This blog focuses on an evaluation of the Missouri Bullets 180-grain cast lead bullet with IMR 4227 powder in the three .357 Magnum revolvers shown above: A 6-inch Colt Python, a 6 1/2-inch Ruger Blackhawk, and the 7 1/2-inch Ruger Bisley. All three revolvers have graced these pages previously (I will provide a link to the earlier blogs below); today’s story specifically assesses the Missouri cast bullet and IMR 4227 performance.
Missouri Bullet Company’s 180-grain truncated roundnose (TRN) bullet. Notice that many of the bullet bases have cast lead overflow (not a situation conducive to great accuracy).
The Missouri bullet is heavier than most .357 bullets, which I like. I generally prefer heavy-for-caliber bullets. The jury was out on these, though. I was not too pleased with an earlier batch due to casting imperfections on the bullet base. Missouri gave me a credit for that box and I ordered another thousand. These were better, but still not what I expected (the bullets still had some base smears and runs, as can be seen in the above photograph).
My reloaded .357 Magnum ammo. 14.0 grains of IMR 4227 comes right to the base of the RCBS 180-grain cast bullet.
The Missouri bullets made for a nice-looking load. I loaded the ammo used for this test on my Lee Classic Four Turret press, which is my go-to reloading setup for just about any handgun cartridge. I can’t say enough good things about the Lee gear. It’s been great.
An 8-lb bottle of IMR 4227 powder. I’m just about out of this very good propellant. I hesitate to think what a replacement bottle will cost (it’s probably close to $500). It works real well with cast bullets in reduced rifle loads, too.
As mentioned above, all loads used IMR 4227 powder. I loaded in increments of 13.5 grains, 14.0 grains, and 15. o grains. The 15.0 grains is above what most reloading references list as a max load. I found a reference to that load on the Missouri Bullets website so I thought I would try it. It is a very hot load. I would not advise using it and I’m not including data for it here.
I used brass as identified in the table below, and CCI 550 small pistol magnum primers. All cartridges were loaded to an overall length of 1.585 inches and firmly crimped with Lee’s crimping die. My Garmin chronograph recorded all velocities.
How did I do? The chart below summarizes what I found.
Tough to read, I know. Click on it and a larger version will pop up.The 6 1/2-inch Blackhawk target. The top two were shot with 13.5 grains of IMR 4227; the bottom two with 14.0 grains of IMR 4227. All shots were at 50 feet with a two-hand, rested hold. I know it looks like there are only four bullet holes in the lower right target; one bullet went through the same hole as another (it happens sometimes).The 7 1/2 inch Bisley target. Same thing here; 13.5 grains of IMR 4227 on top and 14.0 grains on bottom.The Python target. After noticing the 13.5-grain load shot way to the left, I noticed the rear sight problem. After moving the blade to the right, it wouldn’t stay in position, and the horizontal spread increased as the windage blade moved around.
With respect to accuracy, the above loads were mediocre. Both Rugers did better with the 14.0-grain IMR 4227 load; the Python did better with the 13.5 grain IMR 4227 load (but I wouldn’t take that to the bank, as will be explained in the next paragraph). None of the loads are what I would call target grade accuracy. That may have been due to me (I’m not a world class target shooter), or it may have been due to the bullet base imperfections mentioned above. Note that one particular combination (the 6 1/2-inch Blackhawk with a 14.0-grain load) shot a 0.721-inch group. Maybe I just got lucky on that one, or maybe those particular cartridges had bullet bases with no casting imperfections.
Colt Python rear sight. The blade that adjusts for windage is on a non-detented adjustment screw. When the sight is in the desired position, the tiny Allen head set screw denoted by the arrow is tightened to secure it. The Python’s rear sight was obviously designed by a guy who doesn’t shoot .357 Magnum ammo very much.
Regarding the Python, I noticed that my shots for the first two groups were way to the left. That’s because the rear sight blade had drifted to the left. I unscrewed the tiny set screw that is intended to secure the blade in place, adjusted the windage, but the sight blade moved again when I fired the next two groups. When I tried to tighten the set screw further, its Allen head socket stripped. The Python’s rear sight is the gun’s weak point. I’m replacing it with a Wilson combat sight. The Wilson rear sight replacement will be the topic of a future blog.
With respect to velocity, the differences in barrel length between the 6 1/-inch and 7 1/2-inch Rugers can be seen (the 7 1/2-inch Ruger was faster). The shorter 6-inch Python did well, most likely because it’s very tight barrel-to-cylinder gap, a slightly tighter bore (I’ve read that Pythons have a marginally smaller bore diameter than most other .357 Magnums), and a more polished bore overcame the longer-barreled Rugers’ length advantage.
I think IMR 4227 is a good powder in the .357 Magnum. It gives velocities comparable to Winchester 296, another great choice for this cartridge. The Missouri bullets do not provide, in my opinion, target grade accuracy. I may load some of these with the 14.0 grain load using bullets that I screen for good bases (i.e., no casting defects) to see how they do. I think these bullets are good enough for hunting, though, and I plan to use the 14.0-grain load in my 6 1/2-inch Blackhawk on my next pig hunt. Stay tuned.
