Author Topic: Hand loading the .45-110  (Read 14835 times)

Offline Don Nix

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Hand loading the .45-110
« on: October 31, 2010, 06:54:53 PM »
Just got my new to me EMF  Sharps 1874 .45-110 in yesterday and I have to say that it is pretty imptessive for a fairly inexpensive rifle.
 The wood and metal fit is good  ,it is smooth  and the heavy octagonal barrel is ipressive. especially to me as  a novice Sharps owner.I went the cheap route because I wanted to try a Sharps big rifle without laying out two or three grand and then just letting it sit in the gun cabinet because it was too much rifle.
 Anyyway my question is this. i am wondering if anyone mkes a small handloader for the 2 7/8 " sharps.I have Lee classic loaders in 32-20,45 colt and 30-30. but i dont see where the 45-100 has ever been available.
 I thought about using a Lee hand press and Lyman dies(if that would work). The thought that a Lee loader kit in 45-70 might be adapted. Does any one have experience in this realm. Can you give me some guidence. i have got to handload as $4 bucks a pop plus shipping is gonna get old.

Offline john boy

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #1 on: October 31, 2010, 09:07:21 PM »
Quote
Does any one have experience in this realm.

45-110 RCBS 3 Die Set ... http://www.buffaloarms.com/browse.cfm/4,4930.html

Don, I load 45-90's, have the die set and really don't use any of the dies much.

* Decap using the Lee Universal Decapper
* When I change bullet diameters, I use a 45-70 resizer and just compress the mouth to the depth of a seated bullet
* I finger seat 99% of my 45-90 reloads with a neck tension of 0.001 to 0.002, so, use an expander plug of the correct base diameter in the Lee Expander die.  Track of the Wolf has them
* Powder compression is done with any 45 cal compression die
* Seat the bullet with my fingers
* Remove the case bell using the 45-70 resizig die - just need a light tap with the round in the die slightly to do it ... NO CRIMP NEEDED!
After the cases are fireformed, there is no need to full length size them unless you change rifles, so the 45-90 decapper/resizing die is not used - don't use the 45-90 M Die nor do I use the seating die.  So if I can reload 45-90's without using any of the 45-90 dies, no reason why you can't do the same with the 45-110's ... but you will need the other die 'stuff' to do it
Remember, the only difference with any of the 45-xx cases is the length
Recommend you slug the bore of the rifle before you go too deep into reloading
Regards
SHOTS Master John Boy

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Brevet 1st Lt, Scout Company, Department of the Atlantic
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Offline Ranch 13

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #2 on: November 01, 2010, 01:00:02 PM »
I don't think the lee handpress is going to have a big enough opening to handle that long case. You'll need a fairly large framed press. Remember you're going to need an opening of close to 4 inches in a press to handle a finished round.
 You can get brass from Jamison international, or get the Norma 45 basic from Cabela's and cut them to length.
Eat more beef the west wasn't won on a salad.

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #3 on: Today at 03:03:47 PM »

Offline James Hunt

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #3 on: November 01, 2010, 03:36:34 PM »
If you are not worried about extreme accuracy - if minute of buffalo is OK with you - you may wish to consider paper patching. The original hide hunters went into the field with pretty sparse loading equipment. It was not until the mid 70's that Sharps began offering a complete loading kit with their rifles.

If your shells are only shot in your rifle, you need not resize your shells. Prime (Lee priming tool is cheap and great), pour in powder, a wad, a lube cookie, and then shove a paper patch bullet in.

Making a lube cookie is easy, beef tallow (not the best choice) can be cheaply purchased on eaby. Melt in the wife's pan to about a 3/16 inch depth and let harden. With the wad pressed into your charged shell, invert shell in lube and them shove down with a wood dowel.Yes this is a winter load, in the summer the tallow without beeswax will melt.

Google will reveal much information on paper patching, but remember guys made a living sitting around a fire at night reloading - don't make it complicated or a mystery.

Buffalo Arms will sell you swagged pp bullets and even a brass template for paper, (you can make your own template with a little math and an  angle that makes the ends about 52 degrees). Use Buffalo arms paper until you get this figured out better. The paper should be rolled twice around the bullet. Not hard, a little practice, paper can be wet or dry, although I find wet much easier to stick to itself. After a few frustrating attempts you will get the hang of it.

