I love this rifle a Winchester model 70 in 458 and I want to use it for Wyoming antelope and Utah mule deer. just going to use the open sights, any good load ideas.

Ha! Well, I think you've got "enough gun" for sure.

Nope, never handloaded the 458 Win Mag.

Regards, Guy

thanks partner yep she is about rank but i lover

That would make a reliable and fun shooting rifle.IMO it is best suited for up close hunting especially with the open sights.It is very accurate at 100yds when the bore is brand new.It will even shoot out to 200yds with a decent group size again when new.If you play with and put over 100 rds or 200rds through it groups will open up at 100yds and consistant and very good accuracy will be limited to 50yds.

mooshoo,

Congratulations. You have arrived.

swiftshot is not to be believed regarding accuracy life and yardage.
That may apply to him alone.
Not you.

For varmints, deer and antelope, you have your choice of 250-grainer at +3000 fps to 400-grainer at +2500 fps in a SAAMI .458 WinMag.
Flat enough for easy shooting within 300 yards, but wind drift will be tricky with the 250-grain Hornady GMX monometal-ballistic tip (poor BC).
Heavier and slower bullets can be used too.
What is your style ?
I personally have so many good loads for the .458 WinMag
that you will have to name a bullet type, weight and velocity range of interest to you to give us a starting point for suggestions to you.
The .458 WinMag is King of Versatility.

Well, here is my starting point, for suggestions to me:

My favorite deer load is a 400-grainer with either 80 grains of AA-2230 or 76 grains of H322 for about 2500 fps in a 24" barreled .458 WinMag.
Hornady brass case and F215 primer.
COL can be adjusted from 3.340" to 3.395" depending on accuracy and velocity tuning, and the particular 400-gr bullet you choose.
That COL range works in my factory M70 which has an inside-box length of about 3.42".
As usual, start low and work up to my favorite load if you choose, like a responsible handloader.
Your mileage may vary.
A 400-grain, .458-caliber bullet at 2500 fps MV will kill anything on the planet with proper bullet-type selection.
Or a 450-grainer at 2300 fps MV.
Or a 500-grainer at 2100 fps MV.
A hardcast 480-gr FN at 1300 fps MV will Bagwell also, if you are a good enough shot and can handle the trajectory.

H4895 cannot cause over-pressure problems in the .458 WinMag with 400-grain bullets unless you work at it with a drop tube fill of case to top
before trying to seat a bullet into the case.
But, a usual 100% LR/net fill with H4895 for a maximum load with any given bullet
may be reduced to 60% of the maximum load for a reduced load, with or without filler.
Even I could get by with H4895 alone if I had to use only one powder for loading the .458 WM.
I have used H4895 to get the 400-gr Woodleigh PPSN to over 2600 fps MV from a 25" barrel, with 3.425" COL,
and likely higher than SAAMI MAP.
One could also do a 400-grainer at 1800 fps for rainbow trajectory varmint, deer, and antelope loads.
That is a 100-yard elk load too, according to Elmer Keith.

Met a fellow with a 458 Win Mag years ago. He bought his Model 70, took it to Africa and killed lots of things, including Cape Buffalo with it.

As we were shooting it at the range he told me that he'd planned to sell it upon his return to the USA, but he liked the rifle so much that he couldn't part with it. Instead he took up handloading and used it on black bear & whitetail deer. As I recall, he used the 400 grain Speer, but... That was a long time ago and I'm not sure of that.

Regards, Guy

You might have been better off with a 416 or 375 for the longer range stuff-also more accurate and a little less recoil and straighter trajectory.Another good thing about the 458 is that you don't have to use mono metals-you could use quality jacketed bullets that the rifling can grip better and shoot accurately for longer.With a 375 you need to shoot tough monometals because you are using lighter bullets that withstand less impact energy.Unlike the 458 Lott,you could have some seating and powder compression issues with the 458WM and jacketed bullets but stick with AA2230 and you will be OK..

