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

Thanks Sir Dennis;

And I recall reading 'on the "other" forum' your remarks about the "unbroken stomach" following the bullet exit!

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

I have spent much of the day in a reread of many of these pages... It is well worth it! And thanks to all for contributions, and especially to Sir Ron for his prodigious work!

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

Fully agree !!

Wish me luck gentlemen!

I'm off today to hunt the mighty Sambar deer and accompanying me will be 'Fatso', my beloved Zastava M70 in .458WM...
The load I'm using will be the 450gn Woodleigh Hydro at a leisurely 2300fps...
I just hope this load will provide enough penetration... ;-)

Will keep you all posted but I'm quietly confident Fatso will be up to the job...

Russ

Lmao on “Fatso” ! Look forward to the Hunt report

Good Luck Sir Russ.
We hope well for you and dear Fatso.

News from the world is that Hammer Bullets might be getting around to this special request soon.
There is hope that we will soon see the real thing instead of my blurry mockup image.





Still awaiting what comes of the above suggestion.
Yep, one planet, one bullet, a .458-cal 400-grain Shock Hammer at 2500 to 2600 fps from the .458 WM+.
Probably could shoot it base forward and slow it down to 2400 fps for the rare elephant needing a brain shot,
or for whaling insurance shots.

This lube appears to be clear powder coat. There is no oily / greasy feel to the bullets.

The Newer, Cast Performance bullets, from their website:

Never settling for second best, the result is a company whose bullets and cartridges will deliver exactly what you need every round, every time.

OUR PROPRIETARY CLEAR LUBE COATS THE ENTIRE SURFACE OF OUR CAST PERFORMANCE BULLETS. THEY ARE READY TO LOAD AS IS.
Our hunting bullets are cast from LBT style molds.
Our bullets are cast from virgin alloy and heat-treated to a Brinnel hardness of 18-21. This provides for a hard yet ductile bullet, which will not fragment, or blow-up on the toughest hide or even bone.
We manufacture both gas checked and plain base for most popular handgun hunting calibers.
Our gas checked bullets do not lead your bore.
Our casting/lubrication process has allowed us to shoot our cast bullets in test rifles as fast as 3100 fps.

Very interesting on the possible Hammer Bullets’ modification.
I have been considering purchasing their current 402 grain Shock Hammer.
But, the BC stalled me. I have a pretty good supply of 350 grain North Fork Cup Point expanding solids. I am not sure if the current 402 grain would have much advantage.

BadBoyMelvin,
If you can hit the Sambar with that load, it should be yours with no follow up.

Our .458 450 grain NF and Punch loads with MV of 2150 fps used in our bullet testing Safari shot through several Cape Buff and a frontal brain shot on elephant went through the head and into the body - DRT.

Even a big bad Sambar should be no challenge for your loads.

The wound channel and exit hole size with that 450-gr HYDRO on a Sambar should be interesting.
May the red gods smile on Sir Russ.

And Sir Larry has got me remembering to try a 400-grain hardcast-PCP-GC at 2500 fps.
I am sure my alloy can handle it if some of the Cast Performance Bullets have been successfully used at 3100 fps.







I want to be able to use all sorts of 400-grainers at 1800 fps to 2600 fps.
If a 400-grain soft is insufficient then a 400-gr FN solid of copper or brass monometal will back it up.
If bullets from 250 to 550 grains are eminently practical then simplify it to 400-grainer for ultimate practicality ..

Ultimate ammo:

For close-range impacts inside of 50 yards,
starting off at 2500 fps MV, the North Fork, or Hammer Bullet might be better.







And of course for the really serious work, in close, a brass or copper FN solid is required.
400-grains will do, but feel free to use a heavier solid if it makes you happy.

Maybe the 400-gr Shock Hammer will make a better FN solid when shot backwards,
but the current 402-gr Shock Hammer might do in a pinch,
no more than 2400 fps needed, and shortest COL practicable.







Might very well turn out that the 400-gr Shock Hammer is the one and only bullet needed for this planet.
Time will tell.
Only The Shadow knows, etc.

The 400 Hammer does look very interesting.

I also have some 380 grain Lehigh copper flat points. Originally purchased for 45-70 use. I have not measured the length. By eyeballing they look equal in length, or very close to, the Cast Performance 460 grain flat points.
The Lehigh 380 grain at least looks as though, that it would slap the snot out of anything in North America.
Whether fired from 45-70 or 458 Winchester.

Your hammer test is epic RC. Very darned cool!

Sir Ron
Great work on the cast bullets. The hammer test is a good one! Stands the test of time. Works on democracies too by the way but I digress.
On alloy and effect; hardness and toughness are different critters and as game bullets toughness is the goal. As you speed those pointier bullets up hardness may get you accuracy but it won’t get you terminal performance. All bullets have to get weight forward bias inside the animal to be reliable performers. Hard pointy bullets won’t do that leading to the same kinds of performance problems you observed with the Barnes 500 tsx in your tests. They will deviate and or tumble to get weight forward. Cast needs to hit, expand a bit, and continue on weight forward through the animal for best results.
That prefers a softer and tougher bullet over a hard one.
I hope that we also can compress, get weight forward and survive our current hammer test as a Nation.
Best regards Sir

Sir, I'm not sure that i agree completely. I've killed Buffalo, bison moose and grizzly with hard cast flat points out of revolvers that were cast to maintain their shape as much as possible and they killed very effectively with most exiting.

We agree; most likely completely. I just did not use enough words to say it all. I too shot flat point "hard cast" meaning heat treated wheel weights out of the 44 mag through both front shoulders of an elk. That bullet however had both antimony and arsenic to make it tough and still was likely less than 16-18 BHN. We all shot "hard cast" out of the 44's and 45's back in the day. Fact is they were not all that hard. Secondly their shape helped them sustain their direction and integrity while in the elk.
Look at the length of the 250 SW 44 or 45 caliber and compare it to the 400 - 500 .458 pills. The longer the bullet, the more it is likely to bend and then deviate all other things equal. Lastly, a 250 grain SW 44 can turn about in a game animal and you will likely never know as it goes base first just as well as it goes point first.
Ross Seyfreid shot a tremendous about of BIG game with the flat point cast out of big revolvers. Some of those were very hard bullets. The last article I remember reading of his was something like, "In search of the perfect bullet." It was about casting a hard body and s soft nose on those revolver bullets.
I will say my preference in a 458 cast bullet would still be for tough and softer than a hard as hubcaps linotype bullet, but indeed, it is at the end my preference. Anything I shoot at game will have as big of Flat point as I can load and feed for the same reason we all shot them out of the revolvers.
Thank you for adding to the narrative!

Out of stock and no back order wherever I have looked, boo hoo.
But buy a donkey to Sir Larry for the reminder.

Sir Scotty has a great sense of humor !

I say Sir Dennis and Sir John are on the same page, and I agree.
The pointier and harder cast bullets are for varmint work.
I have also noted that best accuracy comes when more than half of the bullet length is full diameter before the ogive taper starts.
That favors the bigger FN meplats too.