Our earlier blogs on the Python, the Blackhawk, the Bisley, and a whole bunch of other cool stuff are here.
Subscribe to ExNotes for free!
We need your support! Do what you can to help ExNotes stay in the black!
This blog addresses the Ruger Blackhawk base pin slippage issue. The base pin is the axle on which the revolver’s cylinder rotates. It is held in place by the base pin latch, which consists of a screw, a spring, and a nut with an interrupted slot. Here’s what the revolver looks like with the base pin in place:
The left arrow points to the base pin; the right arrow points to the base pin latch.A shot from the other side. In this photo, the left arrow points to the base pin latch; the right arrow points to the base pin.
What happens is that with heavy loads the base pin latch displaces laterally, and the base pin latch moves forward under recoil. This is what it looks like when that occurs:
The base pin latch displaced by recoil. The base pin latch failed to retain it. The arrow in the above photo points to the base pin annular groove that interfaces with the base pin latch.
I previously tried a new Power Custom base pin on my .45 Colt Ruger Blackhawk (I blogged about that earlier). It didn’t work as a fix for preventing base pin movement under recoil. After an online search, I found that Wolff Springs stronger base pin latch springs are available to address the base pin recoil-induced movement issue. I ordered a set from Midway USA (Midway provides three of the Wolff springs in a set for $5.99). Nobody else (including Wolff) had the springs in stock. I was shocked to learn that Midway wanted $22 for shipping these parts, as they would easily fit in an envelope. I also had to confirm (by checking a pop-up approval form) that I was 21 (I suspect this was a bit of California legislation-induced silliness), and I had to sign for the parts when they arrived. All that’s the bad news; the good news is that Midway ships for free when an order exceeds $100, so I did what the Midway marketing gurus wanted and ordered $100 of Hornady .357 bullets to get the free shipping (for what started out as a $5.99 order).
The Ruger base pin latch spring on top, and the Wolff spring is on the bottom. The Wolff spring has fewer coils and the spring wire is thicker, both of which make the Wolff spring stronger.
The new base pin latch screws were perceptibly stronger (squeezing them by hand) than the stock base pin latch screw.
I also had to order a pin spanner screwdriver bit to work with the nut opposite the base pin latch screw. I ordered a set of pin spanners from Amazon not knowing the base pin latch nut size. They were inexpensive ($5.99). I could have filed a slot in an existing screwdriver blade, but I thought it would be a good idea to have a set of pin spanners in the tool chest. Gresh is having an influence on me.
The photo below shows the base pin latch with the nut removed. Ruger had applied a tiny amount of red Loctite (visible in the photo below) to prevent it from unscrewing. I’ll apply blue Loctite later after degreasing the parts.
Note the specs of red Loctite on the base pin latch screw.This is the pin spanner with the base pin latch nut after I unscrewed it.
When I reassembled everything, I made a quick trip to the indoor pistol range with some very heavy .357 Magnum loads to see if the stronger Wolff spring fixed the base pin retention issue. I’m happy to report that it did, even with my 180-grain retina-detaching, ballbuster loads. I’m going to blog about the velocities and accuracy of loads with the Missouri cast .357 180-grain bullets in the near future, and I’ll share what worked well in the Blackhawk, the Bisley, and the Colt Python.
When I got home, however, I sort of found out that the joke was on me. When I attempted to remove the cylinder, I found that I could not. The thicker coils of the Wolff spring prevent compressing it enough to allow adequate base pin latch movement. I’ll have to unscrew its two halves to remove the cylinder. Win some, lose some, I guess. I’m keeping the Wolff spring in place, though. Having to unscrew the base pin latch to remove the cylinder is an annoyance, but one I’ll live with to prevent the base pin from backing out under recoil.
In the past, this issue of Ruger Blackhawk base pin slippage has been hit or miss (pardon the shooting pun). I’ve never experienced it with the much-heavier-recoiling .44 Magnum Super Blackhawks, but I have experienced it with my blue steel .357 Mag and .45 Colt Blackhawks. The base pins haven’t moved (at least in my hands) with stainless steel .357 Mag and .45 Colt Blackhawks, perhaps because stainless steel grips the base pin latch better, or perhaps because those revolvers had slightly stronger base pin latch springs.
Subscribe to ExNotes for free!
We need your support! Do what you can to help ExNotes stay in the black!
One of the very few areas in which the Ruger Blackhawk design can be improved is cylinder shaft retention. I experienced this problem many decades ago on a Ruger .357 Blackhawk, and back in those days, the easiest thing to do with a problematic firearm was to sell it (that’s not so easy these days). I don’t want to sell any of my guns, especially my 200th Year Ruger .45 Colt Blackhawk. It’s the one you see in the photos above and below.
Before I go too much further, let’s address terminology. The Blackhawk cylinder rotates around a shaft that Ruger identifies as a base pin assembly. That’s okay, I guess; Ruger makes a lot of guns and they can call their parts whatever they want. I tend to use more precise and descriptive terminology. I call the part the cylinder rotates around the cylinder shaft, and that’s what I’ll refer to it as in this blog.
