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Ahhhh, yes. The 25-5. I thought the chamber throats were undersized, though. Probably what I was told was that most BULLETS were undersized for the throats.

Thanks Hawk.

FWIW, S&W finally got around to fixing the throat problem on the 25-5's in the early 1980's. I just bought one last week with a serial # of N826XXX, and it has perfect .452" throats.

Don

The only problem is dies; older dies for the 45 Colt and 45 ACP work well in that they usually arent carbide and have larger expanders. Plus the seater dies accept the larger bullets. Many off the shelf dies today wont allow really large stuff to work well or without issues. Ditching the carbide sizer, RCBS Cowboy dies are a godsend for those who need the ability to make the 25-5 or 45 Colt Anaconda sing with their large throats.

Like others have said, fill the throat as much without undue chambering and the oversized throats arent a big deal.

But I admit the standardization is nice!

No problem, really. I bought a set of steel dies and ordered the expander for the Cowboy expander die. Using this in conjuction with sizing my bullets with my .455" sizing die turns out reloads that work really well in the 25-5's with large throats.

Don

And undersized throats are something a competent pistolsmith can fix in two shakes of a deer's tail.

If you'll notice A) I referenced 38 caliber in my post and B) He asked about 357. So I felt NO reason to mention 45 Colt et al.

In my experience, Ruger 38 throats tend to run a little big, as I mentioned, and S&W are usually right on the money.

Thanks guys. I'm OK with the revolver part of this, it's the autos that concern me. I'll check the chamber diameter to see what kind of clearance there is to play with. Can't have them too tight to function.

I have to go on record here. I had gunswizard mixed up with someone else on this site. I am not going to mention no name, but it is not gunswizard. He is good people.

I wasn't trying to bust your chops, Steelhead...I hope you did not get that impression. I really wasn't all that confident I had it right in the first place---and for good reason, too, as we can all see. I figured this was a pretty generic revolver-oriented subject, and I guess that turned out to be wrong too.

At least gimme some points for consistency.

I ran into that die issue recently with some RCBS 454 Casull dies. I've had them for years, but mostly loaded jacketed bullets back when I first had a 454, and used Dillon dies once I got into casting (no issues with lead bullets in the Dillon stuff BTW, A+ for them).

Anyway, tried to load some 460 S&W with the Lee 300gr WFN bullet in the RCBS dies - the expander is fine but the seater is so tight it pinches the case against the bullet and shaves lead. That surprised me for a bullet only .453" diameter. I swapped to an old Lee 45 Colt seater I had laying around, no more issues.

The only handguns that have given me issues with bullets sized 0.001-002" over is S&W 38's. Unless you size them right at 0.357", the round won't seat all the way in the cylinder.

Ultimately you need to check every gun to see what sizing diameter and seating depth works for you. You definitely want to do a plunk test for autoloaders. Have the t-shirt for going to the range with several boxes of ammo that wouldn't seat in 45 because my years of experience loading revolver ammo didn't directly correlate to the making sure the bullets passed the plunk test.

actually since i own one its around .457. I don't size the cast bullet anymore because of that and they work fine.

finally read this thread. i have usually gone one or two over, but your statements supports exactly an issue i had with daughters ladysmith, they wouldn't go all the way in.