Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Express Rifles and Big Bores Only Your Big bores...

458WM and 500NE currently on a diet of cast projectiles thanks to bursitis. I wanna chrono some "normal" loads from the bench for my 375H&HM - I'll see how that goes.

Currently I only have a Ruger M77 tang safety in 458. I have owned several of them along with a few 375 h&h’s and a 416 Taylor.

Merry Christmas, I started this but didn't check until now.
I like some of the old BB's , especially those that are pretty. I could never keep any rifle pretty.
The English doubles can be ,but I fear the recoil shoulder busting when you get into the .450 and up range. The 45/70 teaches my limit

Had a 45-70. Sold it.
Had two 416 Rigby's, sold them.
Had a 404 Jeffery, sold it.

Currently have a 416 Remington being fine tuned. I would like to think that this one will stick around awhile.

Going to get a steady diet of 350gr Speers for fun and T/TSX for serious work.

Good lord, an 8 bore? Stories pleas?

Depends on your definition of Big Bore. If we go with tradition, then I have one, a Verney Carron double in 450NE 3 1/4". If we go by the popular definition, then add 416 Rigby, 405 WCF, 45-110, 375 H&H & 375 Win "Big Bore"....

jorge, I guess that I’m “old school”. For me......”big bores”, start at .40 caliber! memtb

Old school starts at 45.. a 40 (as a 416 Rigby, 404 Jeffries, etc would be a "medium")

Before I threw them all in the Ocean
Rifles
Custom Turnbull Winchester 1886 45 90
Ar50 50BMG
Hand Guns
SW 460
SW 500
Black Powder
Blunderbuss I built from scratch (no Kit Gun)
Bore was .788 shot a patched .760 round ball
When I had just finished building it I was 120#s wet behind the ears and at stake shoots I would but 2 balls and 80grs of FF powder down it.
It would slide me back a full step.
last time I shot it I got fat and it did not slide me back.

That blunderbuss sounds like my grandpa's 12 gauge Boito single shot, it got meat on both ends!

Big bore for me starts at .458" and goes up from there.

Everyone that watched me shoot it called it a Cannon on a stick.
It is very spirited and a Blast to shoot in more ways that one after about ten shots it will road rash your shoulder pretty good.

It's an 8 Bore percussion rifle of early English style built by our forum member Steve Zihn, the standard load is 300 grains of blackpowder under an 800 grain pure lead round ball, it also has a hard ball load, that ball is cast with much harder alloy, then rolled across a set of flat files to 'score' the ball so it wont slip the patch after you add another 100 grains of powder, that load is the one the African Bore Rifle hunters used on all manner of dangerous game in the days of old, iirc, the 8 Bore is one of the best penetrators of all the Bore rifles, 12, 10, 8, 6, 4, and 2 bore.

I couldn't reach Mr. Zihn on the phone one day, so I called a man in Kansas that apprenticed under him, he said that hard ball load was a real stoner of a killer, I have shot it, and it's most unpleasant recoil wise.

If you take a 10lb rifle, with 400 grains of powder under an 800 grain projectile at or near 1500 fps, free recoil is approaching or slightly exceeding 200 ft lbs, not for the timid, I brought that rifle to a 24HR pig shoot in Tennessee one year, but purposefully loaded only 200 grains of black powder in all the speed loaders, I didn't want anyone to get hurt shooting that thing, loaded full bore, it's not for the uneducated or unfamiliar!

Used to have a 405 Winchester in a Ruger #1, but I gave it to my son in law. Still have 2 45-70s, one in a H&R Buffalo Classic, and the other in a Marlin 1895. Also have a Traditions 50 cal flintlock and a Vaquero in 45 Colt and a Rossi Ranch hand in the same..

The Buffalo Classic is a hoot to shoot. 12 grains of Trail Boss and a 405 gr home cast is a great plinking round. Empty 12 gauge hulls at 50 yards is fun.

450-400

Amazing lists of rifles here!!!!

I've got plenty of "brush guns" from .35 to .500 S&W, but when I think of "Big Bore" , I think "Africa" (never been and probably never will). My two are .404 Jeffery and .411 KDF Magnum.

Like that 404J or whichever that top one is.

375 Ruger Alaskan and a 9.3x62 Ruger African.

458 win mag.....