You’ll likely regret pulling at that particular thread...
I started hunting deer as a kid with my uncle’s 357mag S&W 27. Very quickly I realized, even at that age, how weak the 357mag was for the application, so I wanted more. I loaded hitter and hotter rounds trying to get more out of the 357, approaching what I now know to be near 353 Casull levels. When I finally got my hands on a 44mag, life was a lot better for putting deer down faster, but the trajectory wasn’t any better. So I bought a Ruger 357 Maximum, which was really close, but a specialty frame revolver with limited brass supply. Then a 257 win mag Hawkeye, a 414 and 445super mag, 357/44 Bobcat, 454 Casull, 41 mag, 45-70 & 30-30 BFR’s and a handful of others. I tried light bullet loads, heavy bullet loads, you name it... Admittedly, I bought a lot more revolvers for other purposes along the way, but I spent thousands and thousands of dollars exploring the world for what I considered to be the ideal short to long range whitetail hunting revolver. I largely landed on a desire for a regular/common large frame revolver which could run 180+ bullets over 1800fps, but retaining an SD over .200, and without excessive recoil per the menial task being performed (aka, I LOVE the 454 Casull and 475 Linebaugh, but they’re a bit much for whitetails), and with relatively good brass availability.
The 357max, 353 Casull, 357/44 Bobcat, and 414 Supermag were all very close, but finding 414 Supermag brass was nearly impossible, Max brass also uncommon, the Bobcat poly collars were the biggest pain in the ass I have experienced with any revolver, and the Casull wasn’t quite the right principle I was looking for - and not quite the same performance.
I stumbled upon a photo of a 357/44 Bain & Davis Mag about 7 years ago, bought a reamer and converted an ebay sourced 357mag Blackhawk cylinder to try it out, and found myself very close to my objective. So I bought 3 Redhawks in 357mag the next year, sent the cylinders to California, and have been very happy with the results. When I started with these, the Hornady 3505 180 SSP-SP was still in production, albeit a bit long, so I trimmed the meplats to fit cylinder length and drew them down to .357”. I also sourced a few thousand Speer 2435 180 HotCor’s, also drawing them down to .357” instead of .358”, which fit the Redhawk length beautifully. These rifle bullets have shorter bearing surfaces relative to similar weight conventional revolver bullets, so loads which absolutely flatten and seriously crater primers under conventional bullets will produce far less pressure with these (resized) rifle bullets. I can push those 180 Hotcor’s up over 1900fps, and have crossed over 2000 with some loads, whereas the 180 XTP taps out in the mid 1700’s. The ballistic coefficient of these 180’s is slightly better than conventional 180’s, and better than 44 and 45 300grn pills, but the big advantage is the speed opportunity.
For the powder I’m throwing, I could kill a water buffalo if I put a 44cal 300grn copper solid in front of it, which this tiny 357 bullet couldn’t dream of. But my objective is 0-250yrd deer killing, with moderate recoil. I have other revolvers for other tasks. But for this application, a high BC, high speed bullet is what I needed.
Admittedly, I did take one of my 44mags after doe last season, one of my Toklat’s the year before, and took my 475Line out this year for meat doe. So even though I finally have what I consider to be the ideal long Range deer killing revolver, I still find myself enjoying variety more than optimization.