Time to cast,

[Distant Thunder]

It seems like every time I cast more than a few hundred of a given bullet it ends up not being the one I want to shoot. Then I'm left with a bunch of orphans that have no place to go. The only rifles I have that I don't have that problem with are my .45-70 Hepburn and my .40-65. Both of those I have time proven loads with one bullet for and casting anything else would be a waste of time.

Since I don't shoot my .40-65, which is my silhouette rifle, much at all I never really am behind on casting for that. The mold is super easy to cast with and it cast very good bullets.

My .45-70 Hepburn, which is my Creedmoor rifle, I can never get very far ahead of casting for. I have a proven load and a bullet that shoot extremely well, but as I have said the mold kind of sucks for casting.

My .44-77 shoots pretty well with the 4 different PP molds I have for it, but for some reason I have not done very well shooting at matches with any of the loads/bullets I have tried. There is no doubt in my mind that this is my favorite cartridge/rifle combination and I really enjoy loading it and shooting it no matter how it goes. I just like the .44, .45 and .50 caliber BP cartridges. Those under .44 caliber are interesting to me and I think from time to time that I'd like to have a .38-50, but I know from my history with the smaller calibers that I just can't get too excited about loading and shooting them. They end up sitting in the safe or traded in on something else bigger.

I am really hoping to get on top of this .44-77 this year, but if this year is anything like the last two years that's going to be difficult. It's been since 2019 when I last put in a full season and did a lot of shooting. This has already had somethings come up that will likely shorten my season again. Time will tell, but the lack of range time, match time isn't help me any. I thought when I retired that I'd be shooting all the time, so far not so much. Even with that retirement is the best job I've even had! I'm sticking with it.

I'm headed out to my shop to do some casting, hopefully I have some for the .45-70 by the end of the day. The more the better!