Any body here experienced it ?
Or heard of it ?I think they made .454,s with 6 holes ? Somebody must have blown one of those up ?
I will google it ! ...tj
Here's the text copy and pasted from an old article about the steel used in the 454 SuperRedhawk cylinder. I put one in my 45 Colt Redhawk. I haven't blown it up yet! The link in the article to the online version is no longer valid but this is the text from it. I bolded parts of it.
Carpenter Technical Articles - ONE OF THE WORLD'S MOST POWERFUL REVOLVERS GETS LIFT FROM AEROSPACE ALLOYS 3/11/10 10:14 AM
One of the Worlds Most Powerful Revolvers get Lift From Aerospace Alloys
August, 2000 The new Ruger Super Redhawk .454 Casull is one of the most powerful commercially available revolvers in the world, and a classic
study in creative materials management and design. WHAT'S NEW
This big-bore handgun, developed by fine firearms manufacturer Sturm Ruger & Co., Inc., Southport, CT, was designed from the start to withstand the very high stresses generated by the .454 Casull cartridge. The .454 Casull is one of the most powerful revolver cartridges made.
Wilderness guides, hunters, fishermen and experienced shooters use the powerful sidearm to hunt dangerous game such as brown and grizzly bear, elk and jungle cats. With this revolver, a skilled marksman can drop a large animal at a distance of up to 200 yards! In addition to big-game hunting, the Super Redhawk .454 Casull is also used for target shooting at metallic animal silhouettes.
The massive, high strength frame of the rugged, double-action revolver has been key to its reliability and durability. More particularly, the specially designed cylinder and barrel, made from state-of-the art aerospace alloys, have been critical to its outstanding performance.
The Cylinder
Ruger's goal was to develop the firearms industry's first and only six-shot revolver in a .454Casull caliber. Designers started with the proven, rugged .44 magnum platform, planning to step it up to successfully withstand the higher pressures produced by the .454 Casull cartridge.
The highest chamber pressure created when firing a .44 mag. revolver is about 42,000 psi. That compares with approximately 62,000 psi pressure generated when firing a .454 Casull revolver.
Consistent with the difference in power, the larger caliber weapon has about 54% more recoil than the .44 mag. revolver.
The prospects for success were not encouraging. Since the chambers in the cylinder had to be larger to accommodate the larger cartridge, some of the cross sections left between the chambers were reduced in thickness. These somewhat thinner walls had to withstand essentially 50% higher pressure than the original walls before redesign.
Undaunted by the challenge,
President William B. Ruger, Jr., instructed his design team to use the best materials available to make the six-shot .454 Casull handgun the latest success in the Ruger line of durable, large caliber revolvers.
Ruger first tried making the cylinder from stainless Type 410, a hardenable martensitic stainless steel generally suitable for highly stressed parts, such as Ruger's other revolvers. This grade simply would not hold up for any extended length of time during firing of the higher pressure proof rounds required for the .454 Casull.The company then asked Humberto Raposo, a regional metallurgist from Carpenter Technology Corporation (NYSE:CRS) for assistance in selecting materials. He suggested that Ruger consider Carpenter's new Custom 465® stainless.
Custom 465 stainless, developed as a candidate for aerospace components, is a premium-melted, martensitic, age-hardenable alloy capable of about 260 ksi ultimate tensile strength when peak aged. In this condition, it also offers higher notch tensile strength and fracture toughness than other precipitation-hardening stainless grades. It provides, in addition, excellent resistance to stress corrosion cracking.
Ruger made a cylinder from Custom 465 stainless, then fired 50 proof rounds from each of six chambers (total 300 rounds) at 92,000 psi. This is about 50% higher stress than that produced under actual firing conditions. The designers repeated this firing cycle numerous times and noted that the cylinder successfully withstood all of the proof firing without a scratch or sign of defect anywhere. www.cartech.com/techarticles.aspx?id=1608 Page 1 of 3
Carpenter Technical Articles - ONE OF THE WORLD'S MOST POWERFUL REVOLVERS GETS LIFT FROM AEROSPACE ALLOYS 3/11/10 10:14 AM
With this evidence, Ruger selected the Carpenter alloy for the chamber of its new six-round .454 Casull. No problems related to cylinder materials have been reported to Ruger from the field since the mighty revolver was introduced a year ago.