Glad to see you made it over here where the data and experience is. Sir RifleCrank has written and documented a vast amount of 458 knowledge around the Square Table as he calls it.
I have a Whitworth 458 that I bought in about 1982 or so, shot 500 or so full patch 500 Grain Hornady Solids through it for a "learning about the .458WM" phase in the first year, and then have been shooting it since with a few more full patch Solids, several hundred jacketed 405 Remington's, a hundred or so 400 Barnes original SSP and lot's of Cast Gas Check bullets. Like RifleCrank mentioned, it is nonsense that the .458 won't hold accuracy over many rounds, well proven not true. The big bores are not prone to Throat erosion and the rifling's don't wear out from bullets passing over them...so that is the science of it. I like Cast Loads for hunting but you might like a Barnes 300 TSX at 2500+ FPS. You can find the data for both here in RifleCranks writings.

In which alternate universe that 458s lose accuracy with so few rounds fired.
This is the biggest nonsense posted ever about a 458

You people have low level of experience with the 458.

You are full of BS

No,you are.

Still full of it I see! LOL

OP,
You can check out Sir Bob's Blog as well for a Long history of shooting the .458WM across a wide range of loads.
www.bigbores.ca

You just told everyone how much you don't know.
Time to quit before you get eaten alive...............troll

Hes Canadian, makes more sense now haha

OK idiot.

George is not a troll. I don't know him but, He is an experienced shooter, lot's of bullets downrange, and hunter, killed some game in various places, but like many folks who remained convinced beyond reason, he is just flat wrong on this matter from an incorrect analysis of his own personal experience. No harm. Other folks can figure this one out for their self I think.

You bought a 458 Win Mag?… Well then, you done good. I bought a 458 when a Ruger 77 showed up on a used rack in a LGS, along with a box of ammo that came with it - full house 500 gr FMJ’s with 13 unfired loads and 7 fired cases (we hand loaders just love that when it happens).
There’s no better reason to buy a 458 other than you want to see fit YOURSELF what it’s all about.
I sold that Ruger 77 after taking a few deer and having a ball of fun playing with it. That was a mistake. The Ruger No.1S 458 I have now helped fill the void it left.
Congratulations on your new 458 rifle. You will have a ton of fun with it no matter where you live and hunt, and no matter what others say it can or can’t do!

You are 💯% the idiot here and you keep doubling down on Stupid

Love the 458. It opened up the imaginations of many hunters of some day hunting Africa, the Dark Continent. Some made the trip, many didn't. But owning and shooting a 458 is special.

Congrats on the rifle! My second centerfire rifle when I was a kid in remote AK was a pushy 70. I shot everything with that rifle. Absolutely no flies on the 458.

thanks for all the replies

Great - a total misinformation debacle.

The 458 (or any other big bore for that matter) generally suffers less throat erosion that almost any other type of nitro powder rifle. If you don't rust out the barrel or otherwise damage it somehow, it will keep shooting as well as it did on day one for a very, very high round count. Certainly more than your wallet will thank you for.

In terms of open sights loads, I would load something like the Woodleigh 350gr BPE bullet at 2100 ft/s with H4895, which works well for that sort of reduced load. Just start at 60% of book max and work up until you hit 2100 ft/s. It should be good to about 200y before drop gets bad, which is plenty for normal iron sight use.

https://imrpowder.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/h4895-reduced-rifle-loads.pdf

Above was aimed at swiftshot, and was a dead-on bullseye by Llama_Bob.
The rest of Llama_Bob's post was accurate too.
swiftshot is the BS artist formerly known as shootaway at another forum.

Yes Riflecrank swiftshot is shootaway you told us that before.I guess what I consider acceptable accuracy is not everyones.If you put a steel 7 inch plate out at 100yds and you hit it for the most part you may feel that satisfies your needs.I don't.I don't like wounding animals.A rifle has to group no larger than 3 or 4 inches most before I take it hunting to Africa.Riflecrank,you need to take your fat head out of the books, put the ruler down and try real life experience.

