hope you can get the results you want. I don't think you're barking up the wrong tree, but I do think you're currently on a branch that won't get you where you want to go, easily, if at all.

 

[Unclenick]

These bullet dimensions give a very high number in the stability calculators. What a lot of folks would call "over-stabilized". What the extra spin does, short of making a bullet fly apart, is it exaggerates every minor imperfection in bullet balance to cause wobble and increased lateral jump due to any existing off-bore-axis center of gravity as the bullet clears the muzzle. This can contribute to initial yaw. The other thing is that coning motion toward correcting flight is slowed. This will increase the size of the helix the bullet describes until it settles, but I have not attempted to calculate how much. What made me wonder about that factor is that on your target, the holes furthest from the center appear to have the most yaw, but counting against it is that the yaw is not in a consistent direction relative to the direction of displacement from the group center.

Cast bullets of this size and weight generally have a meplat of about 0.35" diameter and G1 BC of about 0.2. For a 1050 fps MV, This indicates you should be about 10" high at 25 yards with a 0.75" sight height above the bore axis to be zeroed at 100 yards, and about 8" high at 25 yards for a scope that is 1.5" above the bore axis. (I don't know the actual height above the bore axis of the Big Boy factory sights.)

Another thing you can do is duplicate F.W. Mann's method by having a string of target papers in a row that are spaced, say, every 10 yards, so you can track what the yaw is doing all the way downrange. It's a bunch of work, but it does let you track the bullet path and how its yaw is changing in flight.

It looks like, for this bullet, a 30" twist would cover all the bases in a standard atmosphere, and 26" would take it to -40°F sea-level conditions.

With kind permission from Geoffrey Kolbe, whose online ballistics software generated it:

 

[Shadow9mm]

So, silly question. Would increasing pressure bump size the bullet to fit? I have a load that will get me to around 28k psi, vs the 16k psi that i am at now.

I also plan to measure the coated bullets and see if i can get .432 out of them.

 

[Paul B.]

" gun was grouping decently well with other bullets, nothing to write home about, but decent."

Were the other bullets a lighter weight than the "offending" bullet? You might want to check out the twist rate of your barrel. It might be too slow to stabilize that bullet.

"Desire to stay subsonic was for noise purposes. As when hunting we may not have time to put ear protection on."

I doubt a load to a subsonic level will make that much difference in the loudness of the shot. It will still be loud enough to cause hearing damage. I have serious hearing loss, mostly from unprotected shooting over 68 years. Didn't use anything more effective at the range than cotton balls. First real protection came in about 1973 when my kids bought me a set of the muffs people now wear. These days, when on a hunt I wear a set of muffs that you can turn on or off. Took a fairly short while to get used to them but another point in their favor is the do a decent job of keeping my ears warm when it's something like 14 above zero.
How bad is my hearing loss? I'm legally deaf in the right ear and only have about 60 percent left in the left ear. That's why I wear the muffs out in the field.
Paul B.

 

[Shadow9mm]

" gun was grouping decently well with other bullets, nothing to write home about, but decent."

Were the other bullets a lighter weight than the "offending" bullet? You might want to check out the twist rate of your barrel. It might be too slow to stabilize that bullet.

"Desire to stay subsonic was for noise purposes. As when hunting we may not have time to put ear protection on."

I doubt a load to a subsonic level will make that much difference in the loudness of the shot. It will still be loud enough to cause hearing damage. I have serious hearing loss, mostly from unprotected shooting over 68 years. Didn't use anything more effective at the range than cotton balls. First real protection came in about 1973 when my kids bought me a set of the muffs people now wear. These days, when on a hunt I wear a set of muffs that you can turn on or off. Took a fairly short while to get used to them but another point in their favor is the do a decent job of keeping my ears warm when it's something like 14 above zero.
How bad is my hearing loss? I'm legally deaf in the right ear and only have about 60 percent left in the left ear. That's why I wear the muffs out in the field.
Paul B.

They were 240s vs these 285s, but they were also jacketed hp at .429 .

Twist is 1:20, based on the numbers i ran they should be overly stable if anything.