To get the point of this blog, I had a problem the last time I had the Blackhawk on the range (which was only the second I had fired the gun). I shot my 850 fps, 5.9 grains of Red Dot, and 200-grain cast bullet loads (which is a mild load), and suddenly, the gun would not cock. On closer examination, I found that the cylinder shaft had jumped forward. It was the return of a condition I had experienced on another Ruger Blackhawk back in the 1970s and then had completely forgotten about.
The cylinder revolves around a shaft that is held in place by a spring-loaded, frame-mounted lock. Under heavy recoil, the cylinder shaft wants to stay where it is due to inertia as the gun recoils. The spring-loaded lock engages a notch in the cylinder shaft, and it’s supposed to prevent that from happening. Sometimes, though, the recoil is too much. The spring-loaded lock is cammed out of place by the cylinder shaft inertia, and the cylinder shaft slides forward in the frame.
The left arrow points to the cylinder shaft. The right arrow points to the spring-loaded cylinder shaft retention pin. To remove the cylinder, push the retention pin to the gun’s right, and the cylinder shaft can be pulled forward. This allows removal of the cylinder for cleaning.Under recoil, the cylinder shaft’s inertia can cause it to displace the cylinder shaft retention pin, and that allows the cylinder shaft to slide forward in the revolver frame (as you see here). When that occurs, the revolver hammer cannot be pulled all the way to the rear to cock the gun.
When the cylinder shaft slides forward in the frame, the spring-loaded pin at the other end of the cylinder shaft moves forward, too. It shifts to a position that interferes with upward motion of the revolver’s transfer bar when attempting to cock the gun. You can see the area of interference in the photo below.
When the cylinder shaft slides forward in the revolver frame, a spring-loaded pin on the end of the cylinder shaft moves with it. When that occurs, the cylinder shaft’s aft end pin no longer pushes on the transfer bar (indicated by the red arrow). The result is that the transfer bar is no longer held to the rear. When attempting to cock the gun, the transfer bar’s upward motion is blocked by the firing pin.
The transfer bar is designed to prevent the hammer from contacting the firing pin if the trigger is not pulled. This feature prevents an unintended discharge is the gun is dropped. The transfer bar is normally pushed to the rear by a spring-loaded pin in the back of the cylinder shaft, but when the cylinder shaft slides forward, that no longer occurs. The result is that the transfer bar (no long held to the rear) catches on the firing pin, and the gun will not cock.
The Fix: The Power Custom Base Pin
So what’s the fix to the cylinder shaft moving forward in the revolver when it recoils? That would be a product called the Power Custom replacement base pin (note that Power Custom uses Ruger’s terminology for the cylinder shaft). I bought one and this blog focuses on the good, the bad, and the ugly (and which, with a nod to Clint Eastwood, somehow seems fitting for a blog on a part that goes into a Western-styled six shooter).
The Power Custom replacement base pin (upper component) and the stock Ruger cylinder shaft. The little pin on the right end of each is what pushes the transfer bar to the rear, preventing interference with the firing pin when the revolver is cocked. Note the Power Custom’s larger grip on the left.
Installation
When I started to remove the Ruger’s cylinder shaft so I could install the Power Custom part, I discovered something I had forgotten. The ejector rod subassembly has to come off to allow cylinder shaft removal. Without doing so, the cylinder shaft cannot move far enough forward for removal.
A fully-extended cylinder shaft. The ejector rod and its housing had to be removed to remove the cylinder shaft.The screw that allows removing the ejector rod housing.
Removing the ejector rod subassembly was easy enough to do, and after doing so, I pulled the original Ruger cylinder shaft and replaced it with the Power Custom part.
The Good
The Power Custom replacement base pin (which replaces the original cylinder shaft) has a tighter fit in the revolver frame and the cylinder. The Power Custom part has a diameter of 0.2492 inches; the stock Ruger cylinder shaft has a diameter of 2.480 inches. I could feel the decreased cylinder wobble as soon as I installed the Power Custom part. Theoretically, this should translate into improved accuracy.
The Power Custom replacement has a different, larger-diameter, stepped grip. There’s more to grab onto when you want to slide the cylinder shaft forward to cylinder removal.
The Power Custom grip contains a set screw that can be tightened against the revolver barrel (which I did not use). The idea is the tighter fit and the set screw act to prevent the cylinder shaft from being inertially driven forward under recoil. Power Custom recommends using a drill bit through the set screw hole to spot face the barrel, which would give the set screw a better place to seat. I didn’t like that idea, and I didn’t tighten the set screw on my gun.
A set screw on the Power Custom base pin assembly. I opted not to use the set screw. Note the slot in the Power Custom part for the cylinder shaft release, and note that it is unmarred.
Finally, although the Power Custom base pin has a larger grip, the overall part is shorter in length than the stock Ruger part. This allows greater ejector rod travel, which is better for case ejection. Sometimes with the stock Ruger cylinder shaft, the cases aren’t fully ejected due to carbon fouling in the cylinder, and spent cases have to be pulled manually from the cylinder after they are partially ejected. This shorter overall length is a good idea, I think.