Ruger manufacturing personnel started with annealed, cutoff lengths of 1.875" bar stock from Carpenter, but found that the material had such clean microstructure that they could reduce its diameter requirements to 1.828", and save on material costs. A slight amount of OD turning and drilling of the pivot hole was done on a CNC screw machine.
A CNC horizontal mill was used to drill all of the chambers. Ruger held tolerance of 0.002" on the ID of the chamber holes and 0.001" on alignment of the holes to the cylinder latch cut.
Machinists achieved a good finish inside the reamed chamber holes. The finish obtained was so good, in fact, that the company has even considered eliminating the final roller burnishing operation.
After machining, Ruger heat treated the cylinders in accordance with the schedule suggested by Carpenter to optimize essential mechanical properties, particularly strength and toughness.
Nominal chemical composition of Custom 465 stainless steel is: carbon 0.02% max., manganese 0.25% max., phosphorous 0.015% max., sulfur 0.010% max., silicon 0.25% max., chromium 11.0/12.5%, nickel 10.75/11.25. titanium 1.50/1.80%, molybdenum 0.75/1.25%.
The Barrel
Ruger had to deal with several increased power issues in designing the barrel for its new .454 Casull revolver. Designers were concerned with the throat erosion that might occur when the big cartridge would exit the chamber and slam into the interior surface of the barrel. They knew the higher velocity bullet would have greater impact force, causing high-velocity gas cutting and potential erosion problems. That potential could be magnified if the steel selected for the barrel did not have the correct microstructure for these new requirements.
The first material considered was stainless Type 410, the standard alloy used with great success for other revolvers in the Ruger line of revolvers. Ruger was able to gun drill a 0.480" dia. hole in a 11⁄4" OD x 19" long bar in 17.27 minutes at 1.1 IPM. However, the material was unable to meet the newer, more strenuous requirements for strength, ductility and corrosion resistance imposed by the higher pressure .454 Casull cartridge.
Ruger then tried 15Cr-5Ni stainless steel, which met all the design requirements but one. It was a "bear" to machine. It took 28 minutes to drill the same diameter hole through the same OD bar at the slower rate of 0.71 IPM. The company could not accept the much longer gun drilling cycle time.
Again, Ruger asked the same Carpenter metallurgist for assistance. He suggested trying Carpenter"s new Project 7000® 15Cr-5Ni stainless, which also has been used as an aerospace alloy, in place of the conventional 15-5 alloy.
Carpenter Project 7000 15Cr-5Ni stainless is designed to offer improved machinability and with it, the opportunity to reduce part costs, cut cycle time and increase productivity. It has been made available as a "drop-in" replacement for the conventional 15-5 alloy in applications where improved machining productivity is desired.
In its trial runs with the Carpenter alloy, Ruger found that it was able to reduce its gun drilling cycle time by 20%. The Project 7000 stainless grade from Carpenter, in fact, matched the cycle time of the stainless Type 410, while improving tool life significantly. The vacuum melted, PH stainless also has excellent transverse mechanical properties to resist the higher stresses produced by the new cartridge.
The hole in the barrel, with a diameter tolerance of 0.002", is obtained by a deep hole drilling operation. The gun drilling is followed by reaming to obtain a finish. Each blank, starting at 11⁄4" OD x 19" long, is hammer-forged over a mandrel to become 1.171 OD x 23-7/16" long. The rifling and final diameter is formed during the hammer-forging. The forged length is then cut into three 71⁄2"- long gun barrels.
All barrels that had been made from the new Carpenter alloy passed Ruger's rigid endurance tests with flying colors.
Typical analysis of Project 7000 15Cr-5Ni stainless is: carbon 0.07 max., manganese 1.00% max., silicon 1.00% max., phosphorus
0.030% max., sulfur 0.015% max., chromium 14.00/15.50%, nickel 3.50/5.50%, copper 2.50/4.50%, molybdenum 0.50% max., columbium 5XC/0.45, tantalum 0.05% max., iron balance.
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Carpenter Technical Articles - ONE OF THE WORLD'S MOST POWERFUL REVOLVERS GETS LIFT FROM AEROSPACE ALLOYS 3/11/10 10:14 AM
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Carpenter, based in Wyomissing, PA, is a leading manufacturer and distributor of stainless steels, specialty alloys, titanium and various engineered products. Carpenter had sales of $1.0 billion in fiscal 1999 (ended June 30, 1999). More information about Carpenter is available at
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