Mooshoo,

As I mentioned on another post, I thought 350 grain bullets were ideal for North American game in the West. I loaded 350 grain TSXs using F215 primers and H4198 powder. With 80 grains I could easily get 2700 fps in the 22" barrel of my Model 70. By "easily" I mean the empty cases just about fell out of the rifle. I eventually settled on 75 grains, though, a low pressure load in my opinion. Velocity was 2600. 78 grains yielded 2670. 5-shot groups with both of these loads were 2.25" at 100 yards.

The .458 is one helluva cartridge. If Winchester had any intelligent marketing people, they would have brought out a load similar to the above. I also played with 450 and 500 grain bullets for African dangerous game. I never used 400 grain bullets.

I would also second the poster who recommended Sir Bob's blog. He comes out with something new about every month or so.

"5-shot groups with these loads were 2.25" at 100 yards"
You could have gotten those groups a couple of times but to say what you said above and imply that this is what the rifle would shoot many or most of the time is misleading to say the least.What about the times when those groups were 6,7 or 8 inches large? Those don't count eh?

Trying to included civility in all my comments; I have never had a 6,7 or 8" group at 100 yards from my .458 in the 39 years I have owned it. Shooting for Group to me means a good solid rest and a Scope sight to remove as many shooter errors as possible. I have had a few 4 and 5 inch groups but those were with my cast loads at 200 yards resting over sticks from a sitting position. So I have a 39 year long experiment with a wide variety of bullets and loads that tells me my .458 has held very nice field hunting accuracy over a long period of time and into the thousands of rounds. A bore scope inspection of the bore las summer revealed one a small pitted area about halfway up the bore where my storage sometime in it's past must have left something there to promote rusting. I cleaned it up and it still shoots very fine. Without a bore scope, I would have never known it existed.
Fury01 Out.

Tell that joke to someone else.

Hey braindead just because you have POS rifles and can't shoot doesn't mean that applies to others

Swiftshot:

Perhaps I should explain something to you.

In my sessions with the .458 I was mostly concerned with working up loads to give the best velocity. Accordingly I did not fire five shots of ANYTHING until I had reasonably decided on a range of powder weight. Only then did I fire five shot groups. The two I mentioned are the only two I fired.

I should also explain that I earned the Lifetime Master rating in NRA Highpower when I was 16 years old. I was Ohio State junior champion twice and runner-up national champion. You may not know what that means. One thing it means is that even when I'm only chronographing I use a 1" black paster on a white background, and I KNOW if I'm getting a 6, 7, or 8 inch flyer. I wasn't getting any of those.

I did fire a couple of 3-shot groups of 450 and 500 grain bullets, however, to check if anything might be better than North Forks or TSXs. The size of these groups was not much different than my five-shot groups. While I did not record the results, there were no 6, 7, or 8 inch groups.

As for firing more groups, it is a waste of time and money and firing a heavy-recoiling rifle off the bench is not fun. I don't understand why you think a .458 would not be capable of good accuracy. If you have any reasons, or facts beyond prejudice, we might like to hear them.

As for results, I killed elephant, buffalo, and hippo with my 450 grain bullets. None of the animals voiced any complaint.

The 458 does not have a inherent accuracy like the 308 Win.All I am saying is that its accuracy for consistent 2-3 inch groups, has a curve with a sudden steep drop at ranges beyond 50yds.I base this conclusion from the experience of owning and shooting various 8 458's some of which I rebarreled.

To debate with swiftshot is like trying to debate with someone who is convinced that the moon is made of Swiss cheese... You know what we sometimes get in our email messages: "Do Not Reply", because there's nobody home!

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

Here is a 5 shot group I once shot with my Ruger Lott at 100yds.I was using open sights.Groups like this are like getting struck by lightning.BTW the rifle was brand new and did not have a box of rounds through it.I can show you many more targets of the groups I fired over the years but they don't look like that.