The Bad
I already mentioned the set screw business above, and Power Custom’s barrel spotfacing recommendation. I didn’t like the idea of having to use a set screw.
Power Custom provides a tiny Allen wrench for use in tightening the set screw. With the stock Ruger cylinder shaft, the cylinder shaft can be moved into the cylinder removal position with no tools, and should the need arise, the cylinder can be removed in the field. With the Power Custom part, an Allen wrench is needed. I don’t want to carry around a tiny Allen wrench. Is this a real concern? Maybe. In the last 50+ years, I have had to remove Blackhawk cylinders a time or two while wandering around in the boonies. To me, this is a disadvantage.
This brings us to the principal bad, and it’s my fault (for reasons I’ll explain momentarily): The Power Custom base pin did not reliably stay in place under recoil in my Blackhawk. Note my comment above: I did not tighten the set screw in the Power Custom base pin. If I had, it probably would have stayed put. And on the plus side, it doesn’t jump out of position nearly as often as the Ruger cylinder shaft does.
The Ugly
Once the new Power Custom cylinder shaft was installed, I grabbed some ammo and headed to my local indoor range. How did the Blackhawk shoot with its new cylinder shaft? From an accuracy perspective, I could not tell the difference. This is a 10-yard target, depleting a box of my reloaded .45 Colt ammo in the process.
Thanks again, Command Sergeant Major Hickman! My point of aim was at 6:00 on the orange bullseye. At 30 feet, the revolver was shooting high, and the rear sight was all the way down.
During my indoor session on three different targets (using up a couple of boxes of the 5.9-grain Red Dot reloads), the new Power Custom cylinder shaft jumped over the retainer twice. If I had tightened the set screw against the barrel, that probably would not have happened, but to mention it one more time, I don’t like the idea of having to rely on a set screw to hold the cylinder shaft in place.
When I returned home, I pulled the Power Custom base pin. I could see that it had deformed slightly in the groove that engages the mating retention feature in the revolver frame. I then pulled the extractor subassembly to get a better photo.
A gouge on the new Power Custom cylinder shaft. It wasn’t there when new (see earlier photo of the new part). I believe the Power Custom base pin steel should be heat treated to a higher hardness. The part’s softness and not using the set screw is what allowed this to occur.
My conclusion is that the Power Custom base pin should be heat treated to a higher hardness. If it had been, it would not have deformed when forced against the revolver’s cylinder shaft retention feature. But that may be irrelevant. The Power Custom base pin’s principal locking feature is the set screw, and I didn’t use it. And as I mentioned above, while it did shift forward a couple of times, it doesn’t exhibit this behavior nearly as often as the stock Ruger component does.
I emailed Power Custom about the deformation I noted in their cylinder shaft, and to the company’s great credit, they put a replacement base pin in the mail to me the next day. That’s great customer service.
In the early days of the COVID pandemic, I bought a box of 500 240-grain cast lead .44 bullets from a reputable bullet supplier.
A reloaded .44 Magnum cartridge. This is one of my favorite cartridges to reload and shoot. Dirty Harry made me a believer.
When I opened the box to start loading these bullets, I was dismayed to see that the bullet bases were not clean. Most were plagued by excess lead that had flowed beyond the bullet’s beveled base. The conventional wisdom has always been that any deformations to a bullet’s base will degrade accuracy, so I was disappointed when I saw these.
A relatively good cast bullet, with no excess lead around the bullet skirt. This bullet is shown upside down.A defective cast .44 Magnum bullet. Excess molten lead flowed around the base of the bullet. This occurs when the lead has not solidified when the bullet is dropped from the mold, or if the slider above the mold is loose. The theory is that an imperfect base will cause the propellant gases to deflect the bullet as it leaves the barrel.
I contacted the manufacturer (whose bullets I had been using for many years) by email and asked if such bullets met their quality requirements. I included a picture of one of the deformed bullets. The manufacturer’s response was immediate: No, those bullets were not acceptable. They do not meet our quality requirements.
The manufacturer then went on to say they had previously been aware of this lot escaping, they had traced it to a particular inspector, and he was no longer with the company. I probably would have jacked up the inspector a bit, and I would have seriously jacked up the operator instead. After all, it was the operator who made the bad product. The manufacturer also promised to send me a new box of bullets, and shortly thereafter, they arrived.
I put the box of defective bullets on a shelf under my reloading bench and forgot about them for the next several years. Recently, while poking around under the bench, I came across them again. It’s always exciting to find forgotten stuff down there, and I half expect to come across Jimmy Hoffa someday hiding behind a coffee can full of .45 ACP brass. As I looked at the box of bullets, I wondered: Are they really defective? Would they shoot well enough for my purposes?
You can guess where this story is going. I decided to test good versus bad bullets. While I was at it, I decided to also test the effects of powder position within the cartridge case on velocity and accuracy (more about this a bit further down).
