Win 231 in .44Mag

7

71Eagle

New member
I saw in an old thread about loading Winchester 231 in .44 mag (2013) and it recommended starting a new topic thread.

I'm looking at a light .44mag load using a 240gr RNFP bullets with 7.5grs of 231. A friend of mine gave me the recipe and says he has great results. But, I haven't really found any data in the books.

Wondering if anyone uses a similar load. I'm shooting a Mod 629 w/4' barrel. Have been shooting some .44Spec and mag factory loads. The mag factory loads are pretty brutal, I used to think I could handle recoil like that but I guess I'm getting old. :eek:

"In every older person there is a younger person inside wondering What the heck happened!!"
 
Before Powder got hard to find and being able to choose a joke I used a lot of W231 .
Today I use Unique cheaper and dirty but I can buy it about anytime .

I will look up my data and let you know.
 
This is out of the Winchester 14th Edition .
240gr. lead W231 11.0 gr. 1285 fps Pressure 38,000


In my book I was loading 11gr of W231 with the hard cast 240gr bullet .
This was a very good shooting load but recoil is a hand full .

this manual shows a starting load for the 44 Special with 240gr lead and W231 to be 5.4gr at 795 fps and pressure of 12,500

At this time I am loading a 240gr lead bullet with Unique and using 10.2 gr really like it .
 
The Hodgdon website shows a Minimum load of 5.5 grains with a pressure of 12,000 CUP. This is the equivalent to a 44 Special load. The max is 11 grains. 7.5 should feel like a very warm 44 Special load or a light 44 Magnum load depending on how you look at it. The bullet they used is a 240 Lead SWC.
 
This is for the .44 Rem. mag, correct? If so, the two books I'm looking right now, have the 240gr L-swc with 7.7gr 231 as max. Hornady and Speer books. 11.0gr seems mighty stout and over max. Your friends load of 7.5gr 231 seems fine, according to Hornady.
Yet, the Hodgdon site says 11.0gr 231 is max. Geez, go figure. Thats a LOT of wiggle room. Too much for my use.
 
Rifletom said:
This is for the .44 Rem. mag, correct? If so, the two books I'm looking right now, have the 240gr L-swc with 7.7gr 231 as max. Hornady and Speer books. 11.0gr seems mighty stout and over max. Your friends load of 7.5gr 231 seems fine, according to Hornady.
Yet, the Hodgdon site says 11.0gr 231 is max. Geez, go figure. Thats a LOT of wiggle room. Too much for my use.
Click to expand...

Sometimes book stop well short of the maximum pressure when using lead bullets. Does the 7.7 grain load list a pressure?
 
reddog, no, the manuals I have do not list pressure. Hodgdon site does have pressure for the 240gr lswc: 5.5gr 231@12,000 CUP--11.0gr 231@38,100 CUP.
 
The bullets I have are from Extreme Bullets, 240 RNFP Heavy Plate. So they aren't lead cast SWC, sorry I didn't make that clear in my original post.

I bought 100 rnds of Starlight Brass and I asked them about the load and they guy said it should be fine but might experience some split cases. Ya'll have any opinions on that?

Thanks for all the input.
 
Never heard of StarLight Brass. Sure that isn't StarLine? If so that is good brass and you'll have no problem. I don't load Jacketed, soo.... But most plated bullets I've encountered, you treat them like plain lead bullets.

From my notes I see 7.5g W231 under 240g SWC gets you ~973fps out of a 6 1/2" barrel. Nice medium load.
 
You should be able to use cast data for the plated bullets and 7.5 grains of 231 will work OK either way. StarLine brass is generally considered good brass. StarLight brass is probably just a mistake... With moderate loads you should be able to get 20+ reloads without any problems.

If you start to get split cases after 1 or 2 reloads that is not a good sign and I'd trash the whole lot of brass.
 
71Eagle said:
I bought 100 rnds of Starlight Brass and I asked them about the load and they guy said it should be fine but might experience some split cases. Ya'll have any opinions on that?
Click to expand...

Interesting. Several years ago I used W231 in some jacketed 44 Mag loads using several dozen Winchester brass cases. I experienced many split cases in two different revolvers. After reloading the brass several times and throwing out about 2/3 of the brass due to splits, I through the rest out as well.

I don't recall the exact load, but it was not anywhere near a max load. I'm thinking it was around 9.0 gr. of W231 behind a 180gr. or 200gr. jacketed bullet. It very well could have a lot of brittle brass.

I like W231 and use it in many different handgun load, but I no longer use it in any 44 Mag load. And I haven't had a problem with 44 Mag Winchester splitting since I stopped using 231 in them.

Maybe there is something to what Starline said.
 
7.5 grains of 231 is .5 below the current minimum for a jacketed 240. 5.5 of Win 231 is for a cast bullet. Mind you, 7.5 is also a mid range load for a cast bullet.
An RNFP can be jacketed or cast. Plated bullets use cast bullet data by the bullet weight. So any cast 240 grain data will do.
"...a Mod 629 w/4' barrel..." A .44 Mag 4" barrel is going to have considerable muzzle blast with any magnum load anyway. Probably will with a .44 Special load in a Magnum case too.
For some daft reason, Hodgdon used an 8.275" barrel for their on-line test data. Your 4' barrel will have less velocity. Have a look at this for more realistic velocities.
http://www.ballisticsbytheinch.com/44mag.html
 
I loaded a Campro 240 plated over 8.5 grains of 231 in a Winchester magnum case and it was a really accurate and pleasant load out of my 5 1/2” SBH. The load they list is 8 to 11 grains. Very clean burning and no issues with case splitting.
 
I use quite a bit of win 231 in the 44 mag with 215 and 240 gr SWC lead bullets.

IIRC I used just over the max for 44 special load data. I believe the 240 gr load is 7.5 gr of 231. Its well above what a 44 special can handle, but mild by comparison to full house 44 mag.
 
Win 231/HP-38 is one of the most versatile handgun powders on the market. I've used it a lot in a wide variety of calibers and power levels. My most accurate 44 mag field load is 9.2 gr of HP-38 under a 265 gr SWC-GC for around 1100 fps in a 6" Smith. Powerful, yet with very manageable recoil. One thing to be aware of with 231/HP-38: it burns much cleaner as pressure rises. In working up my above mentioned load, it didn't start shooting "clean" until I got to about 8½ grains. 7-8 grain loads under 240s only shoot marginally cleaner than Unique does.
 
If you're looking for light, accurate loads with lead bullets out of your .44 Magnum, I suggest leaving the WW 231 on the shelf.

231 has no greater proponent than me, but my experience with 231 in the really large cases like .44 Special and .45 Colt has not been particularly good.

In .44 Special it was especially problematic given the tiny amount of powder in the case. I was getting ignition issues and spotty accuracy.

I switched to Trail Boss for light loads in .44 Special and haven't looked back.

Now, the situation might be quite a bit different in .44 Magnum because you'd use a heavier powder charge, but I'm still not sure that I woudn't be looking for another powder.

I do use 231 in .41 Magnum, but I keep those lead bullet loads about as hot as I can (right around 1,000 fps, IIRC), and for that purpose 231 does fine.
 
I had good luck with W231 in .44 Special.
6.0g (894fps), 6,5g (946fps), and 7.0g (996fps) under 240g SWC shot great. Extreme spread was low too (32, 27, 14 respectively, 15 shots each for test). Of course these aren't light loads, but medium loads. Note shot in .44 Special Ruger Flattop (not recommended for .44 Special CA Bulldog). Do your own research.

Trail Boss performed well in .44 Special too for the light loads. Agree.
 
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