Choosing 44 cal bullet weight and diameter.

[drband]

I don’t think you can reliably measure the throats with calipers. You need pin gauges.
Another thought is to drive bullets through each cylinder throat and measure them that way. That would be more accurate. Each throat may be slightly different.
I would bet the throats are .430+ but you won’t know unless measured accurately. You can safely shoot .430-.431 lead bullets in it regardless.

 

[Varminterror]

If your bullets are appropriately sized for your bore, but don't slip fit in your throats, I'd ream the throats, if it were my revolver.

 

[drband]

If you get the .430 bullets in and they will pass through the throats with a bit of resistance, that would be the way to go. I would do that before going to the trouble of reaming the throats.
And... you don’t really know if reaming is needed unless you slug the barrel and the throats to get really accurate measurements.

Don’t over complicate it for now. Just try the .430s and see how it works out. You may be good to go.

 

[RealGun]

Okay. SO...

The projectiles I have been using (.431 LSWC) do NOT pass through the cylinder. I could force one through using a cleaning rod, but in the others, the projectile stuck in the throat, and I had to drive it back into the cylinder to get it out. I measured the throats (front end of the cylinder) with a dial caliper; I got four chambers at 0.429" and two chambers at 0.430".

Now then, should I interpret that information?

I have that Oregon Trail bullet and resized them from .432 to .430. Contrary to the Lasercast guarantee, they leaded pretty badly when oversized and so hard.

 

[brewer12345]

I would try much softer bullets sized to .430. For your application, bhn of 12 would.do it. I just got a 200 grain 44 mold in the mail and I plan to cast with alloy around bhn 11 for a mild trail.boss load.

 

[Lafitte]

Slug the bore to determine what size bullet you need to use, .001 to .002 over bore diameter will usually work really well. THEN make certain that a bullet of that diameter will pass through the cylinder throats. If it won't pass through all of the throats they should be reamed to a size that will let them just pass through.

Lafitte

 

[Charlie98]

DB... all the info above is correct. There are a number of known issues with Ruger wheelguns... mismatched cylinder throats is one, barrel restriction from overtorquing the barrel are the two biggest. I am dealing with both of those with my Flattop right now. I've had a good number of Rugers over the years... including a beautiful .41 Bisley stainless that was on my Bucket List... and none of them shot worth a poo, and I've sold all of them. Now that I know about the Ruger issues, and how to fix them, I kick myself in the rump for giving up... but I just didn't know.

The issue with the mismatched cylinder throats is one cylinder chamber may swage (or size) down a bullet more than a different cylinder chamber, and give you inaccuracy issues. The other facet is, on undersized cylinder throats, is the bullets are getting swaged down too small for proper fit in the barrel.

The barrel bulge issue... even with a perfectly sized cylinder, once the bullet pass into the barrel they are being swaged down by the restriction in the barrel caused by the overtorque of the barrel (just in front of the barrel forcing cone.) I don't know if this is a common issue with the REDhawk, but it is with the BLACKhawk.

Easy way to find if you are dealing with a barrel restriction or bulge is... get a very tight fitting jag and patch combo and run it down the barrel, if it hits a notable restriction... you have a bulge or restriction. There are different methods of dealing with it, depending on how carried away you want to get.

And the other poster is correct... you need to measure your cylinder throats with a pin gauge. If you send your cylinder off to get it reamed, it helps to know what your barrel bore size is so they can properly ream the cylinder throats for the proper sized bullet. In my case, my .44 throws all bullets high and left... way high and way left. I sent my cylinder off and got it reamed, but didn't know my bore diameter... so we guessed. It did help... sort of. My bullets still go high and left, but they group better. My next task will be to lap the barrel bulge down and see if I can get the barrel to throw the bullets more to POA.

 

[D.B. Cooper]

Well. I'm fortunate that my problems aren't to that extent (I don't think.) Gun has been pretty accurate thus far. Other than operator error.

I will however, at some point, take it to a gunsmith and have the barrel slugged and the throats measured. If for no other reason than to have a point of reference.

 

[Walkalong]

Gun has been pretty accurate thus far. Other than operator error.

We all have that issue.

If you have some lead bullets that are a slip or even tight slip fit for the throats shooting them will tell the tale very quickly. You still need to match hardness to pressure/velocity.