500 S&W 700 grainer

[snuffy]

I GOT MINE!

This is a group buy from over on castboolits.com. It comes from Miha Prevec who lives and works in Slovenija. If you've never seen one of his molds, you're missing how nice they look. That's if you don't mind waiting for over a year, it started on 01-19-2010!

What a fine piece of work!

After boiling in soapy water, I preheated it on my hot plate. I decided to do one cavity with the plain pound HP, the other with the penta point. The PP didn't want to release the boolit. It flat out refused to let go. I had to melt it loose with the P. torch. Second try, same story. I removed the PP pin, coated the other pin with FA mold release. That solved the problem, but it wore off after about 10 boolits.

Here's a few pics;









Lubed with lar's red or carnuba red if you prefer, and gas checked w/Hornady gas checks. The solid is 680.7 lubed, 665.1 bare. The penta point is 625.8 lubed, 609.1 bare. The normal HP is 616.0 lubed, 598.2 bare.

The alloy is 75% lino--25% pure lead, so it's pretty darned hard. It certainly don't need to be that hard, but it's what was in the lee 20 pound bottom pour pot. After inspecting the bullets, I will ladle pour them in the future. I will also use a much softer alloy, probably range lead w/tin added.

The loaded shells all are with WW-296 @ 24.5 grains,(thanks southpaw for the load reference).

Boolits dropped @ .5045, but sized nicely down to .501 in my Lyman 450.

[reloader28]

WOW what a pig of a boolit! I thought my FN Lee mold was a big.

I printed off the specs on this boolit last fall and was telling my brother he should by it for his 500, but he didnt go for it. Folks,this boolit is longer than a 44mag case by about an 1/8".

[DiscoRacing]

Ya thinkin bout sellin me some a them beauties Snuffy???

[snuffy]

Yup, 1.355 in length! Damn near 2 ounces if cast from pure lead, two ounces is 875 grains.

There's really no reason for this other than the claim of having the biggest, baddest hand cannon WITH the biggest bullet you can find. It's hardly new in that there's been some 700 grain bullets available for some time by a guy up in Alaska. He even sells loaded ammo with those thumpers in them.

My daughters BF has the big Smith, he's one of those,"gotta have the biggest" types. I think after he shoots that thing with some of those thumpers, he'll change his tune!

[jmortimer]

Nothing better than big slow hard cast bullets and this is the top of the handgun food chain. A beautiful thing - bullet and mold. Can you say uber penetration?

[snuffy]

Ya thinkin bout sellin me some a them beauties Snuffy???

How many do ya want? I don't "sell" boolits, but I will send you enough to load some for whatever the flat rate box ships for. I ya want to reimburse me for the lead, that's your call.

Let me get the demands of that huge mold down pat, I'll cast some of whatever point configuration you want of softer lead. I have some .22 rimfire spent bullets mined from an indoor range where only target .22 were fired. It's soft enough to expand well with those cavernous HP's. There will be no concern about leading, if you could get them to 1300 fps, you'd be stretching it. With the carnuba red, and the gas check, you'd not have to be worried about leading.

Oh yeah, that mold weighs a lot. Hmm I wonder what the kitchen scale has to say---------. 2-¾ pounds! My wrist got pretty tired after making about 50 boolits last night. I'm hardly a wimp, I worked for many years as an assembler of heavy duty axles. Although I retired last friday, 3-4-11, I haven't had time to get soft ----YET!

[DiscoRacing]

Tkx Friend

Let me know when you got em perfected...

... I would just be doing it to help you out

...field testing so to speak

[snuffy]

DR, let me know which point configuration. you want. The lead is warming right now, I should have that mold figured out yet today.

Same goes for anyone else that might/does want some. Since I'm now retired, I have the time to do a lot of casting.

[GP100man]

Snuffy , the mold is beatiful just summtin bout brass !!!!

Those 700 grainers ought to knock a hole in anything that walks, talks or crawls !!!

