Henry Rifle Forums

Took small,medium and super sized to the range today. Single shot .22lr,.357 1894c Marlin and the Henry 45-70. The .22 was there to test the chronograph. The Marlin would have done better if SOMEONE had seated the bullets a tiny bit deeper. The Henry was the star of the show. As much as I'd love to get 300 grain hollow points to shoot well the Henry just doesn't seem to like them. 400 grain Speers and 405 Laser cast bullets are a lot better. 32 grains of IMR4198 with a 405 Lazercast and 36 grains of IMR4198 and the 400 grain Speer shoot almost to the same impact. Speed on the 400 Speer load was 1342fps. On theLazercast load it was 1349fps. Surely 1350 fps with a 400 grain bullet would be enough to deer hunt with?! Maybe I've found the magic combination for my Henry?

Sounds like you had a good time. Thanks for the report.

Abnermal wrote: Surely 1350 fps with a 400 grain bullet would be enough to deer hunt with?! Maybe I've found the magic combination for my Henry?

That's very similar to the factory 405 grain Remington loads I shoot in my Contender. It's a traditional 45-70 load. Historically, it's been used to take much larger animals than deer. In fact, it's been used to take all large game species in North America, including elk, buffalo and bear. It's only limitation will be the loopy trajectory. I certainly wouldn't try to make a long distance cartridge out of it, but at woods ranges, no such thing as an animal in our state too big for that load.

Black powder loads for this cartridge vary from around 1,000-1,300 fps with a 405 lead. Many folks hunted large game in Africa with that load!