Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Single Shots No. 1 .450 Bushmaster - Coming soon...

Pat-
One certainly could experiment with cast bullets.

Here's a photo from some brief tests I fired in 2010.
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The slug shooters were having real problems with accuracy in their AR 450B rifles. They asked me to help using my bolt rifle. Unfortunately, I think we ran them too fast, with resultant stripping in the relatively shallow rifling of my barrel. I ran out of time then for further testing.

Some bolt rifle users are now reporting good results. The ARs apparently were losing chunks out of gas checks when the bullets passed the gas ports. Attempts to get tall gas checks didn't work out at the time.

Last summer I fired some trial cast bullet loads with black powder in my long-barreled bolt rifle, and got some very tight groups at 50 yards. The tentative explanation is low velocity helps a lot. More experimentation will follow with the Ruger just as soon as the snow melts on the access road to the range.

Some discussions of cast bullet trials can be found here: [color:#0000ff]cast bullets on 450bushmaster.net[/color]

Here's an image of a black powder-cast bullet shot with my single-shot 450B bolt rifle.
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--Bob

I think I might have to find a RAR in 450BM now.

Cabelas carry the Ruger factory offering with a 16" barrel and muzzle brake. Randys Hunting Center has their version with 22" or 16" barrels plus stainless and left hand models.

I've lately messed with .218 Bee, .300 Blackout, and 7.62x39 - which all take similar, fairly new powders.

Lil'Gun, 300MP, and 1680 are all suitable for these rounds. And Hodgdon just announced a new CFE-BLK. It's intended for the .300 Blackout, but also is in this same burn rate range, and may be interesting in the .450.

The BM isn't on the list of legal cartriges for Ohio.

.444 Marlin is best bet for OH

Moving would be the best of best bets...

Pappy348-

It's baffling that the 450B was excluded from Ohio's list of permissible deer rifle cartridges. Ohio was mimicking Indiana in permitting use of rifles shooting straight-walled pistol cartridges. However, Ohio opted to list approved cartridges by name rather than by dimensional limits as did Michigan and Indiana.

Granted, there's much senseless inanity in deer hunting regulations, but omitting the 450B is exceptionally notable.

Ohio's approved list: .357 Magnum, .357 Maximum, .38 Special, .375 Super Magnum, .375 Winchester, .38-55, .41 Long Colt, .41 Magnum, .44 Special, .44 Magnum, .444 Marlin, .45 ACP, .45 Colt, .45 Long Colt, .45 Winchester Magnum, .45 Smith & Wesson, .450 Marlin, .454 Casull, .460 Smith & Wesson, .45-70, .45-90, .45-110, .475 Linebaugh, .50-70, .50-90, .50-100, .50-110, and .500 Smith & Wesson.
From [color:#0000FF]Ohio list pdf[/color]

The 450B cannot have been excluded due to its being rimless, because the 45 Win Mag and 45 ACP are included. And its exclusion cannot be due to its being a rifle round originally, given the listing of the 45-70, 45-90, etc.

Perhaps the Ohio regulators feared their woods would be invaded by legions of hunters carrying evil-looking ARs chambered in 450B. (A note to Ohio: ARs have been set up to shoot 45 WIn Mag.)

--Bob

That is fairly peculiar, even for politicians. Years ago I was talking to a Ohio hunter and was told, yeah these are the approved rounds because they're worried about bullets flying too far in crowded areas. Then it was pretty much just revolver cartridges, like the .44 mag.

A .50-90 can shoot an awful long way, as an Indian at Adobe Walls found out

FWIW, Hodgdon has data for the .460 S&W, and CFE-BLK with heavy hard cast. No data for the .450 Bushmaster, though. I left Hodgdon a contact form suggesting that they should add data for the .450, as Ruger Americans are apparently selling like hot cakes

Very close, gentlemen.
I spoke with the ODNR law dept in person.
What they did was allow rifle in calibers already allowed for handgun hunting.
They are adding new options slowly, as rifle proceeds with no issues.
There is constant political opposition to any changes.
.450Bushmaster and .50beowolf were on the list for appoval last year, but has not happened yet. I keep after them to get it appoved.
I have a .450Bushmaster AR-15 built for ohio hunting, waiting for appoval. There is an open meeting coming up, for more public input.