There is a very excellent article by Warren Page in (I believe) the 1970 Gun Digest summarizing all of Remington's data for their 40X, fired for group before selling the rifles. The data proves that smaller calibers are more accurate than larger ones due to less leaping, torquing, and blasting.

So...I would be surprosed that a bunch of .308s were not more accurate than a bunch of .458s. .308s are a bit more accurate than 30-06s and .223s are more accurate than .308s.

So what?

If your .458 experiences a sudden opening of group size in terms of MOA at 50 yards, you may have discovered a new and proprietary law of physics.

I discover things all the time.

Wow. Just wow.

When still enamored with accurate shooting with my Winchester pre 64 Model 70 Featherweight .308, I shot 3 shot groups of 3/8 inch and 5 shot groups of 5/8 inch with my handloads AND factory Remington ammo.
Then I realized that was as good as I could do and went hunting. Never looked back. Tossed the targets, but kept the shooting logs, which I recently came across while looking for a forgotten hunting load.

Thanks Indy for the quote by Mr. Page. A better way of saying the same thing is to say that smaller caliber rifles when shot by humans generally yield more accurate results than larger bore rifles when shot by humans. That being because of "due to less leaping, torqueing, and blasting" as he suggested. Agreed.
Also we know from many sources that larger bore rifles that shoot at what is a lessor velocity, suffer far less Throat erosion and sustained barrel heat than the 308 and 223's of the world shooting at 2800-3100 FPS and we know why that is so.
All that seems to lead us down the path that the .458 change in Accuracy that George experiences is not because of the Cartridge and it's level of accuracy. Like most things, George can be the example that lies at the end of the Bell curve and his .458 guns do lose accuracy. If so, I would suggest again that is not the fault of the caliber. It could be the what he shoots; example a sandpaper coated bullet, or cleaning regime, example; using diamond paste and a hand powered drill to clean with, or shooting them until the barrel is very hot and continuing to shoot them. These are just examples ideas intended to show only the direction of the problem not a description of the actual problem. I have no idea what besets George's Big bore rifles or why his results are what they are. I simply disagree about the accuracy potential of the .458 WM and wish him well.

You sound like that Fauci.

Well I tried fellows. Won't make that mistake again.

Never let a douche bag win

swiftsh!tt is a cranky little basturd for shore . know need to be an a$$ just to prove a point

Don't own one but have a 45-70 with 405 grain slugs and about 55 grains of H4895. I suspect its kick is pretty close to a 458. One gets a serious punch and can feel the rifle torque as well. Would like to drop a deep woods elk and perhaps a moose with it. Rumor has it one can eat right to the bullet hole.

Have a 45-90 too, but have not loaded up the 540 grain slugs yet. Should be pleasant to shoot as the rifle weighs 15 lbs.

Elmer Keith was the fellow who made “eat right up to the hole” famous and Elmer was right about many things. I loved the story about him winning the target shoot match with his old 45-70 Buffalo rifle shooting lead and black laying over the fender of an old car.

Being within a couple months of my 86 birthday, and having suffered a severe bout of arthritis last winter, from which I'm still recuperating, I've toned down my loads for the .458 Win to ~40 ft-lbs recoil from upwards of ~60 a couple of years ago. And I still aim to get a consistent MOA, or less, for all my hunting loads in the .458 and 9.3 x 62. I could post pictures here but I do those in my blogs.

My take on Swiftshot is that he has overdone his shooting of .458 Lotts, and no longer can he mentally or emotionally sustain the wack he knows he'll get. I've not been shooting nearly as much at the range over the past couple of years as previously, and have to mentally prepare myself for the wack I'll get every time I pull the trigger.

