Can You Load "African" Rounds Light?

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HoosierQ

HoosierQ

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Just got the American Rifleman. Great articles about an African safari and African safari guns.

So let's say you were luck enough to own a double rifle (or a magazine rifle) in something like .450-400 or .416 Rigby. They'd be great rifles for Alaska of course. It would seem like a .416 or .450-400 double would be a great Brown bear rifle if you were comfortable with 2 shots...2 very quick shots.

So if you had such a thing, could you down-load some cartridges and make lighter game loads? I know people down-load 45-70 for cowboy shooting. Would you be able to do that on these African calibers? If you had such a gun you'd be handloading anyway so why not craft up a variety of loads for the 48 states? Or Alaska even?
 
You can with the smokeless rounds.
The problem with large bore double rifles is they are regulated to shoot both barrels to a specific convergence point with a specific loading.

Vary the loading to any great degree and you will not be able to hit anything with the gun with any sort of acceptable accuracy.
 
I know you will, but just remember to recheck you zero after making your new reloads. Since most are for short work, I don't think you "will not be able to hit anything" like the other poster stated. There might be a change in point of impact, but any responsible shooter would correct for that before going to the field.
 
For a clip feed rifle you can do it very easy. Hornaday makes a good 350gr bullet for a 458 that makes a good deer or elk rifle. Never haveing hunted moose I would have to say it would most likely work for them also. Works very well on black bears also.
 
Thanks Onmillo...I am coming to understand that issue better and better.

In this case, it would be down-loading for close shots. Another poster talked of down-loaded .458s. I mean, could you imagine, having something like a .416 double, down-loaded properly to be reasonable for deer and having those two quick, reliable shots from a tree stand? I always wanted a double barrel slug gun but didn't know of any...pumps being so numerous and affordable.

I just can't help but admire the double rifle, even if somebody made on in 30-30 or .45-70 or .303 or whatever.
 
Another poster talked of down-loaded .458s.
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I get the odd feeling I am being watched. :D From the research that I have done, there is no reason that you wouldn't be able to download a big bore to a acceptable recoil and energy level. I have since dropped the idea of using a .458WM/Lott for deer (only due to weight as it would be similar to a .45-70 but would clock in at about 12lbs!), but I will still get one and have hopes to take it up north to hunt some of the big bears in the near future.

Wanted to add...just make sure and use case filler if you are going to download a cartridge to the extent I had planned...otherwise you get a LOT of bang for your buck if you catch my drift. ;).
I just can't help but admire the double rifle, even if somebody made on in 30-30 or .45-70 or .303 or whatever.
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You are not alone...but with my budget admiring one is all I can afford to do. Have trouble making your mind up on a repeater or a double? Check out this rifle...http://www.jagdwaffe.com/ That's right a repeating double rifle! Just slightly above my budget for a new rifle. ;)
 
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Now, excuse me, while I go and win some bar bets.
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Good luck...just using my imagination for a price guide, but it looks as if you will need it (to afford such a rifle). :D
 
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Well Kernel, you got that right about me for sure. Mother's maiden name is Boden. Taking all of my ancestors into account, I like to say I am 1/3 German, 1/3 Celtic (Irish), and 1/3 Scandinavian. I am a Hoosier after all.

We bought our farm from a man who had been a professional hunter in Africa after the war. His name was Louis Wright. He'd been a pilot in WWII. He bought a farm here in Indiana after he came back from hunting and lived a rather reclusive life in the country in Hamilton county, IN.

He died in about 1965 or 66. When I first saw the house, it was covered in vines and filled...and I mean to say filled...with trophies of every imaginable African and American game. There was a Rhino, there were lions, there was a Cape Buffalo, there were leopards, there were tusks stacked up like umbrellas in one corner of the living room, a moose, I was flabberghasted. Then we left the living room....

In the "parlor" there were guns, double rifles, bolt actions, shotguns...and more trophies...smaller game animals. I'll bet there were 30 guns all there for us to just see hanging on the wall! Since I was 8...no touching.

The next time I saw the place the only thing left was a single live 9mm round in a drawer that was so old it was black...perfectly shiny...but black...german military I believe...mom still has it. Heaven only knows what happened to all of those beautiful guns. The man had relatives so...

At any rate, my father knew of the double rifle from Hemingway and whatnot. Then to see them racked up like that...well he spent the rest of his life admiring them from afar. He didn't hunt at all and certainly never went to Africa but if he ever said anything about a rifle, it was a double. I was infected by him and this latest issue of American Rifleman is going to be a keeper for sure.
 
Go to www.NitroExpress.com and read up on the boards there.
You will have to register to even see the reloading and gunsmithing forums, but there is probably some discussion of loading down the express rifles. I recall having read that the bigger the gun, the easier it is to get a different load regulated. How about a nice 12 bore?

Or just shoot the big loads. A full power .470 can't kill a deer deader than dead and you will not likely fire enough shots at it for the recoil to hurt... much.