Deformed Bullet Base Accuracy and Velocity Testing
The first step involved sorting good bullets from bad. Most of the 500 bullets had deformed bases, but I was able to find 20 bullets with relatively clean (i.e., no excess lead flow) bases. I then selected the worst of the deformed bullets. I loaded 40 cartridges with 5.9 grains of Alliant’s Red Dot propellant (it was what I found to be a good load for the .45 Colt, it was in the range of propellant weight my manuals suggested for Red Dot in the .44 magnum, and I already had the powder dispenser adjusted to drop 5.9 grain from a batch of .45 Colt I had just finished loading). This would allow for firing four groups of five shots each with the deformed bullets, and another four groups of five shots each with the good bullets. It was a large enough sample size to allow making a quantified comparison of good versus bad bullets’ effects on accuracy.
For this testing, I used mini-silhouette Alco targets at distance of 50 feet (you’ve seen me use these targets for other handgun accuracy testing). I shot my Turnbull Super Blackhawk, a superb and elegant .44 Magnum revolver (it’s the handgun you see at the top of this blog). I captured velocity information with my Garmin chronograph. All loads used once-fired Remington brass and the CCI 300 primer, and all were loading using Lee’s superb Classic Turret Press and Lee dies.
Here’s a typical target:
Alco’s target with four mini-silhouettes.
So what were the results? Here’s what I found assessing the bullets with defective bases versus those with relatively clean bases:
Based on the average group size comparison between the good bullets versus the defective base bullets, the good ones group better than the bad ones (even at the short test distance of 50 feet). The good bullets grouped, on average, 1.901 inches; the ones with defective bases had an average group size of 2.432 inches. That’s a 28% accuracy degradation for the bullets with defective bases.
The muzzle velocity difference between the two groups of bullets is not very significant, with an average velocity in the 970 feet per second range and a relatively small standard deviation of only around 19 feet per second. This is a good load.
Powder Position Accuracy and Velocity Test
There’s a concern that powder position within the case will affect both accuracy and velocity. The conventional wisdom holds that if the powder is close to the bullet (instead of the primer), the cartridge will behave differently than if the powder is close to the primer (or so the theory goes). It is thought this affects both accuracy and velocity. I tested this parameter, too.
I had another 40 rounds to do the same kind of testing as described above for the bullet base testing. I did not sort the bullets this time. For the first 20 rounds, I pointed the muzzle down (to position the powder more near the bullet) prior to firing. For the second 20 rounds, I pointed the muzzle up (to position the powder more near the primer) prior to firing. I did this to assess both accuracy and velocity.
5.9 grains of Red Dot does not fill a .44 magnum case; it instead occupies about 70% of the case volume. When the bullet is seated in the case, that 5.9 grains fills even more of the available case volume because the bullet occupies a portion of the case above the powder.
It’s tough to get a photo like this. This is 5.9 grains of Red Dot in a .44 Magnum case. When the bullet is seated, most of that case volume is taken up.
There is a little space available (5.9 grains is not a compressed load), and the powder in the case can be biased toward the bullet or toward the primer. Would this make a difference in either accuracy or velocity? The test results here show positioning doesn’t make much of a difference:
As you can see from examining the above data, the group size difference between the two approaches is not very large, and can probably be accounted for by variability in my shooting. There is a small difference in average velocities, but it’s probably insignificant.
I think what’s going on is that because Red Dot is a somewhat fluffy powder, it occupies enough of the case volume that it doesn’t make any difference which way the powder is situation in the case when it fires. It might make more sense to repeat this experiment with a denser powder like Bullseye, which occupies much less of the case volume. I may get around to that one of these days. What this test says to me is that 5.9 grains of Red Dot behind a 240-grain cast semi-wadcutter bullet is a good load in the .44 Magnum. It’s even better when the bullet bases are not deformed.
More gun stuff? You bet. Buy yourself (or a friend) a copy of The Gatling Gun.
I’ve owned quite a few handguns and I’ve shot quite a few more. These are my five all-time favorites.
Colt 1911 Government Model
What can I say? I waxed eloquent about the 1911 in several ExNotes blogs. I’ve owned several 1911s, and I still own my first, the MacManus Award Colt 1911. My mid-1980s bright stainless steel 1911 is a real honey. It’s hard to go wrong with any 1911.
1911 Government Models can be phenomenally accurate handguns, I love the .45 ACP cartridge, and the 1911 is part of America. I carried a 1911 in the Army and I carry one today (see below).
Rock Island Compact 1911
The Rock Island Compact checks all the boxes for me. It’s under $500 (I picked up mine new for an incredibly low $425). While not quite as accurate as a full-size Government Model, it’s accurate enough and it’s easy to carry. Like the bright stainless Colt 1911 above, my Compact has been lightly customized by TJ’s Custom Gunworks, with a polished barrel and chamber, engine-turned chamber exterior, Millet sights, and other mods to improve reliability (new extractor, recut ejector, etc.). It feeds anything. I like the Parkerized finish; it’s all business and it reminds me of the 1911s I carried in the Army. I call it my American Express gun (I never leave home without it).
