Favorite conical bullet for fast twist barrel?

For those of you who may have an additional fast twist barrel, what is your favorite conical?

Been trying out a Green Mountain .50 LRH barrel. Had an old set of Lyman 445599 mold blocks. Sent them off and had the hole opened up and a new base plug made for a fairly thick skirt. The as-cast diameter is suited to a double wrap of paper to make a friction fit in the LRH bore. It is working quite well so far but from the examination of recovered slugs it appears that the charge can be increased to get more consistent expansion on the bullet body into the rifling.
The bullet weight being used is 385gr of soft lead, a compromise between obtaining velocity and what the barrel will stabilize.
Reckon this is my favorite for now.

I don't shoot conicals much but the Hornady Great Plains in either 385 or 410 grain shoot very well in my GM LRH .50 cal. barrels. I shoot mostly unmentionables from mine.

I aquired a 45-70 1-22 twist barrel. Made my own hoohed breach plug and misc. parts for a drop in barrel for the TC hawken. I cast the Lymn# 457193 (428 grain weight). I load 90 grains of 2f. this combo. does VERRY well in my gun. Recoil is a bit heavy, but what the heck, its fun to shoot. :thumbsup:

Happy Trails
Tradegunner

Another vote for the Hornady Great Plains bullet....385 Grain with the hollow base filled with bore butter and sitting over a OC Wad, on top of 90grains of powder was deadly to 100 yards and probably beyond.

bull3540 said:

For those of you who may have an additional fast twist barrel, what is your favorite conical?

Click to expand...

I used to paper patch some Precision Rifle bullet's. Back in the day for a .508 bore. I liked the 350 grain bullets and last I knew you could get them at Cabela's.

A round nose, or a Postel-style lead cast bullet tends to be the favorite of target shooters, and those shooting metallic Silhouette targets. The faster the ROT, the longer( and heavier) the bullet that can be used and stabilized over longer ranges.

Most long range shooters use paper patched bullets in their guns for best accuracy.

The .45 caliber seems to be the best compromise between recoil issues, and a heavy enough bullet that bucks the wind well. Small calibers are easier in the recoil department, but wind drifts the bullets for the smaller calibers further. Larger calibers drift less, but the recoil becomes a bigger problem.

On a dead calm day, everyone would be shooting a .36 or .38 caliber rifle. On windy days, everyone is using heavier bullets, bigger calibers, and trying to deal with recoil over a 40 shot course, fired twice over two consecutive days, for a total of 80 shots. In cumulative recoil terms, this can be Brutal with the .50 and .54 caliber guns, no matter what padding you might have to protect your shoulder. :shocked2: :thumbsup: :hmm:

In my 50 cal, LRH hunter barrel on a T/C Renegade I am shooting 460 No Excuses lead conicals.I am shooting 75 gr.of fff Swiss powder.Bullets holes touch at 50 yds.

Paper patched 300 or 400 grain .395 bullets from Montana Precision Swaging paper patched to .399 diameter with .001 thick dress pattern paper.

These bullets are for my Schuetzen muzzleloader (Pecatonica River supplied parts).

Zonie, how long do those cartridges last? I've got some I made a long time ago for my percussion Sharps from nitrated heavy rag paper, and the last time I tried them, I got a lot of mis and hang fires. I just stored them in the cartridge box. Is there a trick I'm missing, or is there simply a time limit to using them? (Or am I mixing apples & oranges here?)

Beautiful gun, btw.

The Hornady Great Plains bullets are my prefered go to bullets for hunting. They shoot real well in my 1-48 twist TC barrels.

The only conicals that I shoot are hollow base mini's. I cast mine some what shorter than the civil war style.

Ya know? Your not the first person to ask me about those "cartridges".

When I take my Schutzen to the range,folks often have asked about them. I think my favorite was, "Not very much powder in those cartridges! Are you shooting "smokeless"?"

Actually, those are not cartridges. Those are just the lead bullets with a double wrap of paper around them. The short ones are 305 grain and the long ones are 400 grain. Both of them are .40 caliber and they do not have grease grooves. They do have a special hollow base to tuck the paper in. You can see the hollow on some of the unpatched bullets.

I leave them dry as shown in the picture and grease them with a bees wax and Vasoline mix right before I load them.

Zonie said:

Ya know? Your not the first person to ask me about those "cartridges".

When I take my Schutzen to the range,folks often have asked about them. I think my favorite was, "Not very much powder in those cartridges! Are you shooting "smokeless"?"

Actually, those are not cartridges. Those are just the lead bullets with a double wrap of paper around them. The short ones are 305 grain and the long ones are 400 grain. Both of them are .40 caliber and they do not have grease grooves. They do have a special hollow base to tuck the paper in. You can see the hollow on some of the unpatched bullets.

I leave them dry as shown in the picture and grease them with a bees wax and Vasoline mix right before I load them.

Click to expand...

i get the same thing with my whitworth at the range. i used to use your bullets bigger brothers from MPS, same style shouldered at .440 and 550grn. they shot nice and make a really nice clean hole in the target, but you really notice how the shoulder makes them drop faster than a more pointed nose shape. at least 5 minutes higher in elevation at short range and progressivly more once you get past 300yrds. still, i enjoyed shooting them.

not traditional mind you but i use either powerbelts and thor conicals in the fast twists. heck even in my 1:48's i will use them. I prefer to use a 54 on elk but when i only have a 50..... it gets the conical. :thumbsup:

bull3540 said:

For those of you who may have an additional fast twist barrel, what is your favorite conical?

Click to expand...

Sierra #1410 .224" 53 gr HPBT . . . but I don't shoot conicals out of my muzzleloaders. :idunno: