.44 Henry Rimfire ballistics from a .44-40

[Sir Charles deMouton-Black]

About 1100 1866s were made up in about 1891(?) chambered in .44 Henry CF. The round was a clone of the .44 American. All of these firearms were a special order for S. America, Brazil I think.

Of course the .44 American was merely a CF version of the .44 Henry Flat rf.

[Cliff Fendley]

Couple of points when you start to wonder why the cases and charges were used "as is"

Why a down loaded 44-40?  Because the full 40g charge would jam up a SAA with some regularity.

The issue of reliability is the reason many gunmen of the day used a 44-40 rifle and a .45 Colt hand gun.  

I sure sounds like you're saying a 40 grain charge in a 44-40 will jam up a SAA more than the same 40 grain charge in a 45 Colt?

I don't buy that for one minute because I shoot both in SAA's and I can tell you from experience the 44-40 guns run MUCH cleaner. The only area of concern in them is the cylinder pin/bushing area. The recoil shield, hand, hammer area stay nearly as clean as shooting smokeless. The 45 colt's on the other hand get filthy compared to the 44's. Even worse if I shoot 45 Schofield in them. I'm cleaning a 45 colt right now from yesterdays shoot.

What I do buy is the possibility that UMC may have offered the 28 grain charge ammo in 44-40 for an option in revolvers. Not for reliability but for the same reason people used 45 Schofield and the 45 Government rounds in the SAA. A 40 grain load is not the most pleasant shooting load in a SAA and I have read besides the fact of wanting a round that would work in both the Smith and Wesson and the Colt revolvers, many also found the 28 grain load to be more manageable to shoot.

[Cliff Fendley]

Probably the 28 grain load would have been meant for a lighter revolver round.

I have to agree

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[Sean Thornton]

A lot of the .44-40 v .45 Colt in a rifle was not so much an extraction issue but a fouling issue which I guess could lead to an extraction issue. The .44-40 brass is thinner brass than the .45 Colt. Thinner brass was a good thing when couple with a bottleneck case in that the case could expand in the chamber thus eliminating some of the fouling in the chamber. A thicker straight wall case such as the .45 Colt does experience more fouling due to blow back into the action. The use of either in a revolver does not really present much of an issue, at least in the Colt 2nd generation revolvers I have.

The balloon head did not have much to do with extraction etc. The balloon head was eliminated due to the higher pressures of the smokeless powder loads coming into play.

[Sean Thornton]

The lighter load was a very similar issue that the FBI had in the late 1980's early 1990's when they adopted the 10mm. They simply could not handle the 10mm round as a department. This is much the same as the recruit in the 1880-1890s and the .45 Colt with a full 40 grain load.

[yahoody]

I don't buy that for one minute because I shoot both in SAA's

Sure you do.  The problem was solved more than a 100 years ago.

Try a little research.  It wasn't a 40/10mm recoil issue.  It was a reliability issue.

Same issue to be had with 32wcf and 38wcf HV ammo when used in a SAA.  Primers back out or just flow enough to jam the guns.
Read some of the early documented issues the Texas Rangers had with the first SAAs in 44-40 and get back to us.

[Cliff Fendley]

Sure you do.  The problem was solved more than a 100 years ago.

Try a little research.  It wasn't a 40/10mm recoil issue.  It was a reliability issue.

Same issue to be had with 32wcf and 38wcf HV ammo when used in a SAA.  Primers back out or just flow enough to jam the guns.
Read some of the early documented issues the Texas Rangers had with the first SAAs in 44-40 and get back to us.

Interesting, where can those early documented issues be read about? I'm not talking about the same couple guys posting about case setback or primers locking up the SAA on several different forums.

I had heard of case setback locking up 38-40 before but not anything about a 44-40.

Was it really a primer problem or a case setback problem and if the problem was solved why would this have still been an issue in 1910 when UMC was offering the 28 grain load?

[w44wcf]

No problem at all with full or reduced b.p. loads in a .44-40 nor .45 Colt revolvers.  

Historically speaking, there was also a reduced loading .44 Henry round, the W&C which was loaded with 23 grs. of b.p..
"Adapted to Henry & Winchester Model 1866 Rifles and Colt's revolvers."

There were actually 3 cartridges that UMC offered the reduced 28 gr. load for:
.38-40 (38-28-180)
.44-40 (44-28-200)
.45 Colt (45-28-250)  

In addition, they also offered the .45 Colt in a 35 gr. loading in addition to the standard 40 gr. cartridge.

w44wcf

[Fox Creek Kid]

I would wager good money that the oft repeated tale of the 'vapor locked' 44-40 SAA was due to faulty ammo. In McDowell's book he mentions the Navy having beaucoup problems with their '51 Navy conversions which was finally determined to be faulty ammo that had too soft copper cases.

[nativeshootist]

damn photoshop for taking away lots of great images