For over twenty years I mostly shot "hot loads" in my .45-70s, including a Ruger #1 with a long throat that was equal to a 22" .458 Win in ballistics. That rifle with scope and a few cartridges in a buttstock cartridge holder only weighed 8.6 lbs, and recoil was up to nearly 70 ft-lbs so anything below 50 seemed mild to me. That was until I reached age 80 or so. Then due to concern over my one good eye I decided to trade my beloved Ruger #1 in .45-70 LT for a .458 Win in a Ruger #1 that weighed two more pounds to tone down felt recoil. I did that and then Covid hit us that hampered shooting at the range... and then the arthritis attack.

So my takeaway is what I already knew, and what most experts already were saying, that to stay in the game of shooting any hard recoiling rifle we must shoot them often but not overdo it! I think Swiftshot has overdone it, with apologies.

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

I now rarely shoot full loads with my 458's.I remember when I used to shoot full loads exclusively and then getting a concussion from it.One year I was trying to cross a somewhat busy street but had difficulty.I had other issues as well-one was blocked nasal passages when lying down.I shoot at least 50, 458 Lott loads with 28grs of AA5744 behind a 500gr bullet almost every week now.The last time I shot them I was at an indoor range a chick got scared of the noise and the range monitor gets thrill in telling everyone "he is shooting an elephant gun".

A good all-around load for longer ranges is the 300gr TSX at about 2750 fps. That's accurate in my rifle seated at 3.324" COL (crimped in bottom groove) over 75 grains H4198, ignited by WLRM primers in Rem or Hornady cases.

Or, a more modest load of a 400gr Speer (or 405 Remington) at around 2100 fps (75 grains of RL-15) is very accurate in my Ruger #1.

Then for close work, a 400gr Speer at 1600 to 1800 fps over a modest dose of A5744 will work on any deer to 200 yards or so with some holdover. That simulates a good load from an 1895 Marlin in .45-70.

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

Swiftshot's load of 28 grains of AA5744 under a 500gr would be very, very modest as to MV and recoil from his .458 Lott. I'd expect not more than 1100 fps an d recoil at a very, very modest 14 ft-lbs (about the same as a .243 Winchester shooting a 100gr).

Bob
www.bigbores.ca (My latest blog is up on "Tales and Trails - P1" Pic heavy)

As a further insight to any deer load: My current Ruger #1 load for the .458 is 75 grains of RL-15 behind either a 405gr Remington or 400gr Barnes Buster. They both shoot about 2100 fps and same poi at 100 yards. That is my current "bear load". The reason for 75 grains is that it nearly fills the case behind those bullets seated to 3.262" COL for the 405 Rem and 3.295" COL for the 400 Barnes Buster. I'm not messing with reduced loads in using a relatively slow powder. If I wanted more velocity, I'd use a faster powder like H4198, H335, A2230 or even H4895. I could easily push them to 2500 fps. But what's the point? I'm not hunting elephant! And, apart from the 400 Buster, the 400 Speer and 405 Remington are not built for MV speeds much past 2000 fps for impact velocity below that. The Rem is better than the Speer in that regard. But either will get the job done on whitetails or mule deer at around 1100 fps impact, or even less.

But I will load 75 grains of RL-17 behind the 400 Speer and 405 Rem as that should slow MV by about 200 fps from 75 grains of RL-15. I've already tested the 405gr Rem over 75 grains of RL-22 for slightly over 1500 fps. So it appears that the spread in MV between RL- 15 and RL-22 is -600 fps when loaded with the same amount of powder. RL-17 is not midway, but I'm thinking it might reduce MV by about 200 fps from the RL-15 load when the same amount of RL-17 is used - 75 grains. Why? Same as the answer above: not to mess with reduced powder charges, and giving an approximate MV for a 400 Speer I used from an 1895 Marlin in .45-70 on my first bear.