I can hear a distinct difference in the sound, even with muffs on. There is a boom but no sharp crack with the boom. Also does not make my ears ring if ears are off. I understand its still not hearing safe, but i would prefer to do as little danage as possible if i dont have time to put ear protection in. We have fairly heavy brush here, and unless your hunting a field, a long shot is 75yds. I usually ground hunt and chances of spooking something and having to take a quick shot are high.

 

[Shadow9mm]

UPDATE! so I just heard back from henry, they stated they use a .430 groove diameter with a .423 bore diameter.

I do plan to slug the bore in the near future, but if I can get up to .431 I should be in ok shape.

 

[reynolds357]

There are several factors or limitations at play, not all of which are self imposed.

Desire to stay subsonic was for noise purposes. As when hunting we may not have time to put ear protection on.

I do want mild recoil, but that can be done in the supesonic range, so its not really linked.

I am mostly limited by my powder and bullet selection. I was using 240 xtp however they are close to $40 per 100 and i could not justify the cost. So i started using my friends mold. I have since gotten 2 molds, a 240g swc, And a 200g round flat. I am still debating whether the 200g is suitable for hunting, it left a nice wound channel in my ballistics gel block, but it was also cruising along at 1300ish fps. I have not had a chance to work up a load with the 240swc in 44spl, but it seems to do ok in full power 44mag loads, and it cycles in the rifle.

My main limitation is primers. I only have 300 that are magnum rated. I have 1800 standard large pistol. Meaning i have to use faster burning pistol powders. So far 44spl has had more loads with those powders, and used less powder to get the job done.

Sometimes loads just work. Sometimes they fight you. Im willing to tinker a little longer to try and figure out what is going on at the very least, if im lucky i will get a nice load out of it. If not i will hopefully have some other loads worked up by then that will get the job done.

I have never seen that a 44 magnum needs a magnum primer unless you are leaving a lot of empty case volume.
What does your barrel look like? Leading or staying clean?

 

[Shadow9mm]

I have never seen that a 44 magnum needs a magnum primer unless you are leaving a lot of empty case volume.
What does your barrel look like? Leading or staying clean?

Depends on the powder. Been using h110 in the magnum, and it needs magnum primers. I have tried a few loads with aa#7 that did not need it, but were somewhat lackluster velocity wise.

 

[FrankenMauser]

UPDATE! so I just heard back from henry, they stated they use a .430 groove diameter with a .423 bore diameter.

I do plan to slug the bore in the near future, but if I can get up to .431 I should be in ok shape.

Looks like you worked it out before I saw this thread at all.
But, yea, groove diameter in the rifles is nearly always larger than people expect.
All of mine, 44 and 444, slug larger than .430". Most are .4315" to .432". One of them is .433" groove diameter.
The revolvers are tighter, but not the rifles.

Oversized NOE and custom Accurate Molds are my bread and butter.

 

[Shadow9mm]

The mold is a noe, but i dont know what size it drops. Gonna measure next time i can get down to my friends to use his mold. Will see what size they powder coat to as well.

 

[reynolds357]

Depends on the powder. Been using h110 in the magnum, and it needs magnum primers. I have tried a few loads with aa#7 that did not need it, but were somewhat lackluster velocity wise.

I rarely ever use magnum primers with H110/Win 296. It's not a real hard powder to light.
Most of the Hodgdon data I see lists standard primers.

 

[Unclenick]

Reynolds357,

The real test is to take your chronograph and check to see which primer produces the lowest SD and ES with your bullet and gun with this powder. That will be the one producing the most consistent ignition. The problem with less consistent ignition, in addition to the greater threat of getting a round that squibs out, is that it is associated with variation in exact time between firing pin strike and the bullet exiting the muzzle. This irregularity can be up to tens of milliseconds when it gets really bad, so it can have the same effect as having varying lock-time. It exaggerates the effect on group size by any imperfection in the shooter's steadiness and follow-through.


Shadow9mm,

Sounds like some of your bullets were being unbalanced by either gas cutting on one side or simply distorted by bullet tilt or by the bore engraving it with rifling marks unevenly. If there is any way you can recover some of the bad-behaving bullets, you should be able to see the cause.

Empirically, I have found shooting cast lead 0.002" over groove diameter often groups better than shooting lead 0.001" over groove. This depends on chamber dimensions, but if your mold will allow it, it is worth a try.