Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Express Rifles and Big Bores Only The great 458 Winchester. Everyone should own one at least once

Phil is not known to toot his own horn.
Hence the suggestion that he needs a nudge toward writing his autobiography.
He has much to tell.
Here is a note to Sir Phil from Sir Saint Finn that Charlie Sisk put up on the image gallery ...

From CEB:



Compare to this from Lehigh:



528-gr Lehigh has BC = 0.871 and SD = 0.360
600-gr CEB has form factor that looks as good, at least, and heavier weight with SD = 0.409
and BC is directly proportional to SD for same form factor.
(0.409/.360) X 0.871 = 0.990
Sleek form without all the grooves, that CEB "Lazer" might make it past 1.000 if the single "seal tight band" is not a BC killer.

Most accurate 600-gr Barnes Original load was at 2051 fps in 24" Ruger No. 1 with 74.0 grains H4895.



This is encouraging for Not Quite King of Two Mile.
The 5-yard correction to MV for a BC of 1.000 and circa 2200 fps is 4 fps.

Sir Ron,
Buy a Donkey for Missing the Running Doe! LOL!
Lord knows if I had bought a Donkey for every running missed shot I had at Deer, and Game,
I'd have a Stable Full! LOL!
Haven't heard a thing from Sir Jerry,(gunner500), in a while! Hoping he's doing okay, and made it through those Nasty Tornadoes!
Gent's, really enjoying this informative thread, and looking Fore Ward to the Future Book!

Sir Tony

It is long past time for James Watts to be Knighted and Canonized.
Not cannonized by shooting his ashes out of a howitzer, but recognized as a Saint,
Saint Sir James Watts of the Knights of the .458 Winchester Magnum Brotherhood.
His .450 Watts Short was released to Winchester after years of their dawdling post WW2.
That became the SAAMI .458 Winchester Magnum in 1956.
To add insult to injury, Jack Lott's first ".458 Lott" in 1971 was merely a .450 Watts Magnum of 2.850" brass length
reamed by hand into a SAAMI .458 Winchester Magnum chamber with no barrel setback.

It is long past time for Saint Sir James Watts to have the last laugh:
The .450 Watts Magnum Number 2, aka the ".450 WM2."
It is a .458/.375 H&H with 2.810" chamber length (max brass 2.790", trim to 2.785" to be precise)
and with COL 3.800", so you only have to trim it shorter if you want it to fit in a shorter box with a long bullet.
Crowding in a 3.600" COL happens routinely with the SAAMI .458 Lott.
Not so with the .450 Watts Magnum No. 2.
In fact, any SAAMI .458 Lott can be converted into a .450 WM2 by running a SAAMI .458 WinMag reamer into it, up to the belt.
In fact, the .450 WM2 is just as powerful as the SAAMI .458 Winchester Magnum loaded long-COL,
and more powerful than the SAAMI .458 Lott,
when all are loaded to the same pressure.

Old Fugly is the world's first .450 Watts Magnum No. 2 and as such
shall have its barrel stamped with "450 WM2" to supercede all else thereon.
That will make it even fuglier !

Backtracking now to Old Fugly with a drop box.
I will cast some 600-gr bullets to begin load development from subsonic to supersonic max.
-1100 fps to +2125 fps MV.
Old Fugly is a 1:14" twist but ought to handle the shorter cast lead bullets in that velocity range.
Perfect.
2125 fps is well within accuracy and impact integrety limits for a hardcast, PC-painted, gas-checked, 600-gr/".458-cal" bullet.
Suppressed subsonic will have to wait.
King of One Mile will have to wait for the long, monometal VLD bullets in a 1:10" twist.

An overlapping range of AA-5744 loads for low-end to midrange velocity (no filler)
and H4895 from 70% LR (with filler) for midrange to drop-tubed and compressed for top-end
might gitterdun.


Whatever loads work in the .450 WM2 will also work in the .458 WM+.
Just have to "go commando" with the .458 WM+ not wearing the brass panties to cover all of the bottom of the bullet.

I would love to read Watts biography!!

Ron, so what was the maximum power acheived with the seated out 458 win? Say with 500 grain bullets. Sorry, still working my way through the pages.

158XTP,
It is about time you picked your sir name.
I recall your contributions and correspondence while this was going at the anchor baby's playpen.
No offense meant by association there, please.
Good time to review the state of 500-grainer loads for the .458 WM+.

