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.45-70 rifle cartridge meets the test of time
By LOWELL BRANHAM
March 8, 2003
No one today would think of depending on a kerosene lamp for light, a wood stove for cooking or a horse-and-buggy for getting to town.
But a large and steadily growing number of hunters are taking to the deer woods each fall with rifles chambered for a cartridge that appeared just eight years after Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox.
That cartridge is the venerable .45-70, and its use isn't by any means confined to the deer woods. It has also found plenty of favor among elk hunters, moose hunters and even bear hunters, including some who go after the giant brown bears of the Alaskan coast and the Aleutian Peninsula.
That's a pretty big assignment for a black powder round that debuted way back in 1873. The .45-70 was the first self-contained metallic cartridge to be adopted as standard issue by the U.S. military. Prior to its advent, rank-and-file troops were still armed with muzzleloaders.
As far back as the Civil War, some select units of the Union army were equipped with breechloading cartridge rifles, but they were not standard issue. The .56 Spencer was the one in most common use, but a few outfits were provided with lever-action .44 Henrys, the predecessor of the famed Winchester. Confederates called the Henry "that damned Yankee rifle that you load on Sunday and shoot all week."
The .45-70 and the Trapdoor Springfield rifle that fired it were the mainstays that carried the U.S. Army through the Western Indian wars. They remained the issue arm and cartridge until 1892, when they were supplanted by the much more modern .30-40 Krag.
The Krag had three significant "firsts" to its credit in relation to its military use. It was the first repeater, the first bolt-action and the first smokeless cartridge adopted by the U.S. armed forces. Today, however, the Krag is teetering on the edge of obsolescence, while the much older and seemingly more primitive .45-70 is in the midst of a hearty renaissance.
If memory serves me right, Ruger got the ball rolling in the 1960s by chambering its strong No. 1 single-shot for the .45-70. Then Marlin got on the bandwagon with its Model 1895 lever-action, followed by Browning, Navy Arms, Shiloh Sharps and a host of others.
The original black powder military loading of the .45-70 pushed a 405-grain bullet along at around 1,300 feet per second, which certainly is nothing to sneeze at. Because of the large number of weak Trapdoor Springfields that were sold as surplus and remained in circulation for many years, commercial loads for the .45-70 until relatively recently remained on par with the old black powder rounds.
But when strong new firearms for the .45-70 became available, handloaders soon discovered that the old cartridge had potential far in excess of what the old-timers would've ever believed. Instead of the 1,300 fps of the commercial load, velocity of 2,000 fps and more was obtainable in the strong actions of the Ruger No. 1 and the Browning Model 1885 single-shots.
Back in 1970s, I bought one of the first Browning single-shots offered in .45-70, and for a good many years I stuffed enough Reloder 7 powder in my reloads for that gun to push a 350-grain jacketed Hornady roundnose bullet along at a velocity of 2,350 fps. That's a good bit hotter than most loading manuals recommend, but I never noted any sign of excess pressure with the load and it shot like a house afire.
Recently, I bought a Marlin Model 1895, and while the Marlin action is strong, it's not as strong as the Browning single-shot. As a result, I pulled all the bullets from my .45-70 reloads and reduced the powder charge to produce a velocity of 2,000 fps. That way, the reloads would be safe to shoot in both guns.
When I took the Marlin to the range for the first time, I used up three rounds - shooting at a distance of 50 yards - to get the open iron sights set where I wanted them. I then fired the next three shots off the bench without checking my spotting scope to see where the bullets were hitting.
You could've knocked me over with a feather when I looked through the scope and saw all three shots touching in a neat cloverleaf pattern.
It was luck, of course. My aged eyes are no longer capable of shooting groups that tight with iron sights. But it's that kind of performance that's kept the .45-70 going strong over a span of 130 years.
http://www.tcpalm.com/tcp/outdoors_fishing/article/0,1651,TCP_1062_1799051,00.html
By LOWELL BRANHAM
March 8, 2003
No one today would think of depending on a kerosene lamp for light, a wood stove for cooking or a horse-and-buggy for getting to town.