There are alternatives. Baikal makes a rough but functional double rifle in .30-06 and .45-70. Importation by EAA and Remington and I don't know who else has been sporadic, but you could probably find one. There are all manner of light to medium caliber game rifles from English and more often, Continental makers. The Siace Alaska is a very handsome rifle available in 7x65R, 9.3x74R, .30-06, .444 Marlin, and .45-70. "Only $6350 new." I saw a very nice little Merkel .30-06 at the SHOT Show, about ten grand.

If you shop hard but patient, you can come up with some interesting old guns.

A friend here has a Webley .450 Black Powder Express from the late 1880s and another guy has a Cogswell & Harrison .500 BPE. Big impressive guns with bearable recoil, on the hunting rifle scale of things.

I was once tempted by a Manton double .32-40. There were three of them advertised in Gun List within a few months of each other. One was maybe a turnover but there had to be at least two guns of the same specifications because they were separately advertised in the same issue. I could not figure out what I would do with it and passed it by.

If a double barrelled rifled slug shotgun would be close enough, there is one being made:
http://connecticutshotgun.com/rblpro.html
20 gauge fully rifled for sabot slugs, "only" $3995.
 
This may seem like an odd question, but is anyone aware of any falling block doubles? It would seemingly be a superior design, and I never really cared for the feel of a break action. :)
 
Look around for a smaller caliber

I once had a Westley Richards Double Rifle in 303 British. Intended to use it for deer. It would have been perfect out of a stand.
I have seen other double rifles that were chambered for 7x57, 30/40 Krag. and various other chamberings.
The 30/40 Krag was at the Denver Bass Pro Shop this spring.
 
Here ya' go...and it's on sale to boot (super long link):
http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/t.../search-box.jsp.form23&_dyncharset=ISO-8859-1

If the mod's ditch that link, go to Cabelas.com; search with Pedersoli as the keyword; and checkout what comes up. At the end of the last page you should find a Kodiak Mark IV double rifle in .45-70 on sale for 2,999.88....marked down from 3,999.99. It's in their "bargain cave", so they probably want to move it.

I've heard that the Pedersoli muzzleloader Kodiak doubles are pretty good and that Perdsoli quality is generally above average. Don't know anything about this breechloader, though.
Bob
 
If you would think of a bolt gun, I once saw a custom made Winchester 60 in 375 H&H for like 700 bucks used in great shape. I also saw a bolt gun (cant remember the make) in one of the 40 calibers for a little more.
 
I have a Ruger Magnum in .416 Rigby. I can fire about 10 full power loads before getting punchy, so 90% of my loads consist of 350 grain cast bullets (RCBS mold #416-350-FN) at 1200-1500 FPS. Until a few years ago, Accurate Arms XMP 5744 powder was the go-to choice for this kind of thing, but IMR Trail Boss is now the best game in town. According to the manufacturer, it is safe with cast bullets in any rifle caliber, with a max load being enough powder to touch the base of the loaded bullet, and the minimum charge being 30% less than that. In the Rigby, this gives a max charge of 35 grains (1500 FPS) and a minimum of 25 grains (1200 FPS). I use the minimum load most of the time, which is still a killing load for most American big game, but doesn't recoil much in a ten pound rifle. Three hundred yard shots are, of course, not in the plan.

For my money, large bore rifles are more fun than a barrel of monkeys, when stoked with light loads and cast bullets. (The guns, not the monkeys.)

HTH!
 
i've shot a few big bore bolt rifles & a double rifle & i didn't find the recoil to harsh.
the bolt guns were in 375 H&H & 404 jeffery & the double was in 416 rigby. from a bench or stand full power loads may be a little hard on your shoulder but standing they aren't bad. these guns had british style stocks on them too & that makes a big difference in felt recoil. if you were hunting from a stand you might load them down but otherwise i wouldn't bother
 
Oh, and FWIW, I've just recently gotten "serious" about using that rifle as a "one gun battery". The problems with that are that A) you can have either a long range load that kicks like a mule (350 grain spitzers at 2700 FPS) or a low recoil load that is useless past 150 yards or so (cast bullets at +/-1500 FPS) and B) the rifle weighs a ton, and carrying it up and down the mountains all day is a gigantic PITA. And C), I guess, which is that everyone has a snide comment, or else wants to try it (sometimes both) and keeping enough ammo on hand for that sort of thing gets expensive.
 
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i've shot a few big bore bolt rifles & a double rifle & i didn't find the recoil to harsh.
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Hell, I've heard people say that about the four bore. Either lots of folks are tougher than me, or lots of folks like to pretend that they are!

FWIW, the .30-'06 180/2700 in an eight pound rifle generates 20 ft-lbs of recoil at 12 fps. The Rigby 400/2400 (standard load) in a ten pound rifle (standard weight) generates 60 ft-lbs of recoil at 19 fps. Three times the energy at almost twice the velocity...
 
I hadn't thought of it that way, but yeah, I guess so. It's apparently impossible to blow up a rifle with the stuff.
 
If you can't handle a big rifle, instead of loading it down, why not choose a smaller caliber rifle you can handle?

Lots of Cape Buffalo and Lions where you live?
 
Because we can't all be as manly as you, so we like to pretend.

Anything else you wanted to "contribute"? :neener:
 
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