Conical Bullet For Ruger Old Army Revolver.

[TALL]

A very wise choice,

[tacfoley]

No-one at my muzzle loading club who have tried conicals have had any success. The general view is that the twist rate suitable for a ball (typically 1 in 40") is just too low for a conical.

Yup. At ten - fifteen feet, shooting a hogs with a chamber crammed up and 300gr conical - fine....but anything further than that. Nope.

[simgre]

No-one at my muzzle loading club who have tried conicals have had any success. The general view is that the twist rate suitable for a ball (typically 1 in 40") is just too low for a conical.

The Ruger Old Army has a 1:16 twist rate. Uberti have also gone to this now. Pietta and older BP revolvers have a 1:30 rate.

[simgre]

The Lee conical does not work very well in the Old Army, but it can be acceptable. Issue in the U.K. is that most people will try to shoot it with 15-20 gns of a BP substitute, inert filler and a wodge of grease!
35gns of Real BP will make a heck of a difference.

RCBS make a .458 300gn flat point mold. Casting with pure lead will see it drop from the mold just under .457. It's a gas checked design, so the heel for the check helps getting it true in the chamber. If you want, resize them to .456, but as soft lead you might as well do this on the gun during loading, it does not excerpt undue pressure on the rammer. But too many actually struggle keeping the loading lever and rammer true themselves when operating it!

Again, don't do with, "I'm only punching paper so only need a gnats cock worth of powder" and a load of other cr@p sending up the bore. Use a proper load over 32gns of real BP.

Yes it's stout, yes it is a little more expensive, but yes it works.

[tacfoley]

The Lee conical does not work very well in the Old Army, but it can be acceptable. Issue in the U.K. is that most people will try to shoot it with 15-20 gns of a BP substitute, inert filler and a wodge of grease!
35gns of Real BP will make a heck of a difference.

RCBS make a .458 300gn flat point mold. Casting with pure lead will see it drop from the mold just under .457. It's a gas checked design, so the heel for the check helps getting it true in the chamber. If you want, resize them to .456, but as soft lead you might as well do this on the gun during loading, it does not excerpt undue pressure on the rammer. But too many actually struggle keeping the loading lever and rammer true themselves when operating it!

Again, don't do with, "I'm only punching paper so only need a gnats cock worth of powder" and a load of other cr@p sending up the bore. Use a proper load over 32gns of real BP.

Yes it's stout, yes it is a little more expensive, but yes it works.

Apart from the great craic of shooting a whomping bullet with much gusto, I've yet to see any evidence that you can be as accurate with a conical - that's probably why target shooters still use the average 25gr of 3Fg and a ball.

[simgre]

Not about being more accurate or even as accurate as a ball, they're not and I've never had a better combination that a pure lead ball and 34gns of Swiss. Nothing else, just that. The point is, Conicals will work in particular circumstances, but rarely in U.K. clubs are people interested what will work but what they are prepared to accept within their self imposed parameters.

Bloke at the club had a stunning 5.5" ROA. And next to my very well used 7.5" blued, it look jewel like. He spent money and had two extra cylinders as well! Could not get it to shoot to save his life! But then, he was loading it with exactly what I quoted above, 15gns of Pyrodex, 15gns spout of semolina and a huge dollop of some foul smelling "bore butter" of some description. No wonder the results on the target matched the mess that was being sent down the bore...

I got a cracking trade for it. I've had it ten years now and it's a nigh on par accurate as my pre ban revolvers.

[tacfoley]

Not about being more accurate or even as accurate as a ball, they're not and I've never had a better combination that a pure lead ball and 34gns of Swiss. Nothing else, just that. The point is, Conicals will work in particular circumstances, but rarely in U.K. clubs are people interested what will work but what they are prepared to accept within their self imposed parameters.

Bloke at the club had a stunning 5.5" ROA. And next to my very well used 7.5" blued, it look jewel like. He spent money and had two extra cylinders as well! Could not get it to shoot to save his life! But then, he was loading it with exactly what I quoted above, 15gns of Pyrodex, 15gns spout of semolina and a huge dollop of some foul smelling "bore butter" of some description. No wonder the results on the target matched the mess that was being sent down the bore...

I got a cracking trade for it. I've had it ten years now and it's a nigh on par accurate as my pre ban revolvers.

I bet the target looked as though it had been hit with a half-cooked pizza.

[loiner1965]

i use lead balls in my pietta 1858 but i might try conicals with different amounts of swiss 3fg charges to see if the group tightens up.
i do know of a member on here who did use conicals with triple 7 in his ruger and it was accurate, another club member who used to shoot revolvers to national standards before the pistol ban had a go with it too....he shot an even tighter group at 25 yds standing.
the revolver was accurate with ball as well

[tacfoley]

The answer is, of course, shoot whatever you like - it's YOUR gun.

[Turnup]

The Ruger Old Army has a 1:16 twist rate. Uberti have also gone to this now. Pietta and older BP revolvers have a 1:30 rate.

All ROAs have the same twist rate? Mine is approximately 1 in 38" as near as I can measure it.

[loiner1965]

All ROAs have the same twist rate? Mine is approximately 1 in 38" as near as I can measure it.

will check my 1992 pietta now

edit.....tricky to do on a revolver but mine looks like 1 in 32 twist which seems right

[simgre]

All ROAs have the same twist rate? Mine is approximately 1 in 38" as near as I can measure it.

Yes, I believe they all have 1:16”. This is due to when deigned, Bill Ruger wanted to use as much of the Blackhawk model for ease of parts inventory and chose to use .45 Colt barrels from the Blackhawk for the OA.

This is also why the ROA uses .457 ball over the standard .454. The groove diameter of the 45 colt barrel is .452 and its said that optimum ball to bore fit is two thou over groove diameter. So by the time the ball has passed through the forcing cone it needs to be .454. But, you also need to have shaved the circumference of the ball to seal the chamber. A .454 ball doesn’t allow both events.

[davederrick]

Ive shot round ball & conical in my NMA, group size is about the same. The only difference I could see was the conicals grouped high & right compared to the ball, otherwise nothing better about them.

[loiner1965]

Ive shot round ball & conical in my NMA, group size is about the same. The only difference I could see was the conicals grouped high & right compared to the ball, otherwise nothing better about them.

going to try all this out as soon as we get back to normality.....what load did you find most promising?

[davederrick]

going to try all this out as soon as we get back to normality.....what load did you find most promising?

TBH, I cant remember.