I believe Miha`s molds have more oglive than the 1s Red River Rick casts ,his look like a cyl almost , but still devastating ,even to look at !!!

Believe me I understand bout the tired hands & wrists I`ve spent 27yrs or so working on vehicles & mine are bout shot !

What kind of lube are ya using on the mold ??I see white dust of sorts on the sprueplate bolt & the pins look dry ????

I like the idea of swappin the pins to get HP or solids !!! I bought a mold off ICH the NOE 360-180 & it`s a very versatile mold , it has 1 cavity GC & 1 PB

Sometimes I argue with myself what to cast solids or HPs , but as long as I cast , as long as I cast , as long as I cast !!!

[DiscoRacing]

Would like bout 50 of each of the HPs Snuffy...

100 should fit in the small flat rate box... I ship 100 2 oz sinkers in them all the time.

[1chig]

makes my hands hurt just thinkin about shootin those bad boys!!!! Very nice snuffy

[snuffy]

This boolit was dubbed the "grand canyon" by it's creator over on castboolits.com. I guess the cavernous hollow point was the reason!? It does have a bit more ogive than the Ranger Rick's Tyrannosaurus Thumpers.

Anyway, I dumped the hard alloy, refilled with soft lead that was reclaimed from a "statue", or lead sculpture. A friend at the FORMER workplace,(ha ha does that ever feel good to say former), had the sculpture sitting around his dad's shop for years. He thought it was babbit. I bought all the lead from him for $.50/pound. It has some tin in it, I added some lead free solder which is 95 tin-5% antimony. Weight of those round HP bullets went up from 605 to 624 by changing to softer lead. These should expand even at only 1200 because of the huge HP.

GP, good catch on the lack of lube on the mold. It worked fine without anything on it for lube. I did use some bullplate lube on it for the second try today. Didn't seem to make any difference. That white thing on the sprue plate pivot screw is the wave/pressure washer for the SP. Looks to be stainless steel.

Disco, I cast up 50 of the round HP today, I'll try to get some of the penta points made tomorrow. If I can solve the problem with the boolits hanging onto the HP pin. I think it's the milling marks on the sides of the pin, I'll try to polish them a bit, see if that helps.

I went to ladle casting for the last run. That made a big difference in fill-out and sharp driving bands. 4 ounces of tin didn't hurt either!

[darkgael]

Yes.... Those bullets remind me of Rick Gibson's (that fellow in Alaska) 700 grain "Tyrannosaur Thumpers".....with a charge of Li'l gun, 1200 fps from a revolver.

[IllinoisCoyoteHunter]

Snuffy...those are some purty boolits!!!

Ya gonna try polishing those pins so they release the boolits better???

Can't wait to see the expansion tests you are gonna run on those thumpers.

[snuffy]

My future son-in-law just brought the big smith by to see if my bullets will clear the cylinder. Yup, with room to spare. They look so darn long, and since I only saw the revolver once over a year ago, I wasn't sure.

What a hog leg! Massive is an understatement.









That's the 8-3/8 BBL. 4-¾ pounds empty.

SIL was out shooting some 700 grain bullets that he got from somewhere. A variety pack that had 5 bullet weights in it. He said the 700's were a piece of cake. I have no idea what powder charge they are loaded with, he was able to one-hand the big 500.

As for what I'm going to shoot at with it, just paper for now. I may try to catch an expanded HP just to see what they would expand to. It's heavy enough AND the built in muzzle brake helps out a lot.

Ya gonna try polishing those pins so they release the boolits better???

Yeah, I did! The penta point is the only one that was hanging up. A few swipes with a fine diamond hone cleaned the machine marks off it, then some FA mold release completed the job.

[snuffy]

Well it took 2 months, but we finally took the 500 for a test run. It ain't all that bad!? As far as recoil goes. We fired some test loads using lil gun and the 2 HP configurations, and the solid. 26.0-26.5 and 27.0 in all three meant we would have to fire 45 rounds to complete the test. We got "tired" only fired half. SIL had brought some HSM loads along, 350 HP. They were like shooting medium 44 mag loads.

