Can a Rossi R92 45colt handle "ruger only" loads?
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Domino
Member
Yes, I have seen mulitple M92's handle Ruger Only loads just fine. The M92 is a very robust design, I don't see it bieng a problem. However, for safety sake you will want to work your way up and verify no signs of overpressure in your gun.
USSR
Member
As Domino said, the M92 is a very robust action, and it will handle anything your Ruger will and then some.
Don
Don
CraigC
Sixgun Nut
The Rossi 92 is as much as 18,000psi stronger than a large frame Ruger Blackhawk. About equal to the Redhawk, safe up to 45-50,000psi. It's 10,000psi stronger than the Marlin 1894.
Detritus
Member
In load manuals "Ruger Only" for .45Colt is code for "Don't stuff this in a SAA or Clone" it might also mean not to put it through an Winchester 1873 (and i wouldn't) but mainly it's to keep bubba from looking at those pages of data going "Faster's Better" and turning grandpa's colt into a handgrenade
bergmen
Member.
My son has a Rossi Model 92 in .45 Colt (as well as a Ruger Blackhawk in the same caliber). We load the same for both (max loads) without issue.
I also have a Rossi Stainless in .454 Casull and has been mentioned, the action is very strong for high pressure loads.
Dan
I also have a Rossi Stainless in .454 Casull and has been mentioned, the action is very strong for high pressure loads.
Dan
Bill_Rights
Member
Re-Chambering .45 LC to .454 Casull?
I also own a Rossi M92 in .454 Casull, and I would like 2 or 3 more.
But it is REALLY hard to find the M92 in .454 Casull these days, and, if you do, it'll cost $700-$800, which is twice as much as they used to cost.
Can I just bore out the .45 LC firing chamber 0.1 inch deeper and have it chamber .454 Casull cartridges? Any special throat work? Or throat shape at the case-to-rifling step?
The M92 is readily available in .45 LC, and cheap. The question really boils down to, is the barrel metallurgy and dimensions, and the receiver metallurgy and dimensions, the same for Rossi's M92 .45 LC and .454 Casull?
I also own a Rossi M92 in .454 Casull, and I would like 2 or 3 more.
But it is REALLY hard to find the M92 in .454 Casull these days, and, if you do, it'll cost $700-$800, which is twice as much as they used to cost.
Can I just bore out the .45 LC firing chamber 0.1 inch deeper and have it chamber .454 Casull cartridges? Any special throat work? Or throat shape at the case-to-rifling step?
The M92 is readily available in .45 LC, and cheap. The question really boils down to, is the barrel metallurgy and dimensions, and the receiver metallurgy and dimensions, the same for Rossi's M92 .45 LC and .454 Casull?
CraigC
Sixgun Nut
Absolutely not! Spend your money on handloading equipment and the need for the .454 immediately goes away.
I already load for 45 colt. Not looking for a 454. The question was can the Rossi handle the same 45 colt loads my ruger revolvers handle (redhawk and blackhawk)
CraigC
Sixgun Nut
I was responding to this:
Sorry my bad
Bill_Rights
Member
Please excuse. I diverted a bit off topic to bring up the .454 Casull conversion of .45 LC firing chamber. I was somewhat playing off bergman, who brought up .454 Casull.
Staying on topic, I agree with CraigC that the Rossi M92 ought to be able to handle all .45 LC heavy pistol loads and beyond. I am not sure how I know this, but I think the .454 Casull and .45 LC Rossis are the same, except for the boring of the firing chamber. Why would a manufacturer have two different parts sets and designs? Just adds expense. Therefore, if the Rossi M92 receiver and barrel base can handle .454 Casull, it'll handle almost any wildcat .45 LC loading you can cram into that cartridge.
Going OT again, I was merely seeking confirmation for the .454-Casull-like-strength of the Rossi .45 LC receiver and firing chamber. Anybody?
Staying on topic, I agree with CraigC that the Rossi M92 ought to be able to handle all .45 LC heavy pistol loads and beyond. I am not sure how I know this, but I think the .454 Casull and .45 LC Rossis are the same, except for the boring of the firing chamber. Why would a manufacturer have two different parts sets and designs? Just adds expense. Therefore, if the Rossi M92 receiver and barrel base can handle .454 Casull, it'll handle almost any wildcat .45 LC loading you can cram into that cartridge.
Going OT again, I was merely seeking confirmation for the .454-Casull-like-strength of the Rossi .45 LC receiver and firing chamber. Anybody?
Bill_Rights said:
I like these kinds of discussions. It would seem reasonable that you could re chamber a .45 Colt Rossi for .454 Casull if the only difference between the two from the factory is the chamber.
