My New 50 Cal Wildcat

[SUTTERERMAN85]

I need a step by step thread with pics. That is so awesome.

[Blitzfike]

I'll do a workup tomorrow and try to post it. Its been lots of fun so far, just letting my imagination flow...

[SUTTERERMAN85]

Well I acquired a lathe, have the 50 thumper, and a ton of 45acp brass so I'm in.

[Blitzfike]

If I can get throught the ice here to get to the shop, I'll take some pictures and measurements of what I made up. 50 cal makes it easy, lots of off the shelf .50 reamers available, I machined the die body, drilled the through hole the diameter of the stem used to push the base forming portion of the die out the bottom, then drilled the die cavity slightly smaller than the desired dimension, and using a .500 reamer and some good cuting oil, I finished reaming the body. Then using some Diamond paste and a wooden dowel, I did the final polish to .5015. That portion took a while to get done, I work slow. The nose punch I made from some pretty hard stock, I cut the bullet nose forming portion by boring it while in the lathe. I started with a twist drill that I reprofiled and sharpened, then polished the nose cavity using scotch brite pad material again on the end of a dowel. After getting it to the dimension I wanted, I heated it to cherry red, to the non magnetic state, then quenched it in oil. I have a Blue Oven, and put it in the oven at 475 degrees for about three hours and then let it cool inside the oven. Once out, I polished the inner and outer surface using scotch brite pads and oil. So far, I haven't seen any cracking or distortion of the nose punch so maybe I got it right. Havng that lathe will really spoil you. I assume it will do threading. I've been using an old Craftsman 12 inch lathe that I bought new in the early '70s. That is the machine I used when gunsmithing years ago. The only issue with it is the small diameter thru hole in the headstock. For most barrel work, I had to do it between centers as I couldn't get the barrel through the headstock. I have two mills, one is an old horizontal mill, and the other is a Harbor Freight mill. It surprised me at what it is capable of, but you do have to work it over to keep tolerances where they need to be. Jim

[SUTTERERMAN85]

Thanks for the write up. Yes I bought a south bend model 9a and have successfully threaded and chambered a 338 edge. Only had the lathe a month and have learned a lot so far. Mine only has a 3/4" hole through the headstock as well. Have to chamber and thread on the steady rest. I am very interested in doing this. Thanks for sharing.
Nick

[Blitzfike]

Sent you a PM

[Blitzfike]

http://s482.photobucket.com/user/blitzfike/media/diewithpunch.jpg.html
Here is the die and punch for swaging the 50 cal bullets, works with lead or 45ACP as jackets

http://s482.photobucket.com/user/blitzfike/media/latherimcut.jpg.html
When using 45acp brass, trim the rim off and taper the head to make your HP nose

http://s482.photobucket.com/user/blitzfike/media/annealtored.jpg.html
Anneal the 45ACP brass after turning the rim off

http://s482.photobucket.com/user/blitzfike/media/readutoswage.jpg.html
Here is the jacket, core and gas check in the nose punch ready to swage

http://s482.photobucket.com/user/blitzfike/media/swagedto50.jpg.html
Here is the bullet after swaging to .5015

http://s482.photobucket.com/user/blitzfike/media/FMJtwoswc.jpg.html
These are the FMJHP, and two half jacket SWC from 45acp in the opposite direction.

[sixonetonoffun]

Any thoughts on 2400 for this? Guy I work with mentioned having some. I get a little skittish with the faster burning powder seems like it should work. I just have no idea where to start maybe 500 Magnum max load?

The more I look it doesn't seem to push the heavier bullets real well. Probably a non starter for me. So far I like the 400gr category best.

[SUTTERERMAN85]

I have used 2400 in my 50ae and 44 mag. I don't feel it performs as good as others. I prefer lil gun and h110 much more than 2400, but that's me. I talked to dean about using lil gun a good while back since I have a lot and was gonna start with 500 s&w max load and go from there. You should be able to run quite a bit more since you have probably 50% more case capacity or there about. Do share what you find out please.

Nick

[Blitzfike]

Be careful with reduced loads with WW-296 and its clones. Isn't H-110 the same powder? It gets squirley and flat out dangerous with loads reduced too much. A better choice to me would be IMR-4198 if you want a faster burning powder. I'm still using IMR-4895 for my experimentation, but plan on going to 4198 next. A quick and dirty way I use is to take the water grain capacity of the Thumper and the water grain capacity of another round like the 500SW and calculate the percentage that the 500 is of the thumper. Then take a published load for the 500 and massage the load by that percentage up, staying with the same bullet weight and then reduce by 10% and work up from there. So far, that has worked OK for me, but you're on your own if you follow in my footsteps. Definitely post your results for us. Jim

[scope eye]

If you want to fire reduced loads, H4895 can be reduced down to 60% from max, and there are Trail Boss loads on Hodgdon's site.

Dean

PS: don't forget to put a cotton ball Kleenex or something, to take up they empty void in the case.

[sixonetonoffun]

Makes sense. With the 5744 62gr was about as far as I was comfortable with and it got squirrels on me about 67gr +-. The 2400 I'd predict to come up with slightly less then the 5744. But I'm running short on rl7 so I'd like to give it a run. Maybe use up my 350xtp's.

[SUTTERERMAN85]

Blitzfike-
Yes w296 is the same as h110. And you are correct about using them downloaded. I like you idea comparing case capacity to load. Would be a very easy proportion to calculate.

What is everyone's favorite powder to use in this? I have only used 4895 and h335.

[sixonetonoffun]

So far RL7 has been very good for me.
5744 was good and would probably be excellent with 300gr or less. Nice sharp shotgun like recoil.

TAC did well and leads me to believe 4064 and RL15 can't be over looked. Though most of us horde this range of powders for 223/308 use.

Speeds of 2350 ish was my goal and so far RL7 has delivered but accuracy seems less consistent at higher fps. At least with the 350xtp's. My loading process may leave room for improvement here.

There doesn't seem to be many powders that flat out fail. Finding ones that efficiently deliver the 2500 fps with 400gr pills seems to be the challenge.

Can't wait to hear how you guys are doing with the brass swagged 440's.

[sixonetonoffun]

Here is a few results as I continue to work up to a full case of RL7. All using 350gr XTP's

RL7 78gr
Avg. 2227 es 69 sd 22

RL 79gr
Avg. 2281 es 69 sd 27

RL7 80gr
Avg. 2312 es 24 sd9

Looks like a node here? We'll see... still going up will see if I can hit a full case or not. Maybe the next time out?

[Blitzfike]

Another thought on crimping this beast. I had a variety of loads and crimps worked up, and on some, the brass was slightly longer and jacked pressures up when fired as the case mouth was extending beyond the chamber. Had a few that the crimp was so severe that the case wouldn't headspace correctly and wouldn't fire. There is a sweet spot where you have enough crimp for bullet retention and too much where the case enters the throat. I need to do a little more work on this before I'm ready to say I have a solution. Jim

[sixonetonoffun]

I have been trimming a little short. The crimp definetly caused the case to stretch. It will go right into the rifling. Seems to take care of the issue. Headspaced at 2.65 trim to 2.63-2.64

The idea of letting the brass grow til it stops just won't work when crimping.

Edit: this is no doubt why 50 B&M are built with controlled feed. Doesn't matter how short they are. They shoot short action cartridges in long actions to prove the concept.

[sixonetonoffun]

Here are some more 350gr XTP RL7 #'s
Note headspaced 2.65 trimmed 2.62-2.63
I wanted to keep myself in one piece!

RL7 81gr
Avg. 2259 es 82 sd35

RL7 82gr
Avg. 2351 es 52 sd?

RL7 83gr
Avg. 2367 es 19 sd 9

Accuracy High Node
RL 7 84 gr
Avg. 2379 es 10 sd 4

Do Not Go Any Higher Then 84gr !!!!

Here is first full case of RL7 results!
RL7 85gr
2209
2922
2442
See a pattern? Me either absolutely squirrels here! The first shot was the tip off no way should that number exist with this charge. The 2922 is real there was no chrono error! It literally lifted my heavily weighted lead sled and me 3"s off the table!

RL7 86gr this is a compressed but not crunched load and I only lit one off for the record. It yielded 2481fps and as I said before 84gr was my high max safe load.

All cases extracted and ejected smoothly.

Temp was high 60's to low 70's.

Elevation just below 1000'

Like Dean says thanks for playing!

[scope eye]

You done good Grasshopper,LOL how is the fireball with 80gr plus you must be able to see it from space.

Dean

PS: I see you like quoting me, :wacko:

[sixonetonoffun]

Honestly can't comment on the fireball I was generally kicked to a 30° angle thus my view was blue sky and the occasional random stars.

I can't wait to shoot again. Going to work up the 500 xtp's next. Hope to put aside a few bucks for some higher bc projectiles. The Cutting Edge ones might be just the ticket to get out to 300 yards. These 350gr xtp's .145 bc is pretty pathetic after 150.