Home Forums Reloading Handgun Reloading Elmer's .45s.

In another spot, I found Chancey Thomas's write up on the first of three .45's Elmer blewup. It was a very interesting read. Apparently, Elmer had very little if any loading data to help him along. But this was 100 years ago. The first .45 that blew up was the one on July 4th. Elmer sent the gun to Thomas and some loaded ammo for a reason for the gun letting go. Elmer remarked the day before he shot 10 shots apparently all hits at sparrows, owls, and hawks.
Thomas found the loads Elmer was shooting were much to heavy for the SA .45. Buy the way, Elmer said this was the most accurate SA he had ever owned up to that point.
Thomas found the bulk black powder was made up of three powders. ffg, fffg, and 5 grains of black that was so fine it was dust. Elmer just loaded the ammo with a dipper, and tried for 40 grs. It was 32 when Thomas put on a scale. He also found the 258 gr. bullet that was loaded was far to soft for that charge of powder. Later Elmer blew up another .45 using #80 rifle powder and a cast .45-90 300 gr. bullet. Thomas warned him against that load.
To me it was a very interesting read. Clearly Elmer was expermenting but who know what info was available 100 years ago. I also wondered why there was not some serious leading in the barrel if the bullet was too soft. I think the bullet was sized to .457 and the throat .452. For once I am happy to be in a time where information is available. I am not a bullet caster, but thought we might enjoy hearing of days long ago.

Brass at that time was not the same as todays. The old balloon head 45 brass was known to be a weak link.The old Colts were pretty frail. Mr Keith was very interested in duplex and tripled loads even with smokless powder in his day that was bullseye, unique and 2400.
Him not having loading data is one reason we have a bunch of terrific reloading manuals today. Also we now have single action revolvers built like tanks.
I guess it was you got to break a few eggs to make an omlet theory.

Mr Keith never tried triplex loads. Go visit Winston Montana and Durkee Oregon. Try to imagine what his life was like a hundred years ago. There was little load data available for easterners let alone some guy living in very rural west. What he accomplished was remarkable then and even now. Did you ever meet him?

It was Dick Casul that played with triplex loads

Hindsight is 20/20.

He was using the wrong gun at the time when a better one was clearly available in 45 Colt.

Hawk, guess I'm not following you. What 45 Colt was available that was better?

Dick

If you lay a 45 New Service next to a M29 Smith and Wesson and look at the cylinders, you will see which has more meat on the bone.

It would have been a better platform for pushing the 45 Colt at the time than a SAA.

500, I did meet him twice. Outstanding man. You are spot on with the reloading data at that time. He felt he was just reloading with bulk black powder. No indication of mixing powders at this point.

Although prior to WWII, Elmer did more with single actions first in 44 Special before going to double actions.

I’ve oft wondered what would’ve happened had Ruger Blackhawks and solid head .45 Colt cases been available to him back then.

Interestingly, Elmer seemed to chase 1200fps with the .44 Special in particular and later, in the Ruger .45, he advised the same, vs. the 1400 that everyone (and factory ammo) seems to chase now.

Perhaps taking the roof off of a SAA had something to do with that……

He would've probably still managed to wreck it. It's the sort of thing that happens when you push an envelope (especially a self-defined envelope) when there's little or no loading data or pressure data and one works by the seat of his pants. I've read his stuff and sometimes I wondered about him....

I found this to be rather interesting:

In his books he often describes using powders he knew to be too hot or inappropriate because that was all that was available.

He would likely had blown himself all to hell.