I load and shoot some fairly powerful .45 Colt loads in my Marlin 1894 using the logic that Marlin offers the same rifle chambered for the .44 Rem Mag which has a max SAAMI pressure rating of 36,000 psi.
CraigC
Sixgun Nut
Every manufacturer in the business tried to adapt their designs to the .454 years ago. All failed. None lasted more than 100rds. Both the Marlin 1894 and 336 were not strong enough. Even the Winchester Big Bore with its strengthened receiver was no match for its pressure. The 1886 was plenty strong enough but too big for the cartridge to be practical. When Rossi introduced the 1892 in .454Casull, everybody was a bit surprised. To this day, we have no idea what changes were made, if any, to accommodate the cartridge. There are no apparent design changes, other than what had to be made to handle the longer cartridge. Metallurgy is unknown. What we do know is that the standard 1892 (Miroku Winchester or Rossi) in .45Colt is good to 50,000psi. Which makes the .454 unnecessary for the handloader. Most factory .454 ammo is 50-55,000psi and I don't think I'd feed one a constant diet of 65,000psi loads anyway.
No reputable gunsmith would do such a conversion.
It's unnecessary anyway.
No reputable gunsmith would do such a conversion.
It's unnecessary anyway.
Bill_Rights
Member
CraigC,
Well, yeh, rechambering .45 LC to .454 Casull is unnecessary in this rifle, IF you hand load. Much as I want to do that, and am studying up to begin, and shopping for used equipment, I have other responsibilities and cannot do it right now. And I want a powerful big-bore rifle right now (or in short order).
And I agree that most .454 Casull factory loads are well below SAAMI max, which is fine, because in most applications the extra margin would not matter. Steve Young (Nate Kiowah Jones), whom you've somewhat dismissed in a related post, does advise some mods to the recent-manufacture factory Rossi M92 .454 Casull if you're going to use heavy .454 Casull loadings a lot. But these are for extending extending operational lifetime, not for metal-rupture safety.
Yes, so I suppose I could buy a factory Rossi M92 in .45 LC and use the most powerful factory +P factory .45 LC loads I can find. I gave a few examples over on a concurrent thread: Rossi .45 Colt....16" or 20"? at http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=684852, specifically post #7 (http://www.thehighroad.org/showpost.php?p=8509531&postcount=7), which is about some offerings from Double Tap Ammo. Then, if those are not powerful enough, I can upgrade when I get into reloading, finally.
Or I could rechamber a .45 LC to .454 Casull and just use factory .454 Casull ammo, some of which I already have. You discourage that strongly. Other than the reason that it is innecessary, what other reasons do you have?
Anyway, until then, I am building up a nice store of once-fired .45 LC and .454 Casull brass!
Well, yeh, rechambering .45 LC to .454 Casull is unnecessary in this rifle, IF you hand load. Much as I want to do that, and am studying up to begin, and shopping for used equipment, I have other responsibilities and cannot do it right now. And I want a powerful big-bore rifle right now (or in short order).
And I agree that most .454 Casull factory loads are well below SAAMI max, which is fine, because in most applications the extra margin would not matter. Steve Young (Nate Kiowah Jones), whom you've somewhat dismissed in a related post, does advise some mods to the recent-manufacture factory Rossi M92 .454 Casull if you're going to use heavy .454 Casull loadings a lot. But these are for extending extending operational lifetime, not for metal-rupture safety.
Yes, so I suppose I could buy a factory Rossi M92 in .45 LC and use the most powerful factory +P factory .45 LC loads I can find. I gave a few examples over on a concurrent thread: Rossi .45 Colt....16" or 20"? at http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=684852, specifically post #7 (http://www.thehighroad.org/showpost.php?p=8509531&postcount=7), which is about some offerings from Double Tap Ammo. Then, if those are not powerful enough, I can upgrade when I get into reloading, finally.
Or I could rechamber a .45 LC to .454 Casull and just use factory .454 Casull ammo, some of which I already have. You discourage that strongly. Other than the reason that it is innecessary, what other reasons do you have?
Anyway, until then, I am building up a nice store of once-fired .45 LC and .454 Casull brass!
Gryffydd
Member
CraigC said it succinctly, but here's a great read on the subject:
http://www.leverguns.com/articles/paco/45coltlevergun.htm
http://www.leverguns.com/articles/paco/45coltlevergun.htm
Bill_Rights
Member
Great article, Gryffydd. Do you know what year it was written? (There was no date on the web page.) I am a member over a Paco Kelly's Levergun Forum, but I don't go there often and somehow missed this article. I did see Paco's 2002 review of the M92 itself: http://www.gunblast.com/Paco_Legacy_454.htm. Anyway, up till now I wasn't concerned with .454 Casull conversions of .45 LC.
