41 mag user!!!!………max adequate distances

[potatojudge]

You can extrapolate from 44 mag performance for any given bullet weight and design.

.410 vs .429 isn't enough difference to skew data on field results.

The further you're planning on shooting, the more bullet weight will be your friend. I load my 414 with 265 grain bullets typically but it's limited being a rebored factory cylinder rather than custom full-frame cylinder. Don't think I can fit 300 grains in that cylinder. For my part in the 41 or 414, I'm limited by my ability to compensate for bullet drop more than I am horsepower.

[bigbrowndog]

I’m more curious about actual bullet performance given the limited rounds available for the bore size. A previous poster recalled no expansion at 100 yards with a jacketed bullet, complete penetration (which I would say is good) but no expansion. I wonder if a denser animal or more speed would alleviate that issue, in other words. If impact velocity of 1200fps works great on the regular .41 mag with X bullet then it probably needs 1200fps at impact. Extrapolating that info from .429 bullets doesn’t correlate by my thinking.

Trapr

[wvhunter460]

Jan 14, 2022 18:59:52 GMT -5 potatojudge said:

You can extrapolate from 44 mag performance for any given bullet weight and design.

.410 vs .429 isn't enough difference to skew data on field results.

The further you're planning on shooting, the more bullet weight will be your friend. I load my 414 with 265 grain bullets typically but it's limited being a rebored factory cylinder rather than custom full-frame cylinder. Don't think I can fit 300 grains in that cylinder. For my part in the 41 or 414, I'm limited by my ability to compensate for bullet drop more than I am horsepower.

I am going to totally agree here . I have shit quite a few whitetails with revolver and sorry no pics. I'd say at long I has was 55 yards as I could step it off. But I took several at 40 plus yards. Most with 44 some with . 454 casual. I used cast in all cases and 300 grain the .454 . However I will say I seen no difference in the wound channels, or if it dropped more quickly or not. Each seemed to perform the same in 44 and 45 so I am agreeing that 41 to 44 would show similar results. As far as Max adequate results. I don't think I ever went looking for a super long shot when I could shoot a shorter one. To me Max adequate distance is what you can hold in that pie plate off hand or rested which ever is your forte

[bigbrowndog]

Appreciate the input WV, my question is based on bullet performance more so than your personal accuracy ability. I agree it’s tough to make a shot with a handgun beyond 80 yards or so, especially if your personal accuracy limits you to that distance or shorter. I simply want to ensure my bullet choices are as correct as I can make them for the game AND distance that I’m capable of shooting. So essentially I’m asking for examples of bullet failures due to bullet performance not shooter performance. This shooter, this gun, is comfortable and capable of keeping a bullet in the 8” kill zone of an animal out to 100-150 yards, so I want to ensure the bullet is up to the task when it arrives.

Trapr

[northerngos]

Jan 16, 2022 18:15:39 GMT -5 bigbrowndog said:

Appreciate the input WV, my question is based on bullet performance more so than your personal accuracy ability. I agree it’s tough to make a shot with a handgun beyond 80 yards or so, especially if your personal accuracy limits you to that distance or shorter. I simply want to ensure my bullet choices are as correct as I can make them for the game AND distance that I’m capable of shooting. So essentially I’m asking for examples of bullet failures due to bullet performance not shooter performance. This shooter, this gun, is comfortable and capable of keeping a bullet in the 8” kill zone of an animal out to 100-150 yards, so I want to ensure the bullet is up to the task when it arrives.

Trapr

Good points.  This is critical.  Be wary of the xpb, years and years ago I was trying them out in a .44 mag.  Good accuracy but I didn’t own a chrono.  Put down a couple of deer wounded by friends with it at close range.  Devastating wound channels.  Like once you got past the skin and first layer of muscle you could about fit your fist in there.  Then I shot a smallish 3 point at right about 100 paces.  He humped up and staggered off.  I only gave him a few minutes, little snow and drizzling rain worried me so I tracked him about 70 yards maybe and bumped him from his bed.  I could see blood on his ribs high but below the spine.  Blood on both sides of the bed and spattering from the nose where he rested his chin.  Never found him, later testing showed I just wasn't able to push them fast enough at that range to expand at all, they just took up too much room (5” S.W. model 629-7). Obviously I made a series of mistakes here, that all cost me the buck.  I should have waited and relied on expanding search radius, but I expected damage similar to what I had seen from close range.  Long cylinder 41 mag this may be no issue at longer range but I’d shoot through a chrono at range to test actual velocity on target for any bullet requiring expansion.  And if you don’t get enough info here at least that can give you confidence with bullets with good expansion threshold data.

[potatojudge]

I don't think the comparisons hold true for rifles due to differences in bullet design even within the same line and how rifle bullets are designed to function. Jacket thickness in a 7mm 120 grain ballistic tip may open up at lower velocities (AKA longer range, as velocity drops with distance) than a 120 grain 6.5 mm ballistic tip. For those bullets, there is no substitute for the real world data you're asking for.

If we were to limit the revolver discussion to the XTP line of bullets and cast bullets of standard designs, I think you'll get reasonable validity cross referencing similar calibers, with cast in particular. 

I've shot whitetail to 100-150 yards with a 44 cal 210 and 240 XTP, and with great results. Bullets expanded, damage was significant, recovery was easy. H110 loads in the mag and Special.

Chris at Bayside Custom Guns has posted pics of cow elk taken at 200+ with his Frankenruger 357 GP100s, and he's a strong proponent of jacketed bullets. IIRC they were pushing 300 yards. The internet would collectively scoff.


