Hunting Bullet for the 45 Colt

[cherokeetracker]

I am wondering who has had good luck with a hunting bullet for the Colt?  Part of what prompted this question was Fermin's  search for a good bullet mold in the cowboy style. Using .454 dia.  Now many here have Ruger Loads and Bullets, but the Colts operating pressure is not the same, and this presents a different approach.  The Garrett 260 Grain +P works excellent in my Colt, but is certainly not something for everyday shooting.

    Anyone here have a  260grain bullet that can be loaded to Sammi specs, and have accurate results at 50 yds or more?  And I do realize that each gun is different as well as each shooter.  Prime example is my Colt has .454 throats and shoots the Garrett .452 just fine.    Good bullet design is important. 

    My first thought is that I should talk with Veral Smith.  But before I do, I was thinking of seeking any prior results that might prove worthy. 

      Charles

[Fowler]

What are you hunting and what gun is the bullet going into?

[sheriff]

Charles, I've had good luck with the 270SAA that I cast from a Mihec hp/solid mold. It was designed for the Colt, specifically.

[Deleted]

give the beartooth 265 wfn a look. shot a small deer two years ago with it rumbling along at 1000 fps and it went 20 yards or so and crumpled.

[COR]

Design gets over done a bit on here when it comes to actual hunting. Theory usually drives the discussion more than lead on tissue.....A 250gr round nose will kill any deer you hit in the boilermaker. The 270SAA is my favorite and the 255gr SWC will sing too...

All these are commercial molds or available through bullet casters...

REMEMBER...If you introduce a .45 caliber foreign object at even modest velocity into to most living things you can just get your knife out....

BTW...I love Verals molds and won't discourage that choice.

[jimtx]

When handgun hunting use the right bullet for the game & distances you'll be hunting. With that said deer or other thin skinned game, the "best" bullet type is a JHP, Hornady XTP's are fantastic, they will open under 1000 FPS, and work over 1800FPS as well, I have used them many times on large whitetails 15 to 100+ yds.

Sure you can use a WFN but thin skin game doesn't require hardcast at all.

For 45LC, Hornady makes the 250/300 xtp's as well as 250/300 XTP Mags, slightly different construction made originally for the 454 to me they are like a cross between a JHP & JSP. I used them as well, better for larger thin skinned like elk,moose.

However elk, moose,etc also enters WFN design as top choice obviously punching through shoulder bone, creating a large channel and rapid blood loss. There's my 2 cents for what its worth.

[magnumwheelman]

my only handload for hunting with 45 Colt is a hot 250 grain Hornady XTP... once I get the time, I'll be switching to a good wide meplat cast bullet... but I currently only hunt out of a 10" Contender in the 45 Colt caliber... with loads in the Ruger only pressure category... not something you'd want to put in a Colt revolver... in fact... the Contender is pretty hard on my knuckle... get bloody knuckle after 6-8 shots I shoot tons of 45 Colt cowboy loads in a year, with decent cast bullets at mid level loads... they would probably kill deer quite well

[bigmuddy]

Oct 12, 2016 9:39:23 GMT -5 sheriff said:

Charles, I've had good luck with the 270SAA that I cast from a Mihec hp/solid mold. It was designed for the Colt, specifically.

This! ^^^^^^^^^

Dan

[cherokeetracker]

First off Thank You for all the responses. I appreciate all the help.
I also should have been a little more specific, but decided not to, and left it open for anyone to share their experiences with different bullets and Loads.

Russ and Bignuddy. I have tried the 270-SAA and did not get the desired results. I got them from Matt at Mattsbullets and he cast them in the .454 for me. They would probably take almost anything, except I was not getting the accuracy from them that I expected. I haven't totally given up on them. I may need to try from a different mold.

flexir A 265 from beartooth will be considered.

Fowler I was thinking more along the lines of Deer and did not get specific. see first sentence.

COR Mentioning design was more in the accuracy department than say,,, HP VS Solid or things like that. To let you and everyone here know that I am more adamant about bullet placement and the shooter doing HIS JOB than trying to rely on some magic bullet or load.

jimtx I do agree that the Hornady XTPs are good bullets. Swift makes good bullets too. That has been shown here, by people like Darrel and James. But,, As I stated in the first, my Colt SAA has .454 throats and all bullets are not accurate from it. I thought I had tried them but now I can't remember without going to my notebooks. I do know that in certain calibers they have worked well. I do use them in 45 ACP have used them in my 44 mag. I have had good success with Speer Gold Dots Just not in the 45 Colt.