Nowadays there is a plethora of powders and bullets to move 500-grains at 2150 fps MV inside of 3.340" COL and 60,000 psi,
in the SAAMI .458 Winchester Magnum.
Noncompressed ball powders or mildly compressed stick powders, take your pick.
Either can be temperature stable.

This is best so far for the .458 WM+, with AA-2460 and the 500-gr TBSH, by Sir Jerry,
and I will take credit for recommending AA-2460 to him after he recommended the 500-gr TBSH to me:



I have done not quite so fast with the 500-gr TSX and AA-2230.
Sir Bob and Sir Jerry are in close pursuit on the 450-grain TSX with H335 and AA-2460.
I have done a wee bit better with AA-2230 and the 450-gr TSX:



The 500-gr TSX at 2342 fps MV put two bullets in one hole, third was about 1 MOA to left,
maybe I flinched ?

This is what I based the AA-2460 recommendation on, to Sir Jerry:





Noncompressed 93% LR load with AA-2460 was faster and more accurate than
a compressed 103% LR load with H4895.
2265 fps and 2212 fps respectively.
Seating depth was only 0.240" with the 543-grain FNGC.
I might have to seat a 600-grainer a half inch deep.
Might not be able to make 3.5" COL with the FNGC 600-grainer I am looking at, it is so fat forward.
Might be able to make 3.3" COL in the SAAMI .458 Lott.
Will be looking to AA-2460 most likely,
for use in the .458 WM+ and .450 WM2.
Oh shucks, I am changing the name of last one to the ".450 Watts Winchester Number 2."
.450 WW2 sounds better than .450 WM2.

The .450 Watts Magnum was a member of the Post WW2 Baby Boom Generation.
It gestated from 1938 gleam in James Watts' eye to 1949 birth.
Yep, .450 WW2 is much more appropriate for the last laugh.
It performs just like the .458 WM+ with heavy bullets,
better than the SAAMI .458 Lott with birdshot and rat bullets, and the heavy bullets too.

Those CEB 600-gr Lazers cost about 3 bucks each.
Better to use some 600-gr cast bullets for the ballpark powder checking.
Time for me to cast some.
BTW, having mentioned Sir Jerry's champ 500-gr TBSS load above,
note that his Holiday Casting was an interesting scale up of the Saeco "Model of 1881" Gov't.-style 500-grainer
from .458 to .512 caliber, in 16:1 alloy which sure do make pretty bullets.
The 500-gr/.458 in whatever alloy grew to 715-gr/.512 in 16:1 alloy:







I am swagging that the weight-scale-up ratio for .458 to .512 would be a factor of (.512/.458) cubed = 1.39704 X
So in same alloy, a 500-grainer would become a 699-grainer, pretty close.
So I am suspecting the .458 Gov't. bullet in 16:1 alloy would weigh a little more than 500 grains, or about 511 grains ?
Got a sexy sub-.458-caliber cast bullet to scale up to .458-caliber weight ?

600-ish-grain .461-caliber and 158-ish-grain ".357-ish-caliber" are on my Holiday Casting agenda,
thanks to the picture with the pistol in it as a reminder to try the 6-cavity Lee mould while I am at it.
I find that a 158-gr cast bullet at about 900 fps shoots to the same 25-yard POI as a 125-gr JHP at a modest 1250 fps
in either a 4" Ruger Security Six or a 6" Colt Python.
Good zombie headshot medicine.
Hopefully a subsonic 600-grainer and a supersonic 600-grainer in the .458 WM+ or .450 WW2
can be found to have a useful POI combo at close range for zombie herd shooting when their melons get lined up.

Some Subsonic and Supersonic surrogates for those 3-dollar bullets,
first the plain base 500-grainers in WW that will be a little lighter and bigger diameter when hardcast,
for PC-painting and and sizing to .461":









Data for the 500-gr HTC 500-grainers:

The 600-ish grainer in WW ought to be very close to 600 grains after PC-paint and gas check added to the hardcast weight.







Firing up the pot after my nap ...

Sir Ron, many Thanks, and yessir, the 500gr TBSS at 2360+ is a 500 grain world beater in my 458 WM+, that load should easily provide a complimentary tracheotomy to a fleeing cape buff shot in the tail pipe, this fall we may find out should i be able to find a 40 inch old hard bossed bull, and man you're good, my 1881 saeco .458" bullets to indeed weigh 508gr at 16-1 alloy, with 20 or 30-1 they'd weigh 510-515gr, not to sidetrack this great thread, but i wanted all those benefits for my 50 cal 22 twist Sharps rifles, may even have math cat buddy scale back to 40 cal for my 40-90 2-5/8ths SBN, that slug may weigh around 390-400gr at 16-1.