Arguments against? Use of more powder means more expense and more recoil? True, but when calculated against A5744, I paid 50% more for a can of 5744 than for the RL series which I already have on hand. As to more recoil, it amounts to 24 ft-lbs vs 19.5 ft-lbs. For myself, either is more than tolerable as that would represent the difference between well loaded .30-06's and .308 Winchesters. In other words, it's not currently a consideration, nor is the minimal extra cost of powder usage that might be incurred as I'll not be shooting dozens of rounds anyway for practice of sight-in. A few will suffice to discover if I want to use that combination of powder and bullet for an accurate, reduced load. The current load of the 405 Rem and 400 Buster is near ideal for the purposes intended, and have proven themselves to be consistently accurate.

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

I don't understand why anyone would waste time and money shooting 50 shots with a .458 Lott every week, whether squib loads or real loads.

After I got sighted in, I didn't fire my .458 Winchester except to check zero or when hunting. Any skill you can get from "practicing" is directly transferrable from smaller calibers. Except for handling recoil.

I recommend lioading five hunting rounds and five without powder or primers. Put all 10 in your pocket and then shoot offhand, single loading one at a time without looking at or feeling the primer pocket. That will tell you how bad your flinch is.

The best load I found for African dangerous game was 72 grains of AA2230 wth a 450 grain bullet (TSX or North Fork), F215 primers. Velocity was 2250 fps. North Fork 450 grain flat-point solids will penetrate deeper than 500 grain round noses due to the cavitation effect. Recoil was noticeably less than 500 grain loads at 2200 fps.

The effects of recoil are not well understood. Not only might it make you flinch but also lengthens the time beween shots, due to muzzle rise.

"I don't understand why anyone would waste time and money shooting 50 shots with a .458 Lott every week, whether squib loads or real loads."

For one thing I enjoy shooting it and it lets me practice with the same rifle I will use to go hunting or shoot with at a big bore rifle shoot.

It is one of three rifles I shoot weekly.The other two are a 308 and a rimfire.I've been shooting the 308 for years and I can shoot it really well but the 458 with light loads is more difficult to master.It could be because of the louder bang, greater recoil and heavier trigger.The rifle balances entirely different as well.I also get to practice bolt cycle and loading.I find I am shooting better and better with it and would have been left behind if I thought the 308 or the rimfire were sufficient for practice.Shooting offhand, with open sights consistently accurate at 50yds is a big challenge for me.

And that load is “slow” recoil compared to the 243 and quiet compared to full loads. All making shooting them easy to do and enjoy.
Very few things more pleasant to shoot than big bores so loaded.

My 308 practice load is like my 458-a reduced load but much lower recoil and much quiter.The recoil of the light load 458 feels heavy when I shoot it after shooting the light 308 and rimfire but feels very light when I shoot it from the bench after shooting a 458 Lott using regular starting loads.

Fully agree! I almost mentioned the "slower recoil" factor but thought I'd said too much already. The quiet factor I didn't know about but believe you as the "bang" we hear is related to muzzle pressure being released, so that is likely true since the muzzle pressure of a 500gr/.458 at around 1100 fps would, indeed, be much less than a .243 at normal psi.

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

And, I'll also mention that reducing the noise factor also reduces the sense of recoil. I know that from the difference in using the best ear protection at the range vs adequate!

This past week I went to a "new" logging road which ultimately descended into a gorge. There I fired my "bear load" of the 405gr Rem at 2100 fps from offhand into a smallish hardwood at about 40 yards. But I had my ear muffs on a clip from a small strap around my neck. I put them on before I fired and amazingly the recoil was totally pleasant! It was like... puffffish. But physics said it hit me with 32 ft-lbs of kinetic energy, yet it was just a slightly heavy push like sportsmen give one another when they've scored a goal.

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

Yep Bob; Starting new shooters on Quiet loads is probably the best gift you can give to the odds of them continuing on as a shooter. Of course adding ear protection always. In the Kinetic energy Equation, Velocity is squared and mass is simply multiplied. Fast or slow recoil matters to the shooter. I can certainly tell the difference. That is why heavy guns "soak" up recoil and light ones really "kick." It's the speed they hit you at. The load in the barrel was the same.

I wouldn't advise that, you'll be WAY under gunned.