Anyone here play with a 45 raptor yet?

[RBHarter]

I believe that the reamer is of tolerance . The Lee bullet is a rifle bullet and all but 1 of my smokeless moulds cast fat . The commercial reamer is .452 with a 1.5° throat. It looks right on the 457-340 . In terms of where the lands hit in relationship to the case mouth . The nose on that bullet is .449 for a bbl 458x 450 . If I had 452-340 pistol bullet it would be good to go .

 

[Ian]

Tom can hook you up with one. .452" is about right for jacketed pistol bullets, but not so great for cast ones meant for a .451" groove. I'd like to see it at least .454" with a .5 ° included throat taper if it were mine, and it would handle some of the middleweight .457" rifle bullet noses that way.

 

[Josh]

RB, I may have a perfect fit then, I ran a batch of moulds based on an improved Lee 430-310-RF and I obturated a few up to .452, let me check the numbers when I get home. I know it drops about 325 gr.

 

[RBHarter]

The other pistol bullets will seat long even at 454 .
I want to tackle the feed before I cut on chamber .

Anybody have a 45 cal neck reamer taking up space ?

 

[Josh]

Not sure if it would work, bump this to .452 and that's it

 

[RBHarter]

I should have a better idea as the week progresses . I guess I could do a chamber cast . Naaaa , too easy .

 

[RBHarter]

I was lamenting that so many of the Mauser parts and packages have become hard to find an expensive .......

Then I broke the mag spring .... So I had to go looking again. What do I trip over ? A short action kit with spring new follower and a magazine block , $19 , it's $14 for a new standard spring .
I sprung for a new mould . I basically dropped the crimp groove , enhanced the lube grooves , added a little bore ride and took the Lee bullet down to 454/445 from the 460/450 . it gained a little length but it should work well . As an extra bonus it will fit in the Schofield and seat at Colts length or a little more and it will run in the RBH and 92s , just in case I need to shoot some major heavyweights.
My mag block worked until just before the spring gave up , the 308 rim is causing the hang up , too thick . Who'd have thought that .053-.045 would be a hassle on a 100 yo action.

 

[freebullet]

Quite a time but, they are all a journey.

Member bored has a Manson 45 reamer. He might let you borrow it for shipping. We did 2 barrels by hand with it & it solved our issues.

 

[RBHarter]

I'd almost forgotten about this thread ......OK I completely forgot about it .
I've made good progress on this .
I have a 454-350 from Mountain Moulds that could have been just a little bit narrower on the nose . It casts at .446 on the nose , .448 just in front of the .455 band w/o a crimp groove . Sized 454 and @ 2.300 OAL there is .456 inside and .455 outside .
It is of course a work in progress .
It feeds the round nose and RNFP okay but hangs a little on the last round .
I loaded 12 gr of Unique under,
454424 Lyman @ 1335 fps
454424 NOE. @ 1338 fps
429421 @ 1375 fps it casts at .448 and paper patched.
452-255. @ 1345 fps @ 265 gr
454-350. @ 1225 fps
With work up loads of H322 the 350 went to 1650 fps before suffering alloy/base failure the last load went 1710,1725, 1680,1625 and 1620 .
The recoil is ......Brisk , yes that's a good word , in the 5.5# rifle , so much so that in 3 trips it stripped the screw threads off the mount screws . No more dot optic until I can get an SR Mauser bridge mount Weaver rail. With any luck at all the modified handi rifle sights will stay put long enough to find a good load for fun and business .

I haven't achieved full reported/advertised 460 speeds ,but somehow I think 2200 fps for the 350 would eliminate any sort of a fun factor at all so I'm okay with coming up short . I might try that papered 429421 at 257 gr just for fun . Now that I'm here I'm having some difficulty with the idea of a 257 gr SWC at over 2000 fps running into something solid like a hog .......Do ya think it would do brain damage in a 200# ?

 

[Ian]

I believe it would do brain damage even if you shot it in the arse. Glad you got it going, that's a really nice looking rig.

 

[RBHarter]

It'll look more right when the colors are all matched up.
It should be handy in stands and the like .
Strelok app predicts a 100 yd zero should be point of hold with the heavy out to 255 yd . In case I have to shoot a hog in the neighbors house through the garage and the car....

 

[KeithB]

RBHarter - Acetal plastic might make a good magazine filler. It's dense and strong and machines pretty well. They make gears and other structural components out of it. I have some Delrin (trade name for a grade of acetal) hunks laying around. How big a piece would you need? I have a black piece laying on my desk right now that is a little over 1/2" thick x 1" wide x 3-3/4" long.

 

[RBHarter]

The block came with the short action kit .

 

[KeithB]

Cool, all is well then.

 

[RBHarter]

I appreciate all the kind offers .

 

[freebullet]

Thanks for the update, RB.

454-350. @ 1225 fps
That one sounds quite enjoyably fun.

Some of those stiffer loads would require a limbsaver for me. I'd also need to bump the weight up. I prefer 7 pound or heavier rifles. Would have the wobbles bad with this cal @5.5lb. Maybe drill & fill the stock.

I'd still love to build one of these on an a2 stocked ar308. Wouldn't be as purty as Rb's wood stock though.

 

[RBHarter]

The Boyd's has a factory pad of some sort on it . After shooting a couple full tilt LevEvolution and strong lever 45-70s in a W96 and GG I can confirm these are no more abusive than the LevEvolution 325 FXT .
Standing isn't to bad , sitting at a bench would be brutal .

 

[freebullet]

Honestly I'd be in the 10-13 lb range in the ar308 style. I bet that would tame it quite a bit.

Any favorite load or top accuracy performer? With it eating the optic mount I'd guess not yet?

 

[RBHarter]

I did have a couple of the heavies that went into what is an unconfirmed 2.5" at 50 yd sawing additional holes in an already chewed up backer .
The paper patch load did an honest 2" from a standing field position for 4/5 over the Chrony . I expect that I should be able to get at least one of the 250s and a worked up load for the 350 to match that at 100 over a rest.

 

[freebullet]

Nice, that could be tough to better without magnification.