Yeh, I get the point: The old .45 LC case is so huge, there is no need to make it 0.1 inch longer (i.e., like a .454 Casull) to achieve 60,000+ psi chamber pressure, with modern powders.
Is there any difference in the brass design of .45 LC and .454 Casull? Wall thickness? Curvature at inside of the base? Whatever? Why did Robert Casull invent this cartridge/case? (Is it Robert?)
At the time I purchased my first recent-manufacture Rossi M92 (early 2010, S/N MA0207XX), I was unaware there was an issue with achieving the strength needed for full-power .454 Casull rounds. It may just be a matter of great care and quality control taken in the steel alloy blending, casting, rolling/forging, heat treating, etc. And followed up by modern, automated X-ray inspection to detect and reject any imperfect parts. Jet engine parts, and I am sure many other products, could not exist without this level of effort. Gillette's razor blade steel is a metallurigical work of art, for example. So it is not too much of a mystery that IT CAN BE DONE by Rossi. Just a mystery why it is so rare or why it is not done by other gun makers (and maybe it is, just not in lever rifles).
Yeh, I get the point: The old .45 LC case is so huge, there is no need to make it 0.1 inch longer (i.e., like a .454 Casull) to achieve 60,000+ psi chamber pressure, with modern powders.
Is there any difference in the brass design of .45 LC and .454 Casull? Wall thickness? Curvature at inside of the base? Whatever? Why did Robert Casull invent this cartridge/case? (Is it Robert?)
At the time I purchased my first recent-manufacture Rossi M92 (early 2010, S/N MA0207XX), I was unaware there was an issue with achieving the strength needed for full-power .454 Casull rounds. It may just be a matter of great care and quality control taken in the steel alloy blending, casting, rolling/forging, heat treating, etc. And followed up by modern, automated X-ray inspection to detect and reject any imperfect parts. Jet engine parts, and I am sure many other products, could not exist without this level of effort. Gillette's razor blade steel is a metallurigical work of art, for example. So it is not too much of a mystery that IT CAN BE DONE by Rossi. Just a mystery why it is so rare or why it is not done by other gun makers (and maybe it is, just not in lever rifles).
Detritus
Member
Because he could??
others can correct me if i'm wrong, but the logic i was told back when i first heard about .454 Casull was that the round was at least partly developed as a way to market Casull's high(er) pressure .45 loads and the guns that were safe for them, without the risk of bubba stuffing one in an inappropriate firearm and the consequences of (repetitions of) such an act. so if that's the correct logic, then the extra 0.10" of case length is there ONLY to keep it from chambering in guns chambered for 45colt.
CraigC
Sixgun Nut
Dick Casull, who is one of our most talented gunsmiths and entirely underrated, developed the .454 using .45Colt cases. He started by fitting specially heat treated Colt frames with oversized five-shot cylinders and eventually built his own sixgun from scratch. Which is what became the Freedom Arms 83. He was driving 260's at 2000fps. The .454 was brought about so that his loads would not find their way into Colt SAA's and New Services, which would've brought about catastrophic results.
Bill_Rights said:
The .454 Casull uses a small magnum rifle primer whereas the .45 Colt uses a large pistol primer. Primer energy aside, the smaller primer pocket on the .454 Casull reduces the chance of cratered and dropped primers with the higher pressures generated in the .454 Casull.
CraigC, from a purely "academic" point of view, what would the difference be between a Rossi re chambered from .45 Colt to .454 Casull and a Rossi chambered at the factory to .454 Casull?
CraigC
Sixgun Nut
We really don't know.
Yep. Folks run their custom five-shot Rugers at 50-55,000psi without issue.
Bill_Rights
Member
Detritus/CraigC,
I bet you're correct, about the longer .454 Casull OAL preventing catastrophe in .45 LC chambers, some of which chambers go back to the black powder days.
CraigC, Thanks for the tribute to Dick Casull!
Yeh, regarding
BUT, I am coming from my commercial point of view, which is that I cannot find any .454 Casull Rossi M92 rifles to buy. That's a pretty profound "difference"!
I bet you're correct, about the longer .454 Casull OAL preventing catastrophe in .45 LC chambers, some of which chambers go back to the black powder days.
CraigC, Thanks for the tribute to Dick Casull!
Yeh, regarding
the answer is, "we don't know", as CraigC said. I am hoping that the difference is "zero", technically. However, even if the metallurgy and steel thicknesses are the same between the Rossi .45 LC and the Rossi .454 Casull chamberings, it is possible that there is/was less quality control done for the .45 LC frame, in which case you'd have a safety issue up-chambering to .454 Casull.
BUT, I am coming from my commercial point of view, which is that I cannot find any .454 Casull Rossi M92 rifles to buy. That's a pretty profound "difference"!
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