[Intel6]

Thought this might be of some interest.

I have had a Ruger #1H that used to be chambered in .458 Win Mag. I had it re-chambered out to .460 Wby as a cheap way to get into shooting a big gun. While a Weatherby bolt gun in .460 is over $1,200, I bought this gun used and after a re-chamber job that cost less than $100 I am into a .460 for just over $400.


I have worked up some pretty stiff shooting loads for it with jacketed bullets. My “normal” shooting load is a Hornady 500 gr. RNSP with 120 grs. of Accurate 4350 pushing it out at just under 2,700 fps. I also load a Sierra 300 gr. JHP that was made for the 45-70 in front of 117 grs. of Accurate 2520 which sends it out right at 3,000 fps.


I had recently started getting into casting. And although I hadn’t really thought of making lead bullets for the .460 I did see that Lyman lists a reduced load for a 550 gr. Bullet in the .460. A friend mentioned having been given an Ideal .45 cal rifle mould and he doesn’t even have a gun that can use it. I looked up in my Lyman book to see what it was and found it to be an old 375 gr. RN GC design. I decided it might be fun to shoot some reduced lead loads in the .460 so I ordered a Lee 500 gr. Mould, gas checks and the proper sizing die. I also got my buddy to loan me his Ideal mould so I could try two different bullets.


Using straight wheel weights the Lee mould came out at 500 grs lubed and gas checked and the old Ideal mold produced a 397 gr. bullet after being sized and gas checked.


I first decided to use the bullet that was closest to the listing in the Lyman book so I only tried the Lee mould. . The starting load is 20 grs. of Unique and the ending load in 28 grs. of Unique. Working with a limited number of cases (they are almost $2 a piece) I just loaded up a few rounds starting with the 20 grs. and ending with the 28 gr. Load. Because I was dealing with the large case capacity and the charge of Unique no where near filled the big Weatherby case I chose to use a small square of Dacron stuffing to keep the charge against the flash hole.
I ran them across the chronograph and got:

Lee 500 gr. Bullet & Unique
20 grs. – 1157 fps
25 grs. – 1317 fps
26 grs. – 1337 fps
28 grs. – 1386 fps

I have since loaded up and fired some of the Ideal mould 397 gr bullets with the same 28 gr load of Unique. I was just shooting them at about 50 yds at a steel gong just to get the feel of them and make sure they were worth continuing with. They shot well also and I will continue with them.


Next step is to get out and put some on paper to see how they shoot. Below is a pic of both bullets loaded in cases along with loaded jacketed rounds (500 gr and 300 gr JHP) along with a .308 round for comparison.