My favored Compact 1911 loads are a 230-grain cast roundnose with 5.6 grains of Unique, and a 185-grain semi-wadcutter with 5.0 grains of Bullseye. The 185-grain SWC load is crazy accurate for a snubbie .45.
Colt .22 Trooper
This is an unusual one. I bought it in the 1980s. The Trooper is the same .357 Magnum that Colt manufactured for police duty, except it’s chambered in .22 Long Rifle. The barrel and the cylinder have the same external dimensions as the .357 Mag, which makes it heavy and that translates into stellar accuracy. It is the most accurate .22 handgun I own. Mine has custom rosewood grips. I love shooting the Trooper, and it does well with every brand of ammo I’ve put through it.
I paid $200 for the Trooper back in the ’80s. If you check what they go for today on Gunbroker.com, I think you’ll agree it was a good investment. But like all the other guns in this blog, it is not for sale.
Ruger .357 Magnum Blackhawk
Ruger Blackhawks are exceptionally accurate revolvers, they are easy to shoot, and they are just plain cool. I’ve shot loads in mine that run the gamut: 148-grain wadcutter target loads, 110-grain max hollow point loads, 158-grain max loads, and metallic silhouette 200-grain cast roundnose loads. The Blackhawks don’t care; they handle all of them with target-grade accuracy.
I used to say Blackhawks last forever, but I have to tell you I can’t say that anymore. My stainless steel Blackhawk finally wore out. When I sent it in to Ruger for repair, they were surprised, too, and they backed up their surprise with an even-more-surprising offer to buy the gun back (an offer I accepted). I’ve got my antenna up for another .357 Blackhawk, and when things calm down a bit in the gun world, another one will find a home with me.
SIG P226 Scorpion
The SIG P226 is an amazing handgun. At $1200 (and that’s a pre-pandemic price), they are not cheap, but I feel like I spent my money wisely on this piece. I love the SIG’s finish and grips, and I love its accuracy (it is the most accurate 9mm handgun I’ve ever owned).
I first learned just how good the SIG is when I fired good buddy Python Pete’s, and it wasn’t too long after that I bought the one you see here. It did better than any of the other 9mm handguns in the load development comparos (for both cast and jacketed loads). Trust me on this…if you want a fine handgun, you won’t go wrong with a SIG P226.
A favorite load that seems to work well in any .357 Magnum revolver, including my stainless steel Ruger Blackhawk, is 15.7 grains of Winchester’s 296 propellant and the Hornady 158-grain jacketed hollow point bullet. I use standard rather than magnum primers. This was a 25-yard target.
The .357 Ruger Blackhawk
Ruger’s Blackhawk is an iconic firearm, one that’s been in production since the 1950s in one form or another. I bought my first one in a department store in Texas for under a hundred bucks back in the mid-1970s, and I’ve bought and sold several since. I wish I had not sold any of the Blackhawks.
I’ve owned a few .357 Magnums over the years…Rugers, a couple of Model 27 Smiths, a Model 28 Smith (remember that one?), a Model 19 Smith, and a Model 65 Smith. I’ve owned a couple of Colt Pythons, too. The Pythons were nice, but not nice enough to command the premium prices they pulled in the 1970s, and certainly not nice enough to pull the exorbitant amounts they sell for today. The Smiths were accurate, but they didn’t hold up under constant use with magnum loads. I had a new Model 27 that I wore out in a couple of seasons in the metallic silhouette game; it suffered from extreme gas cutting under the top strap and a cylinder that sashayed around like an exotic dancer in a room full of big tippers. The Ruger Blackhawks seem to last forever.
Every Ruger firearm manufactured in 1976 carries the 200th year bicentennial stamp, just like the one on my 200th year Blackhawk. On my gun, the liberty scrollmark is on top of the barrel.
I’m down to one .357 Magnum now and it’s a 200th year stainless steel Blackhawk with a 6 1/2-inch barrel. It’s one of my favorite revolvers and it’s not for sale (it never will be; I learned my lesson about letting good guns get away). I have a few favorite .357 Magnum loads I’ve used over the last 50 years. I thought it might be a good idea to document how they did in the Blackhawk, try a few more to see how they do, and share it all with you here on the ExNotes blog. I guess this is the appropriate place for the disclaimer: These are loads that work well in my Blackhawk. You should never just take these loads (or any others from the Internet) and simply run with them. Always consult a reputable reloading manual (I like the Hornady and Lyman manuals best). Always start with lower charges and work your way up, looking for any signs of excess pressure, and go no higher if you see signs of excess pressure. Okay, so that’s out of the way. Let’s get to the good stuff.
Last week’s .357 Magnum testing at the West End Gun Club.
.357 Magnum Accuracy Loads
I’ve played with a lot of different .357 Magnum loads over the years. I have a few favorite .357 Mag loads that have been superbly accurate in any of the .357 sixguns I’ve owned. That’s a bit unusual because frequently a load that is accurate in one gun won’t be accurate in another, but that rule doesn’t seem to apply here. The loads I like have worked well for me in any .357 I’ve ever shot. I verified these loads in my Blackhawk with this latest round of testing, and like I said above, I explored a few more loads.
