longshot for 45 colt?

[appalachainamerican]

was recently given a few pounds of longshot powder, have never used it. but i do have a pile of 45 brass and some 255 rnfp cast bullets laying around. hogdens doesnt list a load using this powder for the 45 colt. but they do for the acp. any thoughts on using it for 45 colt or not? if so how much? i normally use hs6 for this but presently am out, and local shop is also.

 

[campbell]

Shooting these in a Ruger or something with similar tolerance for pressure? That'll give a decent margin for error.

Any load in that large .45 Colt case is going to run at substantially lower pressures that the data for both .44 mag and .45 ACP. Since there's loads for ACP with Longshot only running at 12K CUP, low pressure shouldn't be an issue. If it was me, and keep in mind this is from the perspective of someone who only shoots .45 Colt in large frame Rugers, I'd use the following .45 ACP and .44 mag data to give myself a rough outline.


.45 ACP 230 GR. LRN 6.8 grains 16,800 CUP

.44 mag 240 GR. NOS JHP 11.0 grains 29,400 PSI
.44 mag 270 GR. SPR GDSP 9.8 grains 27,900 PSI

If it were me I'd probably try loads in the 8-10 grain range. Again, this is with the caveat that I'm shooting guns that won't be fazed if a 10 grain load turns out to be 20,000 PSI.

 

[appalachainamerican]

thanks for the reply cambell, just wanted some other input. had decided to try 9 grains, may go a little lower, since i have a colt. once again, thanks

 

[pinkymingeo]

Different guys have different experiences. I like Longshot for 10mm, and use it for medium 44mag loads under jacketed bullets. Every time I've used it with cast bullets, my book notes "leading" and "bad leading". It's on my "jacketed only" list. AA5 is hard to beat with cast 45lc loads, and Unique does well, too.

 

[Clark]

Way back in 2002, Hodgdon published LONGSHOT and HS-6 loads side by side for 38 special +P and 454 Casull, and others.

The ratio of Longshot to HS-6 in these cartridges seems to run about 83% ~89%.

I am guessing that you used to use 10.7 gr HS-6, 255 gr cast, ~14,000 psi.
If so, I would cut that down to 8.9 gr LONGSHOT, 255 gr cast, which would also be ~14,000 psi.

What you do is up to you and your risk, but if I were in your shoes, I would use 8.9 gr LONGSHOT.

I should warn you that I once blew a 32 S&W long revolver into little pieces by accidentally substituting LONGSHOT for LIL'GUN, so you may want someone else to be your example. The containers came into the room together and looked allot alike

 

[appalachainamerican]

well, didnt try the cast bullets with the longshot, found three 200 gr. hornandy hp xtp laying around, loaded them with 9.5 grains of the longshot. terrible results, had to use a brass rod and hammer to remove the bullets from my barrel. cases were blackened, even the one that made it out of barrel. was a small amount of unburned powder. seems to me that it was probably too light a load. but the sound level of explosions was not much different than the factory loads i shoot, but there was no recoil, with the ones that failed to exit barrel, the one that did shoot had a light recoil, not much different than factory. I think i'll just scrap the longshot until i get out my shotshell's, and try it for twelve guage loads. thanks to everyone for your time and advice.