I will say that I am not trying to reinvent the wheel here, just looking for your suggestions on what has brought you success, with the Colt or Clones. It seemed someone here even took a Deer with a Blackpowder load in their Colt. So we all know it can be done. Nothing wrong with the Colt 45 even with more sedate loads.

Thanks Again.

[joej]

Maybe try the Speer 250 grain Deepcurl?

[bradshaw]

Charles.... the .45 Colt lends itself particularly to a well designed cast bullet. For your purpose on the trail of deer, the anneal provided by powder coating (PC) adds punch through soft skin. PC teated deserving consideration include 330 grain Keith SWC (NEI #310), and 280 SWC HP. Among my photo essay series posted by Lee Martin in the Gallery section, these Tank-made bullets fired from the Ruger 03 5-1/2" and Freedom Arms M83 4-3/4" are accurate @ 100 yards and more. The LBT 335 LFN would be a choice in lubed, hard alloy form, although my preference for immediate wallop on deer favors the nose upset on softer lead. Accuracy was a disappointment in limited experience with Wide Flat Nose. Instances of excellent accuracy failed to repeat in the big picture.
David Bradshaw

[sixshot]

Charles, the 45 Colt is excellent on deer & they are not hard to kill with correct bullet placement. I've taken many of them using the 260 gr. Keith, mostly using 18.5grs. of 2400 but a few were taken using 9 grs. of Unique with that same slug. Almost always the alloy was straight air cooled wheel weights. I've also taken 4 elk with cast slugs, either the 260 gr. Keith or a 325 gr. LBT, all 4 were one shot kills & neither bullet showed any advantage over the other, placement was key.
In spite of what you've read a jacketed bullet is not superior to a cast bullet, equal perhaps but not better in any way. The nose on a jacketed bullet is smaller (disadvantage) some will say you get more expansion but a cast bullet can easily match or exceed the expansion of a jacketed slug & still give penetration (soft nose cast) plus you can match the bullet to the cylinder throats with cast, you can't change the size of a jacketed bullet.
Having said all this I think Hornady XTP's, Speer Gold Dots (Deep Curls) same thing, work great on deer. I've taken one elk with a 270 gr. Gold Dot & it worked just fine. It will always boil down to placement & penetration
Remember a rifle kills by hyper velocity, bullet expansion & massive shock, a sixgun can't match that velocity & must have that big flat nose doing the work to create a large wound channel in the vitals, when it does that it works very effectively. Usually little if any expansion is necessary for a sixgun bullet to work its magic, that flat nose is key. I've had very, very few animals walk out of sight from moose & African plains game down to deer & antelope.
Your 45 is up to the task with any decent cast or jacketed slug with correct placement on deer but switch to premium jacketed or heavy cast slugs for elk, they are the ultimate big game test for a sixgun in North America outside of the big bears.
One last thing Charles, try shooting your cast slugs powder coated & unsized & you'll probably fix the problem with your over size throats.

Dick

[whitworth]

As important as all that has been discussed, is what game you plan on shooting with your .45, and matching your bullet accordingly.

[bigmuddy]

Charles

I've got a Colt NF 2nd Gen that has the infamous oversized throats. It shoots RNFP .454 bullets very well, but like yours it does to like the 270 SAA. I cut the forcing cone to 11 degrees and it helped some, but when I went to the Lyman 454424 Keith bullet accuracy was much better. You can get this bullet from Matt's as well. I shoot this bullet with 8.5 to 9.0 gr. Unique.

Dan

[sheriff]

Charles, another bullet that you might consider is LEE's 255gr RFN. I bought it to run in my acp's and Rowland as the nose configuration allows it to feed in the 1911's, but in shooting it in my Rugers it's proven, for me at least, to be as accurate as the Keith style swc's. Mine do drop from the mold .452-.453 , but if you cast them a little soft they'd probably upset enough to cover your .454. The melplate on the RFN equals the melplate on the Keith style, so you're not giving up anything.