But a large and steadily growing number of hunters are taking to the deer woods each fall with rifles chambered for a cartridge that appeared just eight years after Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox.
That cartridge is the venerable .45-70, and its use isn't by any means confined to the deer woods. It has also found plenty of favor among elk hunters, moose hunters and even bear hunters, including some who go after the giant brown bears of the Alaskan coast and the Aleutian Peninsula.
That's a pretty big assignment for a black powder round that debuted way back in 1873. The .45-70 was the first self-contained metallic cartridge to be adopted as standard issue by the U.S. military. Prior to its advent, rank-and-file troops were still armed with muzzleloaders.
As far back as the Civil War, some select units of the Union army were equipped with breechloading cartridge rifles, but they were not standard issue. The .56 Spencer was the one in most common use, but a few outfits were provided with lever-action .44 Henrys, the predecessor of the famed Winchester. Confederates called the Henry "that damned Yankee rifle that you load on Sunday and shoot all week."
The .45-70 and the Trapdoor Springfield rifle that fired it were the mainstays that carried the U.S. Army through the Western Indian wars. They remained the issue arm and cartridge until 1892, when they were supplanted by the much more modern .30-40 Krag.
The Krag had three significant "firsts" to its credit in relation to its military use. It was the first repeater, the first bolt-action and the first smokeless cartridge adopted by the U.S. armed forces. Today, however, the Krag is teetering on the edge of obsolescence, while the much older and seemingly more primitive .45-70 is in the midst of a hearty renaissance.
If memory serves me right, Ruger got the ball rolling in the 1960s by chambering its strong No. 1 single-shot for the .45-70. Then Marlin got on the bandwagon with its Model 1895 lever-action, followed by Browning, Navy Arms, Shiloh Sharps and a host of others.
The original black powder military loading of the .45-70 pushed a 405-grain bullet along at around 1,300 feet per second, which certainly is nothing to sneeze at. Because of the large number of weak Trapdoor Springfields that were sold as surplus and remained in circulation for many years, commercial loads for the .45-70 until relatively recently remained on par with the old black powder rounds.
But when strong new firearms for the .45-70 became available, handloaders soon discovered that the old cartridge had potential far in excess of what the old-timers would've ever believed. Instead of the 1,300 fps of the commercial load, velocity of 2,000 fps and more was obtainable in the strong actions of the Ruger No. 1 and the Browning Model 1885 single-shots.
Back in 1970s, I bought one of the first Browning single-shots offered in .45-70, and for a good many years I stuffed enough Reloder 7 powder in my reloads for that gun to push a 350-grain jacketed Hornady roundnose bullet along at a velocity of 2,350 fps. That's a good bit hotter than most loading manuals recommend, but I never noted any sign of excess pressure with the load and it shot like a house afire.
Recently, I bought a Marlin Model 1895, and while the Marlin action is strong, it's not as strong as the Browning single-shot. As a result, I pulled all the bullets from my .45-70 reloads and reduced the powder charge to produce a velocity of 2,000 fps. That way, the reloads would be safe to shoot in both guns.
When I took the Marlin to the range for the first time, I used up three rounds - shooting at a distance of 50 yards - to get the open iron sights set where I wanted them. I then fired the next three shots off the bench without checking my spotting scope to see where the bullets were hitting.
You could've knocked me over with a feather when I looked through the scope and saw all three shots touching in a neat cloverleaf pattern.
It was luck, of course. My aged eyes are no longer capable of shooting groups that tight with iron sights. But it's that kind of performance that's kept the .45-70 going strong over a span of 130 years.
http://www.tcpalm.com/tcp/outdoors_fishing/article/0,1651,TCP_1062_1799051,00.html