Another way to look at range is by a measure of velocity. Distance isn't so important if you can make hits. The bullet doesn't know if it's flown 50 yards or 150 yards, given a load that's proven stable and discounting loads that prove themselves unbalanced when stretched to longer ranges, as some do. Since most revolver kill data is shorter ranges than you're asking, maybe look into the results seen by people who load their 41 down to modest levels for hunting. This is a great surrogate for how a hotter load would perform at longer ranges since you can measure or calculate velocity at 50, 100, 150+ yards in your chosen hunting load.

[sixshot]

Trapr, sorry but this is the best I can come up with but not with the 41 magnum. I've shown these photo's before so I'll keep it short but this was with an old model brass frame 7.5" 45 using the 260 gr Keith. It was a late season cow elk hunt with my old hunting buddy "Duck", he's gone now & I sure miss him. I think the load was 23.0 grs of H110, might have to look tomorrow, could have been more.
Anyway the cow was walking down hill towards us in deep snow & I had my wrist run through the strap of my walking stick and the stick laying across my left thigh. Duck was shooting her with the range finder & when she stopped & wasn't coming any closer he said, 168 yds & I touched it off, running the Keith slug through both lungs with lots of blood coming out both sides, she only ran 30-35 yds as I recall & flipped over. You can see quite a bit of blood in the snow, but this wasn't the best photo of the blood.


I would guess the 41 magnum would do about the same because you can run a 265 gr 41 cast bullet just about as fast with equal barrel lengths.
Dick

[bigbrowndog]

Dick I’m definitely leaning towards better overall performance at distance with a cast bullet than a jacketed one, the only jacketed bullet I can think of that might run with a properly made cast would be a Swift AFrame. I’m hoping to run one of your 250HP’s into a pig later this week at 45MANs ranch, his porch feeder is about 135yds from the shooting bench. I had no luck locating a shootable buck last week at my hunting place. I’d be very interested to see what happens to the big HP as velocity falls off.
The only jacketed .41 bullet I’ve run into a sizable animal was a 210 Speer deep curl at a decent sized pig at 60ish yards, the bullet mushroomed beautifully after severing the spine and taking a lung, but what concerned me was finding the bullet with only 18-20” of penetration. Impact velocity was 1280ish fps, for medium game I think it’s a good bullet, but I’d prefer to have two holes in my game. Which is why I’m looking at heavier than 210gr. bullets.

Trapr

[45MAN]

OK TRAPR, YOU GET THE PIG DUTY AT THE CAMP FEEDER.

[blackmamba]

XTP Chart for Velocity Performance

[bigbrowndog]

A better comparison chart would have penetration depth listed alongside the velocity, because I’m sorry I have a hard time believing a .30cal 90gr is going to give the same performance at 800fps as it does in excess of 2100fps. I’ve never placed a lot of trust in these ambiguous comparisons.

Trapr

[blackmamba]

I believe the way to decipher the chart is that the red line represents the range of expansion. At the minimum velocity, you get minimal expansion, and at the maximum velocity you get complete expansion. For hunting, I would want to be somewhere in the middle.

[bigbrowndog]

I think if you look at Hornady’s reloading manual you’ll see that the velocity range listed matches the velocity range of all the loads listed in the book, not necessarily relating to expansion. The chart lists velocity performance not bullet performance as it relates to expansion, too much variation exists in actual target density to be able to accurately make a chart, unless something like ballistic gel is used.
Trapr

[pleadthe2nd]

Jan 16, 2022 17:42:08 GMT -5 wvhunter460 said:

Jan 14, 2022 18:59:52 GMT -5 potatojudge said:

You can extrapolate from 44 mag performance for any given bullet weight and design.

.410 vs .429 isn't enough difference to skew data on field results.

The further you're planning on shooting, the more bullet weight will be your friend. I load my 414 with 265 grain bullets typically but it's limited being a rebored factory cylinder rather than custom full-frame cylinder. Don't think I can fit 300 grains in that cylinder. For my part in the 41 or 414, I'm limited by my ability to compensate for bullet drop more than I am horsepower.

I am going to totally agree here . I have shit quite a few whitetails with revolver and sorry no pics. I'd say at long I has was 55 yards as I could step it off. But I took several at 40 plus yards. Most with 44 some with . 454 casual. I used cast in all cases and 300 grain the .454 . However I will say I seen no difference in the wound channels, or if it dropped more quickly or not. Each seemed to perform the same in 44 and 45 so I am agreeing that 41 to 44 would show similar results. As far as Max adequate results. I don't think I ever went looking for a super long shot when I could shoot a shorter one. To me Max adequate distance is what you can hold in that pie plate off hand or rested which ever is your forte

Well I hope you feel better.... don't need to see the pictures, the mental ones are pretty funny though

[bigbrowndog]

Took a average sized pig this morning with Sixshots 250HP, 58-60 yards, severely quartering away. Ordinarily I wouldn’t shoot a pig in this orientation but I wanted to run the bullet through as much pig as I could. The bullet was recovered after 16-18” of penetration, the HP portion had shed its mushroom but the “petals” traveled the distance together with the shank or base of the bullet. They were all recovered just under the hide on the offside shoulder, internal devastation was excellent, the bullet entered behind the ribs on the left side and traversed lungs and major vessels above the heart. IMO, with a bit less impact velocity, (mine calculated out to 1400fps) I’d expect an exit, and on a broadside or less severe quartering shot I’d say the same. I’ll try and get a couple more different impacts before rendering a final decision, but I’m really liking this Blue HP of Dicks!!!

Trapr