I found out that the top load of lil gun,(27.0),in the solid @ 695 grains will have to be pulled apart. The 26.5 had really flat primers, pressure was max right there. I may even drop them back to 26.0

Accuracy was excellent. Offhand standing @ 25 yards, we were keeping them in a 4" group. Group was a bit high, about 4" from where he had it set for the lighter bullets. We then backed up to 50 yds, tried some more of the solids. They were even higher. Shot right over the target until we started to aim at the bottom edge.

One concern from some has been "will those huge chunk O lead stabilize"? YES! Even from 50 yds, the boolits were hitting point first, cutting nice clean holes.

No chrono data, it was misting and not real warm. I'll drag it out the next time I take it shooting. We tried to dig one of the penta points out of the dirt, 6" in, still no boolit. It's gonna take a lot of earth to stop one.

[DiscoRacing]

You just shot them now???!!!>>. I shot some a mine two days after I got em from ya...

... was surprised to find that the recoil was much less than I had initially thought it would be.

[snuffy]

You just shot them now???!!!>>. I shot some a mine two days after I got em from ya...

... was surprised to find that the recoil was much less than I had initially thought it would be.

Yeah, well, it's been a long hard winter! Range road is still closed, so we traveled 35 miles one way to another range. Not to whine or anything, but I just finished 38 radiation treatments for prostate cancer. It takes a couple months to feel like doing anything.

It felt good to get outside and get some trigger time.

Nice to hear yours worked well. I too was surprised at the recoil of the big Smith. I had heard such horror stories about how wicked it is. Still not something I'd want to shoot with 50 full loads in one day .

[38superhero]

OH my...

[darkgael]

I too was surprised at the recoil of the big Smith. I had heard such horror stories about how wicked it is. Still not something I'd want to shoot with 50 full loads in one day .

Very interesting. I don't have a .500 revolver. I shoot the big slugs from a T/C Encore with a 15" barrel. Recoil is thoroughly unpleasant from shot one onward. Normally, heavy recoil does not bother me but that bullet out of that gun is no fun at all.
Pete

[DiscoRacing]

Still not something I'd want to shoot with 50 full loads in one day .

For Sure..

..Five shots is plenty for me...

...If I dont hit it by then...will have to use smaller backup weapon of some sort...20mm,,, L A W,,something along that line.

[TXGunNut]

Wow! Beautiful moulds, beautiful bullets. Suspect T-Rex population is in grave danger as soon as the season opens. Gotta ask; if you stand @ the edge of that cavity and yell do you hear an echo?
Congrats on your retirement Snuffy. Hope you get healthy & start enjoying it more soon!

[bluetopper]

Here's a link to some 500 S&W 700 grainers and the best selection of 500 S&W Magnum bullets I've found on the net.

www.mattsbullets.com

[snuffy]

Here's a link to some 500 S&W 700 grainers and the best selection of 500 S&W Magnum bullets I've found on the net.

www.mattsbullets.com

Matts bullets bought out all of ranger Ricks molds since he quit selling his "T" rex bullets. Dunno if the quality is as good as Ricks.

Wow! Beautiful moulds, beautiful bullets. Suspect T-Rex population is in grave danger as soon as the season opens. Gotta ask; if you stand @ the edge of that cavity and yell do you hear an echo?
Congrats on your retirement Snuffy. Hope you get healthy & start enjoying it more soon!

Dunno if there's an echo, but the big smith sure hollers when it spits those enormous HP's out the front.

Yup fellin a little bit better each day. Plantin a garden even spent some time at the range last week. Gotta go try some new boolits tomorrow, IF the monsoons are over for a couple o' days.

Look for a new thread on another Miha cramer type mold, 4 cav .452 HP.

[darkgael]

he quit selling his "T" rex bullets

Wow. I didn't know that. When did Rick stop?

Pete