A great holiday casting session to break the monotony of hurry up and wait, hurry up and dont be late, hurry up then be stuck in a house with 60 people and 85 degree temps, lord have mercy on me! over eating, sometimes two times daily with family and friends is just what the Doc ordered, for me to only loose one bullet out of the 105 i cast was GREAT!, lost none to weight variances and the one under the glass that had a bit of trash in the groove, needed a hundred, now have 104?

Hope you had a great casting session with your 458-461+ and 357's, and thank the lord the holidays are behind us.

Hello Sir Tony, i'm here my friend, have logged in a few times over the last month or so just to check pm's on sale/buy/donation projects, haven't posted much, but all good, hope same for you and yours, ready to pole vault over the holiday crush!

Sir Jerry,
Glad to see your still Pole Vaulting! LOL!!!
Sounds like your Runnin n Gunnin!
Keep it Movin!

Sir Tony

LOL, that i will Sir! Thanks!

Sir Jerry: WOW ! That is some great casting control to cull only one bullet out of 105.

My latest casting session was rough as a cob.
First time with three new moulds, alternating two moulds when casting.
Even though I pre-heated moulds on a hoptplate, I culled half of my bullets.
I will run it hotter and quicker with those aluminum N.O.E. moulds next time.
Will do it again with 20:1 alloy too !
The corn cob alloy has its uses, and so does the prettier 20:1 ...







The AM 46-485N is and FNGC described by AM as: "Long front band for long throat 458 Win mag":



With gas check and PC paint it will be approaching 480 grains in the corn cob alloy.

That's Good Stuff Guy's!

Sir Jerry,
I agree with Sir Ron, That's Pretty Good having only one cull in 105 casting's.

Sir Ron,
You've definitely got it down to a science!

Keep up the great work, Good Sirs.

Sir Tony

Yes, Sir Jerry puts me to shame.
Here are the 20:1 alloy castings of the the previous 92521-BHN25:





The highlight of the above, for me, is that 20:1 castings weigh very close to same in straight clip-on wheel weight alloy (WW).

For my next trick I am going to try the Saint Sir Bill Bagwell Bullet (Lyman PH "475-grainer")
and some .45-caliber paperpatch bullets (up to nominal 550-grainer in WW) but cast in 20:1.
The paper-patched might be loaded with duplexed BP in the .458 WM,
or they might be "patched" with powder-coat paint, sized, and loaded with Blackhorn 209 in the CVA Paramount.
Thus, both the .458 WM-BPCR and the inline muzzleloader might mimic the Creedmoor Era muzzleloaders and BPCR ballistics,
same same.
Accurate to 1000 yards ?

BTW, my goal with the .357 RemMag bullet is 1050 fps in either a 4" or 6" revolver barrel, whichever works best.
Could be a useful all-purpose handgun plinker and defensive load.
Afterall, Phil Shoemaker used his pocket 9mm Parabellum with 3.5" barrel to save the lives of fishing clients from a brown bear.
That was a hardcast load from Buffalo Bore, 147-grain FN at about 1050 fps.
His .355"/147-grainer worked.
My .357"/158-grainer will have a slight sectional density, momentum and I dare say frontal area advantage
after both squeeze through their barrels for same MV.
How is that for fly specks in the pepper ?
That is way less difference than the power advantage of the .458 WM+ and .450 WW2
over the SAAMI .458 Lott corruption of the .450 Watts Magnum.

Moral of the story: If brown bear hunting with a muzzleloader, bring your handgun to the dance.

LOL, i like those corncob ingots Sir Ron, that casting session you just had is more thana good enough for intended purposes, my weighing every bullet [+ - 1 grain with 700+ grainers] then visually inspecting for trash, bubbles, possible voids, even bullet bases for rotational imbalances applies to Sharps rifle barrel sight shooting so far for me to 900 yards, i have to try and remove [me/human] from the equation as much as possible, you do know i went to the Saint Bagwell School of Casting, man that dude was tough!

I have a 36 cal lee gang mould, it dumps 18 buckshot pellets with 22 BHN lead, 12 of those stacked neatly in 4 tiers of three pellets each in the low brass clear Fiocchi 2-3/4 inch hull is max payload for home defense 000 buck loads.

Sir Tony, many Thanks, i love a good casting session, on the recovery today, maul split and stacked near 2.5 rick of firewood on back porch yesterday, worn out as a pair of jumper cables at a hillbilly funeral this morning ; ]