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Hunting Bullets for 45/70 Sharps (Read 5205 times)

TimK Ex Member	Hunting Bullets for 45/70 Sharps Apr 13^th, 2005 at 8:34am	Print Post
	I'm still rather new to Sharps shooting. I have a 45/70 Shiloh Sharps, 26" heavy barreled saddle rifle, with MVA sights. I have been trying several different bullets with both BP and smokeless. I was wondering what others were using for hunting bullets for BP and the loads. I hunt deer, bear and boar in the North East, so my shots will be limited to 200 yards maximum (mostly under 100 yards). Thanks for the input in advance. Tim K


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PETE Ex Member	Re: Hunting Bullets for 45/70 Sharps Reply #1 - Apr 13^th, 2005 at 8:57am	Print Post
	TimK, Personally I'd use Lyman's 457122. It's a 330 gr. H.P. that was developed by Ideal/Lyman over a 100 yrs. ago for A.C. Gould, a late 1800, early 1900 shooting magazine publisher. It's one of those bullets that seem to be accurate in about any twist rate the .45/70 comes in, and any MV you care to use. I shoot it in a 1-18" twist. If you'll alloy it properly, and with the appropriate loads, it will take anything on this continent. Lyman stil lists it, and Buffalo Arms carries it in their catalog/web site. Can't help you any with BP loads for this bullet as all I've shot it with so far is smokeless. Wouldn't want to give you the loads I have for that as I'm running well up into the Ruger #1 load area and I'm not sure if your Sharps will handle those kinds of pressures. PETE


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Joe_S Frequent Elocutionist Offline Posts: 1010 Joined: Jun 29^th, 2004	Re: Hunting Bullets for 45/70 Sharps Reply #2 - May 9^th, 2005 at 9:39pm	Print Post
	I have only shot two deer with my Sharps, but the 400-440 gr bullets are big medicine on deer. The first deer I shot had an exit wound about 4" in diameter, and this was with moderate velocity. I lathe bored some hollow points but havent shot game with them yet, accurace almost as good as solid points. Joe S


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Dale53 Oldtimer Offline Posts: 810 Location: Southwestern Ohio Joined: Apr 17^th, 2004	Re: Hunting Bullets for 45/70 Sharps Reply #3 - May 12^th, 2005 at 9:28pm	Print Post
	I go with Pete's recommendation. The Gould bullet as made by Lyman has been the "standard" for the 45/70 for "light big game" for about a hundred years. For really large game, there is nothing at all wrong with the 500 grain Gov't bullet. I have had luck casting and loading this for Bison for friends. The most important thing with ANY cast bullet is to use a SOFT alloy. Anywhere from 50/1-30/1 lead and tin. On Buffalo, the Gov't bullet will expand properly with the right alloy and still give the necessary penetration. I would stay away from any alloy using antimony. I had a friend shoot a deer several times chasing it over a couple of miles of deep snow in Colorado with hard bullets and it made a believer out of him (he wouldn't listen to me and thought that wheel weights would do just fine. He learned and of course, I also learned. The loads did not expand and just penciled thru. This was a mature Mule Deer so it wasn't exactly tiny. My friend is an excellent shot and quite "woods wise". He just had the wrong alloy. So, to reiterate, for light big game, the Gould bullet is premier, the 400 grain flat nose is "ok" and for really large big game (Elk, Moose, and Bison) I'd go with a 500+ grain bullet, The alloy recommendation is the same - 50/1 to as hard as 30/1 (I lean towards the soft end). This alloy is mallable and will expand readily and hold together. You should not have any leading problems. I would use Emmert's home mix, SPG, or Pioneer Products lube. You can use an Alox based lube with smokeless but I would, no doubt, go with black powder and the above lubes. Good luck! Dale


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KenKauffman Ex Member	Re: Hunting Bullets for 45/70 Sharps Reply #4 - May 24^th, 2005 at 9:50pm	Print Post
	I use a Hoch mould C 2298. .459 diameter, 374 grains weight, loaded in .45-70 Winchester brass. Federal magnum rifle primers. 5.5 grains IMR 4759, and 62 grains of Goex BP Cartridge powder. This is a flat nosed bullet. Lead 25:1, SPG. This load knocks an Antelope down at 200 yards. Good hunting! Ken Kauffman


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marlinguy Ex Member Ballards may be weaker, but they sure are neater!	Re: Hunting Bullets for 45/70 Sharps Reply #5 - May 24^th, 2005 at 11:56pm	Print Post
	I have that Lyman 360 gr. mold, plus another that casts a 420 grain flat nose. I don't own a Sharps, but I have an old Ballard #4 that I rebarelled with a Green Mountain 34" barrel, 1-18" twist. It shoots up to 550 grain bullets with great accuracy, but also shoots the 360 equally well. I've taken a couple deer with this combination, in both the 360 and the 420 grain cast bullets. Both were at or under 100 yds. and with loads chronographed at about 1400 fps. The kills were clean, and instantaneous!

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Dale53 Oldtimer Offline Posts: 810 Location: Southwestern Ohio Joined: Apr 17^th, 2004	Re: Hunting Bullets for 45/70 Sharps Reply #6 - May 25^th, 2005 at 11:12pm	Print Post
	Ken's suggestion on duplex loads will definitely work well, if you don't want to use pure black. The area where I live has had BPCR Silhouette matches for many, many years (at least 20). For many years, we ALL used duplex loads. I don't recommend more than 10% smokeless (if the compressed load with BP is 65.0 grs, for instance, you could use up to 6.5 grs of smokeless by reducing the amount of BP by an equal amount). You would end up with 58.5 BP and 6.5 grs of smokeless to end up with a total of both powders equaling 65.0 grs. Each grain of smokeless, is equal in power to about 3.0 grs of BP. Therefore, you will actually get some velocity increase when shooting duplex under those conditions. So, you have two advantages - more velocity and you can literally shoot all day long without cleaning and have NO fouling problems under normal conditions. I have used both 4759 and RL-7 and much prefer the RL-7 because it measures so well. I typically put the smokeless next to the primer, add enough black powder to compress the load as much as .350" using Goex and a compression die. Of course, this is NOT a Black Powder load, strictly speaking. The "purist" uses straight black. After we got sanctioned NRA Silhouette matches in the area, we all learned to shoot straigt black powder and most of us learned to do it well. I much prefer Swiss if I were hunting and using straight black. It is more powerful and seems to be more consistent (at least in my experience). I found that Swiss requires much less compression than Goex and I settled on .065"-.085" compression depending on actual accuracy results. These rifles can really shoot well. Under an inch at 100 yards is not uncommon. My silhouette rifle with straight black has done 10 shots at 500 yards in 6.00" in good conditions. Every thing has to be "right" and it helps if you are shooting well that day, but it IS possible. Dale53
	« Last Edit: Jun 10^th, 2005 at 4:35pm by Dale53 »

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