Reloading?

[OlJarhead]

Good article but I must admit, I'm glad I have the old model!  I tend to want hotter loads I guess, or at least the ability to test them though I prefer to shoot a little lighter then hottest.

For example, I enjoyed shooting my 360 grain WNFP's from Oregon Trail with 18.4 grains of Win296 and CCI350's.  Those were designed to come out around 1129fps and produce 1019 ft-lbs of force from a 7 1/2" barrel but I'm shooting a 5 1/2 so expect a little less, maybe 900-950 or 1000 if I'm lucky (have to get the chrono working right to know).

I'll test them up to the max though (20 grains of win296 to produce 1234fps in the 7 1/2" vaquero at a rather impressive 1218 ft-lbs of force) but admittedly I don't enjoy shooting loads that hot as much (so I learned when shooting the old Corbon 'Colt Magnum' rounds they no longer call 'Magnum' but rather +p -- they just hurt! lol)...but I want to test these at that range to see how they perform in both the handgun and the rifle.

Maybe I'm a nut though! LOL    I am a jarhead after all.

Truth is I was reading an article a few years back about shooting wild bore with 300 grain Cast Performance  bullets going some crazy velocities out of a rifle and dropping big bores on the charge like a ton of bricks and I've wanted to try to produce some loads like that to see what they're like to shoot.

I was sitting on my duff wondering why all of a sudden the ants were finding certain parts of my anatomy so fascinating...when I heard him coming and grunting and complaining, like his boss gave him a hard time at work. Ants forgotten, I lifted the Win/94 in 45 long Colt....300 grain WFN (wide flat nose) loaded to about 1500+ fps giving around a 1500 ft.lbs.or less of muzzle punch. He broke cover at 65 long paces...I was even with his chest, so I put it there...it traversed his entire body and exited after going thru his left hip joint (back leg joint socket).

Chances are I'll settle on something around 1000fps with the 360's and continue to shoot my 250gr RNFP's around 850fps and be happy but I'll always have some of those big monsters in my belt for those days I'm trudging along in the heavy brush in the mounts or in the valley up the way where it can get tight and the only place for that bear to go is right through you or back the way he came....know what I mean?

Anyway, I'm looking for a powerful load that I can shoot with the rifle but that won't break my Vaquero (or my hand) and I'm thinking Oregon Trails big huge bullets traveling over 1000fps from the pistol ought to produce some serious grunt from the Model92

[OlJarhead]

http://www.leverguns.com/articles/paco/45coltlevergun.htm

Sorry!  Forgot that article.

[Yonderosa]

Check out Garrett Cartridges commentaries. 

http://garrettcartridges.com/commentaries.html

[OlJarhead]

Good article on handguns and bears...confirms some of my own thoughts (big and slow).

I grew up in Coastal BC and North Central (when I was younger) and there was a time I could smell a bear before he ever got close enough to charge me unless I was upwind of him.

Funny story, best told when time permits, but when I returned from Desert Storm I'd been out of bear country for over 5 years.  I went out fishing (in Canada so no sidearm or longarm though later I began carrying a shotgun) and had just gotten settled at a new fishing hole I wanted to try not far from Port Alice BC.

Shortly after my first cast I smelled garbage (or so I thought) and the flies were loud as can be.  I was pissed that anyone would have thrown their trash in this pristine location but the trash smelled somewhat strange.

I sat contemplating the smell and the sound of the flies and then it hit me like a ton of bricks!  I was sitting CLOSE ENOUGH to a bear that I could both smell him AND hear the flies buzzing around him.

I first thought of trying to real in my line, even started doing it but realized I needed to be careful, he obviously was curious but not charging me....I rustled my tackle box and banged it on a rock once before realizing how stupid that was (I'd been there before and it only aroused interest -- yes, interest)....so then I did what I'd learned so many years before:  I introduced myself to 'George'.

"OK George, here is how it's going to be, I'm going to get up real easy like and I'm going to walk right back down the trail to my car and put my stuff away and your going to let me do just that.  ok?".

While talking I reeled in my line, picked up my gear and slowly turned around and got ready to walk back.  Bushes moved nearby as 'George' gave me room.  I walked back to my car (maybe 50 yards) and as I reached the parking area (this wasn't a public lake the way you probably think of one...this was a lake that wasn't within 5 miles of a building or a person near a town that was 45 miles from the next town or building for that matter) which was really just a gravel pullout on a logging road.  As I made the clearing old George, as I called him or her, moved off into the brush on the other side.

I got in my car and drove away, I'd decided I'd had enough excitement that day.

The next time I went fishing there I had my shotgun (side by side 12guage) leaning against a rock and a game warden came walking up.  I'd heard the car pull over by mine a few minutes earlier but was surprised by the warden because I'd never seen one before.  He asked me "What are you hunting?" when he walked up.  I looked at him somewhat puzzled (remember this is Canada after all and I'd just come back from the US after getting out of the Marine Corps after Desert Storm) and said "I'm fishing".  To which he replied while pointing at my shotgun "with that?".

I laughed and said "No that's bear repellant but I'd rather have one of those for that" and pointed at his sidearm.

We had a nice chat that day and he agreed it would be much better to carry a sidearm then to rely on a shotgun leaning against a rock that I might walk a yard or three away from while reeling in a big one.

In all my years of wandering around the woods alone (I've done that a lot) I've never been charged by a bear, wolf or cougar but I've been tracked by all of them (except maybe a cougar since you never really know with them) but any time ones been too curious (or more then one) I've either talked my way out of it (you'd be surprised how well that works) or convinced them I was far more dangerous then they were by shooting something nearby. 

BUT, and this is a big BUT, I've read too many stories about lone people being attacked in the woods by sick, frightened or startled animals and you just never know.  If that ever happens to me I pray I'll have my .45 colt on my hip with big flat bullets loaded up in it and my bowie on my other hip and preferably a shotgun or rifle in hand!

Like in the Marine Corps, the pistol is a last ditch protection measure to be used only when all else has failed and then it better be up to the task and from what I've seen and read the .45colt is if loaded well (and I think Yonderosa can attest to that since he's hunting with .45colt by the sounds of it).

I would never, however, rely on 9mm, 380, 38 special and would prefer not to have to rely on .357magnum though it's a good handgun it's still just a .38 moving fast.  I'd rather have my .452 chugging along at a respectable pace with the power to stop whatever it is that I'm faced with.

By the way, I wouldn't rely on the .45 colt in Grizzly country though -- not serious Grizzly country.  No sir, then I think I'd migrate over to the .454 Casull instead.  Just need that much more force.

There was a guy who shot a charging brown bear with all 6 rounds from his .454 and the bear dropped at his feet still alive but unable to do anything.  The guys wife shot the bear shortly afterwards.  He later said he thought his pistol malfunctioned because it quit firing.  He hadn't realized he'd fired all six!  That happens in combat too.

How does Springfield Arms put it?  "Bring enough gun".    In Blackbear county I think I can do that

[OlJarhead]

Hmmm had a post get lost.

In short (cause I don't want to type it all again) the 19.5 grain Win296/CCI350 load for the 360gr WNFP's ran the most consistant at an average deviation of only 10FPS and an ave velocity of 137fps.

I went from 18.5 to 20.0 but the 19.5's were the best/

Energy should be right around 860 ft-lbs of force at 15 feet.