A few of the loads tested for this blog. From left to right, the first five are .357 Magnum cartridges and the last three are .38 Special cartridges (you can fire .38 Special rounds in a .357 Magnum handgun). The bullets (from left to right) are the 110-grain Hornady jacketed hollow point, the 158-grain Hornady jacketed hollow point, the 158-grain Hornady jacketed flat point, the Xtreme 158-grain plated flatpoint, a cast 158-grain flatpoint, a cast 158-grain flatpoint in a .38 Special case, a powder-coated 158-grain semi-wadcutter in a .38 Special case, and the Missouri 148-grain double-ended wadcutter in a .38 Special case.
So, with the above as background info, let’s get into the loads. I’ll start with one of the standard “go to” .357 Magnum loads. That’s the 158-grain cast semi-wadcutter bullet (the Keith-style) over 7.0 grains of Unique. This is not the hottest .357 load (it’s a mild-recoiling .357 Magnum load), but it’s hot enough, it’s very accurate, and it’s relatively flat shooting. I have a guy who casts 158-grain flatpoint bullets for me and I like those with 7.0 grains of Unique even better than the semi-wadcutter bullets. The load is very consistent, and with the same zero and six o’clock hold I use at 50 feet (seen in the target below), I pretty much hit right on target at 25 yards, 50 yards, and yep, even at 100 yards. I was hitting a steel gonger last week at 100 yards consistently with this load. My shooting buddies were impressed, and after all, that’s what a lot of this is all about. This is a good load.
A 50-ft target with the .357 Blackhawk using 158-grain cast flatpoints with 7.0 grains of Unique. Like they say, this is close enough for government work.
For hotter .357 Magnum loads, any of the Hornady 158-grain jacketed bullets (hollow points, flat points, and full metal jacket flat points) work superbly well with 15.7 grains of Winchester’s 296 propellant. These loads have a distinctive bark, high velocities, snappy recoil, and they are superbly accurate.
15.7 grains of WW 296 and the 158-grain Hornady jacketed flat point resulted in the best group fired in this test series. Two shots went through the hole in the lower right.
Another long time favorite load is a bit unusual but it’s accurate as hell. That’s the 110-grain Hornady jacketed hollow point and a max Unique load (10.0 grains of Unique, as listed in a Hornady reloading manual from the 1970s). I first tried this one 40 years ago when I had a Colt Python and I was impressed with its accuracy. I tried it again in this test series and the results were similarly impressive. It’s probably the fastest load I tested because of the max load and the light bullets. My old Hornady manual indicates the 110 grain Hornady bullet with 10.0 grains of Unique exits the muzzle at 1450 feet per second. That’s fast.
If light bullets and high velocity float your boat, try this one (but work your way up to it): 10.0 grains of Unique with Hornady’s 110-grain jacketed hollow point.
Plated Bullets: Are They Any Good?
Surprisingly, the 158-grain plated flatpoint bullets I tested didn’t do well with any charge of Unique, and in the past, they have performed very poorly with 296 (the bullets frequently shed their plating in the bore). These plated bullets are offered by Berry and Xtreme. These are not jacketed bullets; the copper plating is chemically applied and the coating is very thin. I did get one decent showing with a lower-end charge of IMR 4227 propellant, but given the choice, I’d go for a plain cast bullet rather than plated bullets. You may feel differently. Please leave a comment here on the blog if your experience is different than mine.
Powder Coating and Paint Fumes
I tried powder-coated bullets last week, too, to see how they would perform. Powder coating is a concept that’s been around for a few years as an alternative to lubing cast bullets. I found that accuracy was more or less on par with lubed bullets, but not really any better. The powder-coated bullets look cool (the cartridges kind of look like lipstick). When I fired several powder-coated bullets fairly quickly, I could smell the paint. Some folks swear by these bullets and love them for IDPA and similar competitive pistol events. For me, performance was the same as conventional cast bullets. Your mileage may vary. Leave us a comment if you feel differently.
Powder-coated 158-grain semi-wadcutter bullets. I found their accuracy to be comparable to conventional cast and lubed bullets.
A Metallic Silhouette Load
When I shot metallic silhouette competition I used a 200-grain cast roundnose bullet in my .357 Magnum Model 27 Smith and Wesson. That bullet worked extremely well, and because of its heavy-for-caliber nature and high length/diameter ratio, it carried a lot of energy downrange. It was superbly accurate with 12.4 grains of 296. But finding those bullets is next-to-impossible today. It used to be a standard .38 Special bullet for police duty, but very few (if any) departments carry .38s today, and nobody seems to stock the 200-grain bullets. Maybe I need to get back into casting. I sure loved that 200-grain bullet in the .357 Magnum. They actually made the .357 Magnum work better on the 200-meter rams than a 240-grain .44 Magnum. The .44 Magnum wouldn’t consistently take down the rams; the 200-grain .357 Magnum did so every time.