Ohio has a proposal expected to pass to change the wording to any straight walled cartridge 35-50 cal

Since this model comes with a threaded barrel, you could remove the brake and attach a suppressor like the Silencerco Hybrid. Just saying.

They started putting the brakes on the rifles because they were getting feedback that the recoil was killing scopes on the lightweight rifles.

After building myself a slightly heavier repeater 450BM on a savage action, I just can't justify another one, especially a single shot.

Indiana was a slug gun state, then went PCR.
They then icnreased the cartridge length allowance of PCR to 1.8 (which allowed the .460 S&W).

There is no straight wall mandate.

.35 Remington trimmed is popular under the PCR 1.8" law.

Last yr they also allowed reg rifle cartridges (no max case length) in .24 and .30 cal.

That is for private ground only. PCR is still usable on state ground.

There are (and never were) slug gun only areas. When PCR passed it was allowed on public and private ground.

New bill to "correct" the HP rifle las of last yr (still test period) hasn't become law yet.........might make 1.16" min and no max on case length, .24 cal and up.......private ground.

Yeah, the prev law seems silly, but it got passed.........because it gave the appearance of limits. Think politics and not ballistics. They tried before and it didn't pass. Then the next go around there was some really stupid stuff the libs added to the proposal, and that crap got cut off...........and we have the HP rifle law we have now.

Legislators and the public are often idiots, gotta work with them unfortunately.

We gt PCR's a while back, have some HP rifle now........it's a decent progression IMHO.

But I don't own a .270 so am not in limbo under current regs.

I also am not such a cheap arse that I can't go and buy a rifle to fit the current regs.

.450 Bushmaster...........wouldn't shoot that cartridge outside of an AR.

.460 Smith in a #1 would be my choice.

Not to shoot .45 Colt or .454 Casull either.

Tried to find one a while back, no luck. Am content to run my little RSI .243 under the new HP rifle law.

Everything works out

If the regs change again this year, just makes me want a #1 rebarreled to .35 rem even more.

I have a .450Bushmaster AR-15 built for ohio hunting, waiting for appoval.

There's a three shot limit, mag and chamber combined, according to a DNR web page.

Straight-walled cartridge rifles in the following calibers: .357 Magnum, .357 Maximum, .38 Special, .375 Super Magnum, .375 Winchester, .38-55, .41 Long Colt, .41 Magnum, .44 Special, .44 Magnum, .444 Marlin, .45 ACP, .45 Colt, .45 Long Colt, .45 Winchester Magnum, .45 Smith & Wesson, .450 Marlin, .454 Casull, .460 Smith & Wesson, .45-70, .45-90, .45-110, .475 Linebaugh, .50-70, .50-90, .50-100, .50-110, and .500 Smith & Wesson. Shotguns and straight-walled cartridge rifles can be loaded with no more than three shells in the chamber and magazine combined.

They don't say your rifle can't be capable of holding more, only that you're limited in hiw many you can load.

http://wildlife.ohiodnr.gov/hunting...-regulations/allowable-hunting-equipment

I'm thinking that, provided they turn out to be solid, Henry is gonna sell a bunch of their new single-shots in .44 and especially .45/70.

Correct, three shot limit. And now on the honor system. No more plugs needed in shotguns, either.
When rifle was added, there was no easy way to "plug" a rifle, so the shotgun requirement was changed to match.
(It is also why I have an order in for a 5 round mag, just for hunting, since the 10 round standard mag is much larger than i could legally hunt deer with.)

It's amazing how complicated some states make sheit.

Where do you get your 10 round mags, or do you modify 5.56 mags? All I find are the 5 round (BartZ & Bushmaster).

I order them from the same supplier as my upper. Walsh gun and tackle. It came with a choice of 5 or 10 round.