I wonder how much difference there is

[Scott Tschirhart]

Between these two bullets on game?

The round nose shoots so much better.

[GunnyMack]

Only one way to find out Scott!

[44shooter]

I think that flat nose will cut a bigger permanent wound channel. Then again, if you let the air out, they can’t go but so far.

[JimT]

The nose ("meplat") of the projectile is the "working" end. With a hardcast bullet the size of the nose and the shape of the nose has a real effect on how much tissue is crushed and torn and how deep the projectile will penetrate.

I have shot animals with the #454190 bullet in the .45 Colt.

454190.JPG

The semi-wadcutter with the larger meplat tears and crushes more tissue making the wound "channel" larger. The #454190 bullet, if you put it in the right place, it works well. If you need penetration it works well. I shot a 1100 pound Hereford cow with that bullet backed by 38 gr. of FFFg black powder and dropped it in its tracks. BUT .. I put the bullet through the top of her head when she lowered it to eat some range cubes. I used my old 1887 Colt Single Action to do it.

[Scott Tschirhart]

True. That 454190 penetrates very well and it was designed to do just that.

When I was shooting the .45-70 bullets out of the Sharps I killed a lot of things with that 520 gr round nose Government bullet.

The .50-70 has a very similar design to the 454190 and it’s pure poison on game.

It just has me wondering…

[JimT]

It starts out as big as they are trying to get the 9's and the 40's to expand to.

[Scott Tschirhart]

That’s certainly true

[marlinman93]

Normally I go for the flattest big nose for knockdown. But when it comes to accuracy, it always wins out over knockdown power for me.

[Walt]

Beautiful revolver, Scott! It appears to be a Freedom Arms; is it a model 83 or 97? What's the barrel length and how do you like it?

[FLINT]

what kind of game? deer? what distances will you shoot? you can always limit the distance to how far you can shoot accepably with the bullet you want to use. people use bent sticks to fling arrows into the kill zone every year

[Scott Tschirhart]

Beautiful revolver, Scott! It appears to be a Freedom Arms; is it a model 83 or 97? What's the barrel length and how do you like it?

It’s an old 83. 4 3/4 inch barrel. I have a .45 Colt cylinder and I use that more than anything. It’s quite east to shoot well because it has a nice trigger and great sights.

I’m not sure it’s any better shooting than my old SAA but I can push it harder if I want to.

[bmtshooter]

If they hit in the right place, one won't kill them any deader than the other.

[Scott Tschirhart]

For some reason the Keith style bullets don’t seem to group as well in my carbines as they do in my revolvers.

But the round nose flat points seem to shoot better in both.

[Walt]

Scott, your .454 is an early one; some of the first ones on the market had replaceable forcing cones. Is yours one of those?

I have a 7 1/2" .454 I bought in 1990, a .44 mag model 83 came in 1991 and my favorite, a model 97 in .45 Colt came as a result of a trade at Cabela's. It was a used gun and it started out with a couple of issues. The forcing cone had a tiny, shallow line around its circumference which caught lead from my cast bullets so I applied some fine grinding compound with a brass burnishing tool and then fire-lapped it. That issue solved, I replaced the front and rear sights with conventional sights rather than the express rear and brass dot front. It has a 5 1/2" barrel and is a favorite. Freedom Arms makes some outstanding revolvers.

[Scott Tschirhart]

Scott, your .454 is an early one; some of the first ones on the market had replaceable forcing cones. Is yours one of those?

This one has a conventional forcing cone, but very tight chambers. .452 diameter chamber mouths.

[Walt]

Mine too. Freedom Arms doesn't do oversized chambers or throats.

[44shooter]

If the roundnose is cast soft, will the bullet expand a bit to mitigate the difference? Seems roundish soft lead bullets were the norm for a few hundred years and slew all matters of critters.

[JimT]

If the roundnose is cast soft, will the bullet expand a bit to mitigate the difference? Seems roundish soft lead bullets were the norm for a few hundred years and slew all matters of critters.

They can. But you don't need expansion to take animals cleanly. A big bullet in the right place does the job without expanding. I have taken Javelina (they are small compared to deer and elk) with cap and ball blackpowder pistol. The ball does not expand. In fact, the exit wound was smaller than the entrance wound on this Javelina. But he did not move out of his tracks.

Remington-Javelina.JPG

[Scott Tschirhart]

We are so used to expanding hollow point bullets and how they perform in gel these days. I think that technology is a good thing and it should help make handguns that people actually carry safer and more effective.

But let’s not forget that this is a very recent thing. We had hollow points back in the 1980s but they did not perform particularly well (except for a full house .357). Many departments used a RNL or SWC in a .38 Special case in those days.

But folks still got shot and stopped. I will tell you that seven .45 ACP Winchester Silvertips 185 gr were fired in a fight in the early 1980s and none of the seven expanded. The ME’s office said that was normal. They almost never expanded.

[44shooter]

Yes I agree a 45 doesn’t have to get bigger to kill. I meant if the round nose could deform just a bit so that is blunt but penetration is still there. It may not matter. I plan on developing a moderate load with swaged bullets in 44 mag. 900-1000 fps with dead soft lead should be nice in my Vaqueros for general pistoleering. I have JSP, JHP, and hard cast for dedicated hunting, more so for my Marlin. But I’m thinking a moderate load can take care of a lot of things that might come up

[Scott Tschirhart]

Interesting that I shoot a load like that all the time. The swaged Hornady Cowboy bullet shoots cleaner than anything else I’ve tried.