350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

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350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Lar45 » Wed Apr 10, 2019 8:28 pm

Anybody do anything with the Speer .458" 350 Hotcor?
I picked up a couple of boxes and a Lee .451" sizing die. I lubed them with Imperial Sizing Die Wax and stuffed them through the die. They sprang back to .452" on the other side, and are .990" long.
I loaded one dummy round just to look at.
Image
My magazine will accept it loaded out to 2.290"
My rifle is the Ruger AR with 18" bbl and 16" twist.
It is boxed up right now for a trip back to Ruger. I think that the chamber is too tight. Hornady Black 250FTX will not pass the plunk text and gets stuck about 3/8" out. This is with a squeaky clean chamber and barrel.

I've been doing some reading on using heavy bullets in the 450, it seems that most everybody suggests AA1680.
I have Quickload to give me some ideas as to start and max loads.
Quickload suggests that
35gns should give 1681fps @ 33kpsi at 85% load density
37gn should give 1795fps @ 40kpsi at 92% load density
I was just wondering if anyone had used this bullet with any success.
Last edited by Lar45 on Mon Apr 29, 2019 9:51 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Rklenke » Wed Apr 10, 2019 9:59 pm

I'm curious as to how much force it took to size from .458 to .451 in one stroke. Maybe the Speer bullet is softer than the Hornady 325s, I got one stuck trying that.

I agree with 1680, although I skipped from 300 grains to 500 grains, so I don't have any 350 grain data for you.
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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Lar45 » Thu Apr 11, 2019 3:54 am

The first bullet took 3-4 increments until it was all the way through. Then the inside of the die had lube on it, so the others went through in one stroke. I was using the Lee Classic Cast press. The handle on the Lee is hollow and won't hold up to heavy use, so I replaced it with a Dillon 550 handle.
I have an old Huskuvarna in 9.3x57 that has an oversized bore at .368". So I took Speer .375" 235s and sized them down to .368" using an NOE sizer. If you ever need odd sizes, then NOE is probably the place to look. The hollow handle of the Lee press bent while sizing the 235s, so I shopped Ebay and found the Dillon handle for cheap.
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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Hoot » Thu Apr 11, 2019 4:45 am

I used 3 or 4 (I Forget) dies to get the Hornady 325's down to size and still my arm was pissed after 50 of them. 1680, 300BLK or SW BLK would be the powders I'd look at. Too bad QuickLoad is 10 years (or more) behind the times on supported powders. :roll: My only gripe with it.

That 16 twist will do fine though more barrel length would be optimal for the powder(s) burn rate.

Looking forward to your range report!

Hoot

P.S. Does anyone here know how to get in touch with new member Papi?
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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Buckeye45 » Thu Apr 11, 2019 5:16 am

That’s interesting as I just found I had a box of these yesterday. Thanks for the info on the die to use. I’ve got lots of .458 bullets leftovers that may get squeezed.
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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Hoot » Thu Apr 11, 2019 6:33 am

Buckeye45 wrote:That’s interesting as I just found I had a box of these yesterday. Thanks for the info on the die to use. I’ve got lots of .458 bullets leftovers that may get squeezed.


I went .457 -> .454 -> .452 ->.451 to encourage consistency and avoid distorting the lead core to copper jacket fit, as much as possible, when I did my 325gr FTX bullets. They flew amazingly accurate from my 1:24 barrel. Much more so than native .452 300gr FTX bullets. Go figure...

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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Bmt85 » Thu Apr 11, 2019 8:59 pm

I resized some Hornady 350gr soft points which look like they might have a little more bearing surface. I first took them down in 2 steps. .454, which was pretty easy, then .452, which was quite a bit harder. Bullets sprung back to .4525ish. Picked up a .451 die and sized them again. Was just as hard as the .452. I suppose you could size it down in 2 steps, .454 then .451, but it wouldn’t be fun to do a bunch at a time. I agree with Hoot though, I’d be worried about the lead core deformation.

I did Speer 300gr soft points and they were a lot easier, iirc.
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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Al in Mi » Fri Apr 12, 2019 6:50 am

STP makes a decent lube in a pinch, have sized a bunch of .458's to fit the smokeless ML's in 3 steps and 44's down to .416 for the 410ICBM in 5 steps, clean up with a splash of gas and let dry on a paper towel. Slight jacket separation will be a gimmie, but has never seemed to make a difference on hair.

I do use a arbor press thou, just more leverage with it.
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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Lar45 » Mon Apr 29, 2019 11:35 am

Well, I tried some loads with AA1680 and the 350 Speers and had hangfires and misfires.
I had some new primed brass, which I thought were CCI 450s, but I did not write it down in my notes, so they could have been WSR primers instead. The brass had been sitting on my bench for about a month waiting for the rifle to get back from Ruger. It had a tight chamber and they honed it out.
So in all fairness, I should reshoot the loads with CCI 450s.
37gns gave 1559fps and a hangfire
I skipped the 38 gn loads thinking the powder charge was too light.
39gns gave erratic velocities from 1540 to 1799fps
40 gns gave 1798fps but had verticle stringing and gave one misfire. When I pulled the bullet, there was a clump of unburnt powder along with loose powder in the case.

I'm gonna try some Lil-Gun next and see where that gets me.
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Re: 350 Speer .458" sized to .452"

Postby Hoot » Mon Apr 29, 2019 1:10 pm

Lar45 wrote:Well, I tried some loads with AA1680 and the 350 Speers and had hangfires and misfires.
I had some new primed brass, which I thought were CCI 450s, but I did not write it down in my notes, so they could have been WSR primers instead. The brass had been sitting on my bench for about a month waiting for the rifle to get back from Ruger. It had a tight chamber and they honed it out.
So in all fairness, I should reshoot the loads with CCI 450s.
37gns gave 1559fps and a hangfire
I skipped the 38 gn loads thinking the powder charge was too light.
39gns gave erratic velocities from 1540 to 1799fps
40 gns gave 1798fps but had verticle stringing and gave one misfire. When I pulled the bullet, there was a clump of unburnt powder along with loose powder in the case.

I'm gonna try some Lil-Gun next and see where that gets me.


WSR Primers are pretty hot as far as SR primers go. Lil Gun would be swinging a little far in the opposite direction from 1680, which should offer a good choice for 350gr bullets. My gut feeling is that there's something else afoot. Did you mic every bullet after resizing? If one for whatever reason, wound up undersized, you wouldn't have a good grip between it and the case, depending upon how stiff a crimp you put on it. IMHO, Bullets jumping out of the case before the powder gets cooking good, is a prime cause for what you experienced. Contaminated primers would be a close second. Weak primers like CCI BR4's would be my 3rd guess. All three are guesses however. All your resultant velocities seem low. I was getting the resized 325gr FTX's up around 2000fps without pressure signs, using 1680 and Rem 7 1/2 (very close to WSR). The faster they flew, the tighter their groups became.

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