Hand press the bullet into the case, the bullet does not need to be seated deeply, but enough to chamber. Use tallow in the bore, the chamber must be dry. The soft lead will bump up and usually give you acceptable accuracy. Not great, but acceptable. This is the cheapest way to go. Almost no equipment required.

I have never been very successful at hand pressing a naked bullet (grease groove) into a shell without belling the case a bit, and that requires equipment you don't want to purchase. I know this sounds a mystery, but again it is cheap and it works. 50,000 commercial hide hunters can't have been wrong. Paper patching can be very accurate, I am told, but there must be a bit of alchemy associated with it as I can not yet get what I can with grease groove. I'd have to ramp up my skills and knowledge a bit and I am but a minute of buffalo shooter. And, you'd be period correct.

Oh, although I use 2f Goex, some very good shooters find better fouling control with 1f. I don't really experience a difference. You will probably have to wipe frequently with this much powder. Using a 50-70 I have put 20 rds down range with out a blow tube or wiping. Seemed to kill paper very effectively at 100 yards, and while they began to chamber a little bit of difficulty at the end, accuracy did not suffer.I use only tallow in the bore.  My .45-110 is wonderfully accurate with grease groove, I have not tried pp with it yet though. So my advice is reflective of doing this with a .50 gvt Shiloh.
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"The duty is ours, the results are God's." (John Quincy Adams)

Offline Ranch 13

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #4 on: November 01, 2010, 03:56:49 PM »
Given the generousness of most Italian chambers, to paper patch that rifle is going to take a patched to groove bullet without resizing the cases, and that will mean absolutely having to wipe between shots, just to be able to chamber the next round.
 Paper patching isn't that complicated every 10 year old kid in the country knew how to do it in the 1870's, there are just some modern folks can't the hang of it to well. :)
 And yes most of the time a properly constructed paper patch load will out shoot a grooved bullet, with the added benefits of less elevation on the sight and windage used that the grooved.

 Keep it easy to start with get a large enough press to handle the length of the 2 7/8 case and load greased bullets until you get the hang of handling the heavy recoil .
Eat more beef the west wasn't won on a salad.

Offline James Hunt

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #5 on: November 01, 2010, 08:32:18 PM »
I didn't say I did this well, my name is not bantered about on the Shiloh board with shock and awe  :o . What I did intend was the impression that I could do it, I could do it with minimal equipment, and it was basically easy. That pp is not really any more difficult than grease groove if you are not worried about hitting goats at 500 meters.

Using in excess 100 grains of powder in a 2 7/8 case does seem to require care that necessitates either a blow tube  or wiping, at least for me and grease groove bullets. However, I have found this not necessary for my .50 with 65 to 70 grains of powder. Again, I am shooting at 100 yards.

The swaged bullets I get even when wrapped, are still well under groove diameter, as far as I can tell they bump up adequately in the Shiloh .50. Again, I am not achieving any great shakes in accuracy, but it goes bang and is on the paper. I could hit a buffalo, somewhere.  ;D

My thoughts were meant to get ya shooting without that nasty reloading stuff expense - just like the guy's did it in 1872.

By the way, I load my .45-110 on a old single stage RCBS press using a three die set by 4-D and it works well. I drop tube and compress the powder, the whole nine yards. It is a wonderfully accurate round in my particular rifle although it took me about a year to get it working at this level. Lurk about the Shiloh board, that will help quite a bit. Eventually you will want to get into it at this level, the round just has to much potential.

My .50 is pure fun, it scores much better than my .45-110 (Shiloh) or .45-70 (Pedersoli) on the fun factor scale. It is my favorite BPCR  for hunting. The same goes for  an original conversion carbine where a .515 greaser just about slides down the bore on its own. It has pie plate accuracy despite its 1868 arsenal reline date.

