Loading The Single Action Sixgun

[JimT]

Lawsuits were not as common as these days. And the general consensus was, if you can't handle a gun safely don't buy one. If you screw up it's your fault. These days no one ever accepts the responsibility of dicking something up.

[Pat C]

Jim , That USFA SAA is a beauty , I kinda wish now when they came out I would have bought one. Those one piece grips are really nice . That would be my goto.

[JimT]

Yeah .. the USFA's are now priced where the Colts were a year or two ago. I shoulda bought two!

[Scott Tschirhart]

Yeah .. the USFA's are now priced where the Colts were a year or two ago. I shoulda bought two!

My most carried single action is a USFA Rodeo (all US made). I can’t find a fault with it.

My Colt is in El Paso with Paul Persinger.

[Walt]

Scott, assuming your Colt SAA has the original cylinder, do you size your bullets to .454" or do you use bullets from a custom loading house like Buffalo Bore?

[Scott Tschirhart]

Scott, assuming your Colt SAA has the original cylinder, do you size your bullets to .454" or do you use bullets from a custom loading house like Buffalo Bore?

It depends. I shoot a lot of .452 commercially cast bullets. But I don’t buy them too hard. When I make my own I cast them softer and size them to .454. Either seems to work satisfactorily in my guns.

[Walt]

I bought one of the Saeco lead hardness testers a year ago but I'm not entirely happy with it. The vernier scale is so small and the differentiation between one hardness and another is so nebulous that it kinda leaves the the true hardness in question.

I recently bought 500 bullets from Missouri Bullets in .452" that they claimed were BnH 12 hardness. Since I don't have confidence in my hardness tester, I can't really confirm that but since other commercial bullets seem to be about 20BnH I probably will order more from them since I'm about out.

[Scott Tschirhart]

Walt, I want a bullet that is soft enough that I can mark it with my thumbnail. That’s not terribly scientific but I don’t like really hard bullets.

[LeverGunner]

I like as soft a bullet as I can get away with. Wheel weights, which are 10-11 BHN usually serve me well. You can just barely mar them with a fingernail, but you can't scratch them. You can put a very minor nick in the edge if you try.

[Scott Tschirhart]

I think that a lot of machine cast bullets are way too hard these days. You want that bullet to be able to slug up a little.

I also like a soft gooey lube though admittedly such a lube is messy.

I actually like the factory Remington load in .45 Colt. It has a very soft swaged bullet with a waxy lube that is much like the lube on their .22 shells. It is a little short on velocity at around 750 fps, but it seems to hit plates harder than .45 ACP ball ammo. And there’s nothing wrong with .45 ACP.

[JimT]

I have not shot a factory load through any of my .45's in ... probably close to 30 years! I don't have anything against them. It's just that I have so many that I've loaded for myself. Back in the 1960's and early 70's I shot quite a lot of factory ammo. Winchester-Western Super X and Remington. I used them on rocks and other targets out to 400 yards and they worked just fine.

[Lastmohecken]

I have not shot a factory load through any of my .45's in ... probably close to 30 years! I don't have anything against them. It's just that I have so many that I've loaded for myself. Back in the 1960's and early 70's I shot quite a lot of factory ammo. Winchester-Western Super X and Remington. I used them on rocks and other targets out to 400 yards and they worked just fine.

I rarely shot anything but handloads out of any of my handguns, throughout the 80's and 90's, but I have carried mostly factory loads, for quite a few years now, but I don't shoot as much as I used to. And I never did load for 9mm, or 40 cal. And I found some really good shooting factory loads for my 44mag's and 45's, so I kind of got lazy. But I have lots of components left and should probably roll more of my own.

[LeverGunner]

I haven't hardly shot a factory round of centerfire in about 10 years.

[Scott Tschirhart]

I rarely shoot factory ammo. But it’s what I carry when I am out and about.

It’s just too expensive to shoot much factory made ammo and I have a Dillon so it takes me no time at all to make up whatever I like.

[piller]

Now that I replaced the factory barrel, my full size .40 S&W can shoot reloads. Accuracy has gone from a 6 inch circle at 25 yards with the factory polygonal junk to a 2 ½ inch circle at 25 yards with traditional rifling. With handloads, it is even a bit better. I find that I can trust that Austrian junk now. I do not care how reliable it is, if it isn't accurate, it is not trustworthy. My Canik and my Sarsilmaz are much better, but in 9mm, I do not see a point in reloading for them. Funny, but my new barrel on the Austrian junk likes VitaVuori powder and lead bullets.