Henry Rifle Forums

Here's the target I shot yesterday with the steel Henry .38/.357. Took the opportunity to also chronograph the loads. Interesting as the results below will show.
This is the 2nd test using Alliant Bullseye and the Ideal 358411 bullet and shot at 50 yds.

Target# 1; Powder chg.- 4.0 grs.; M.V. - 1101 fps; Std. Dev. - 8.050; Ex. Spread - 20 fps

Target# 2; Powder chg.- 4.2 grs.; M.V. - 1129 fps; Std. Dev. - 7.626; Ex. Spread - 23 fps

Target# 3; Powder chg.- 4.4 grs.; M.V. - 1172 fps; Std. Dev. - 4.176; Ex. Spread - 13 fps

Target# 4; Powder chg.- 4.6 grs.; M.V. - 1199 fps; Std. Dev. - 3.464; Ex. Spread - 9 fps

Target# 5; Powder chg.- 4.8 grs.; M.V. - 1228 fps; Std. Dev. - 6.968; Ex. Spread - 19 fps

Target# 6; Powder chg.- 5.0 grs.; M.V. - 1268 fps; Std. Dev. - 6.818; Ex. Spread - 15 fps


The round circled on target #3 is the first round in the group. I have no idea why it's there. The one circled in #5 is too.

As you can see the S.D. & E.S. get smaller till target 5 & 6. As it turned out I picked up a little Leading and suspect it started at 5 & 6. Groups get noticeably larger too. So looks like that's about the limit for Bullseye in my gun.

Time for another powder and a better bullet.

did I leave anything out? Right now don't expect the data layout you see above. took about a 1/2 hour to get to look that good.

Pete

Very interesting and nice shooting. Thank you.

Thanks for the detailed range report, Pete. Great shooting at 50 yards. I look forward to reading about your next powder and bullet selections and results.

I admire shooters who use lead bullets that they've cast themselves and learn from the experience about what works best and why. It's a world away from what I do, though I'm very curious.

Nicely done, thanks for the report.

Thanks for the kind words. Sometimes I wonder if I'm making any progress.

CT,

Been shooting cast bullets exclusively for so long I can't recall when that was.

Been reading up on what the SASS shooters are doing and found I have a mold they highly recommend. It's the Lyman 358665. The reason they like it is because it doesn't have that raised band at the nose. Transitions right from the nose to the driving bands. They claim that it eliminates that slight hangup you get if you have to crimp on a driving band. I found a taper crimp helped some but not completely. Cast up a few and loaded some dummies up and found they were right. Loaded up 40 rds. for the next session and ran them thru the gun and not a hangup in the bunch. Yes. I know. Not a good idea.

If you look it up in Lyman's #4 Cast Bullet handbook they've made some radical changes between what's in the book and what they've done since I bought mine a couple years ago, Wgt.. is now 165 grs. instead of 158 grs. The ogive tapers a bit more and it has a flat point instead of rounded.

So been spending the last couple days casting up enuf bullets to cover the tests.

As for the powder I'm going to use. Thot I'd go over Titegroup again. Didn't work work well with the lighter bullet, but maybe........

Pete