The point is if it goes bang it will be fun, if you hit the paper it is pretty darn cool, and if the second shot is somewhere in the vicinity of the first it was worth it all. Have a good time. :D
NCOWS, CMSA, NRA
"The duty is ours, the results are God's." (John Quincy Adams)

Offline Ranch 13

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #6 on: November 01, 2010, 09:34:00 PM »
 The guys in "1872"'s guns had much tighter chambers and smaller groove diameters than what we have today. A good many of the chamber casts from original Sharps 45 caliber guns comes up at .470 at the case mouth compared to the .480 of today. Standard lead angles of today are 45 degrees, the old sharps etc were at 7 degrees.
 Lots of things different between then and now, so it takes some adjustments to the old dead guys ways.... It's not hard to do , but it can be quite time consuming and aggrevating to make todays chambers work as they should with patched.
 Still with all that said it's still better for a neophyte to get the hang of things with the grooved bullets, then take up the patching.
 As a general rule anything holding over 75 grs of powder is going to preform a good bit better with 1f than with 2. The smaller grained powder will foul heavier in the large cases. Even back in the day Sharps, Remington and Winchester discouraged the use of anything smaller than 1f would cause problems in the big rifle cartridges using over 50 grs of powder.
Eat more beef the west wasn't won on a salad.

Offline Don Nix

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #7 on: November 01, 2010, 11:38:41 PM »
I am ,I admit a little slow on the uptake,but what I am gathering is that a classic Lee loader kit in 45-70 should be all i would need to reload the 45-110. If the entire case does not need to be resized each time.  and that by adjusting the bullet seater   for additional length it should work alright . Im not sure about  using the crimp  but i am thinking a little experimentaion would work that out.Crimp or paper. If I read this right the hardest part is the priming/depriming and bullet seating ,with no need to resize the entire case then the 45-70 Classic Lee loader would be a minimal investment . In fact as I sit here and write this it occurs to me that the only differnce  in the loader would be a full length sizing  tool and one could be made by a knowledgeable machinist easily enough as it is basically just a steel tube camfered and bored to the diameter of the case that you drive a case into. I have a friend who is a master gunsmith with a big computer controlled lathe that he uses in his rifle builds and I bet he could run out a 45-110 full case sizer with no problem ,if one was needed.does that make sense.

Offline Ranch 13

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #8 on: November 02, 2010, 12:56:52 PM »
Actually you don't want a crimp on either a cast of paper patched bullet. So yes if you can get the primers kicked out with the lee hand set you should get by alright You may have to invest in one of the decapping tools from BACO or similar. How much resizing you ultimately have to do is going to be determined by how generous your chamber was cut, but for the most part just enough resizing of the case mouth to hold some tension on the bullet ought to work.
 
Eat more beef the west wasn't won on a salad.

Offline john boy

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #9 on: November 02, 2010, 07:12:19 PM »
Regards
SHOTS Master John Boy

WartHog ...
Brevet 1st Lt, Scout Company, Department of the Atlantic
SASS  ~  SCORRS ~ OGB with Star

Devote Convert to BPCR

Offline Don Nix

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #10 on: November 02, 2010, 11:45:42 PM »
Yep, thats me, it almost has to be a felony for me to buy it.Thanks

Offline Montana Slim

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #11 on: November 08, 2010, 09:34:51 PM »
I haven't seen any "bad" advice yet.....just a matter of your preferences and of the rifle. below are a few of my rambling thoughts:

I have seen a couple 45-110's in use & do recommend you get a hand-operated chamber brush to be able to run up there every now & again.

1F powder sounds like a good I dea...along with a grease cookie.

I use the crimp fetaure of the die to just remove the belling of the case (little to no actual crimp).

You'll justa have to dive in and find out what does & doesn't work.

Regards ( and good luck),
SLim
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Offline Don Nix

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Re: Hand loading the .45-110
« Reply #12 on: November 16, 2010, 12:55:31 AM »
Well, my bullets arrived on Saturday and I ran to town and picked up some primers and this afternoon  tried out all the knowledge I have garnered here.
 Gander mountain had no black powder so I decided to use the Pyrodex I had on hand.
 I loaded the new brass with RS and placed two thin wads and compressed it about 1/8'. I then used my Lee Loader Bullet seater and seated the .458 bullet. With the new brass it was a bit difficult to get started  but once it was seated  it seemed to turn out fine. I stepped outside my shop  and tried her out. I was a little leery of the recoil as I have read many horror stories of the 45-110. But when it let go I was pleasantly surprised to find that it wasnt bad at all,comparable to my Plains rifle with a heavy load. I immediately loaded another round and tried it agian..
 i think I may be hooked on this big rifle. it is heavy at close to 14lbs and the action is as smooth as silk. i cant wait to go out to the range and set up some longer shots but I do know that I have found my favorite hunting rifle.
 I look forward to working up good loads with goex.
 Thanks for all the advice and heip. 

 

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