.38 Special Loads
One of the great things about a .357 Magnum handgun is you can also shoot .38 Special loads in it. I guess that’s a good thing, as the .38 Special cartridges have lighter recoil. I tried three .38 Special loads with three different bullets. The accuracy load in .38 Special is a 148-grain wadcutter bullet seated flush with the cartridge mouth over 2.7 grains of Bullseye propellant. That load is super accurate in my Model 52 Smith and Wesson target pistol, and it did okay in the Ruger, too. I’ve always believed that a .38 Special cartridge would never be quite as accurate in a .357 Magnum handgun because the bullet has to make a longer jump to reach the rifling, and my testing last week did nothing to change my mind on that count. The .38 Special does okay in a .357 Magnum handgun, but I believe the best accuracy resides in a .357 case.
.357 and .38 Accuracy Testing Results
Here’s a chart summarizing my accuracy results:
Ruger Blackhawk accuracy testing results. All testing was with a two-hand hold at 50 feet. All groups are five shots. All loads (except the plated bullet loads) were crimped. All cast bullets were sized to 0.358. Note 1: Two shots went off paper. Notes 2 and 3: One shot went off paper.
There you have it. If you have a load that works well, please leave a comment. We’d love to hear from you.
My stainless .357 Blackhawk, with a 25-yard target. It’s one of my favorite handguns. The loads you see here use WW 296 propellant and Hornady’s 158-grain jacketed h0llow point bullet.
One of my good buddies wrote to me over the weekend asking about the Ruger Blackhawk in .357 Magnum. He wanted to know if I felt they were good guns. In a word: Yes. My friend was specifically considering the .357 Blackhawk with the extra cylinder for 9mm ammo; I’m not a big fan of the combo Blackhawks (I think they’re a solution to a problem that doesn’t exist). But the basic .357 Blackhawk? It’s a winner, and I think it’s one of the world’s great handguns.
I’ve owned several .357 Blackhawks over the last 50 years, starting with a plain vanilla blue steel New Model I bought at a K-Mart when I lived in El Paso (yep, they used to sell handguns). I traded that one away, and then I bought an Old Model Blackhawk with the convertible 9mm cylinder. It was a pristine used gun, still in the original box, with the shorter 4 5/8-inch barrel. I never fired that gun and I only owned it for about a week. I paid something like $75 for it, and then I sold it to my boss at Fort Bliss a few days later because he wanted it. That Old Model with its convertible 9mm cylinder would be collectible today. Eh, live and learn, I guess.
There were two convertible Blackhawks back in the 1970s, and I guess there are still two available new today. One is the 9mm/.357 combo I described above; the other is the .45 ACP/.45 Colt deal. I had a New Model Blackhawk .45 ACP/.45 Colt around the same time as I bought that Old Model 9mm/.357. I only shot .45 ACP in it because I had a ready supply of .45 ACP ammo. Mine wasn’t very accurate. It might have been because the .45 ACP bullet had to make a big jump to the rifling (it’s a shorter cartridge), or it might have been that I just had the wrong .45 ACP load for that revolver. I think the same accuracy detractors exist with the 9mm/.357 arrangement. The accuracy challenge is perhaps even more significant for the 9mm Blackhawk because of the slight difference in bore diameters between the 9mm and the .357 (the barrel diameter is .357 inches; the 9mm bullets are .355 or .356 inches in diameter). If you have the .357 Blackhawk with the extra 9mm cylinder, you can actually shoot three cartridges in it (9mm from the one cylinder, and 38 Special and 357 Magnum from the other). But I don’t have an interest in any of that. I only shoot .357 Magnum in mine.
My .357 Blackhawk is the stainless model you see in the photo above. It’s accurate (I can usually hold all my shots in the 10-ring of a silhouette target at 25 yards). They are super strong and I think they are more rugged than a Smith and Wesson. I sold all my S&W 357s years ago. And on that subject, I owned a couple of Colt Pythons back in the 1970s and I sold them, too. I never understand all the excitement over the Pythons; their fit and finish was great, but they didn’t shoot any better than the Blackhawk (at least in my hands).
No targets? No problem. My Blackhawk is a shooter.
There are several variants of the Blackhawk; I have the full-sized Blackhawk with the 6½-inch barrel. I like the feel of it, I like the grip, and as a kid who grew up watching Westerns, I like the idea of a single-action sixgun. Today, Ruger makes several variants of their .357 Blackhawk. There are fixed-sight versions they call the Vaquero, smaller frame versions they call the flat top, different barrel lengths, stainless models, blue steel models, and more. I like the stainless version because the grip is made of steel; in the blue version it’s anodized aluminum. The stainless grip is a little heavier and the gun feels better to me. But there’s nothing wrong with the blued-steel Blackhawk. They are great guns.
My Blackhawk was manufactured in 1976, and like all Rugers built that year, it carries the “Made in the 200th Year of American Liberty” rollmark.
I like loading the .357 ammo, too, and I loaded a bunch this weekend. It’s a cool cartridge to reload. WW 296 is my preferred propellant. Unique does okay, too, but 296 is the cat’s meow for the .357 Magnum cartridge. It’s a flat-shooting cartridge, and I can hit consistently with it all the way out to 200 yards. I may set up a target or two at that distance the next time I’m on the range just to back up that statement.
here!
