Fire Forming 44-40 brass

[rusty gunns]

I own an Uberti 1866 in 44-40. I shoot it with a 205 gr .428 Black Dawge SPG bullet (from http://www.powderinc.com) over 25 grains of 2f , with a lil corn meal to make it nice n tight. All tucked into Starline brass and a Winchester primer.

Love the cartridge. Shoots straight as an arrow out to 50 yards. But as anyone who reloads 44-40 knows, the brass is sometimes gobbled up by the press.

Right now, I resize them every time I reload them. But I was thinking... if I replace the sizing die with my universal deprimer, I wouldn't have to lube the brass and I wouldn't loose any to the press (now I know why its called "The Crusher").

Anyone have any experience/comments using fire formed 44-40 brass in these great guns?

[Ben_Rumson]

It might work with BP..I tried your idea with smokeless loads but the necks didn't sufficiently hold the bullet despite being tight enough that I could not thumb seat a bullet. I made sure they were well crimped too. SDs, High & Low AVGs were all over the place. Grouping was lousy too.

[jnyork]

I shoot a 44-40 and have lost a few cases. Only cure for it I have found is to slow down and be more careful when resizing.

[Marc]

I do not size cases for my original 73 44WCF. I use Starline brass. I flare the case mouths and start the bullets by hand. I then finish seating and crimp with the seating die. The bullets are cast from a Saeco 446 mold and sized in a .431" die. They are snug in the cases. The rifle shoots very well with this method.

[Borregos]

jnyork +1