The .44-77 1980's made Farmingdale Shiloh

[Kurt]

With no matches going on I been spending time with different rifles shooting up left over ammo to empty the cases. Some have been loaded since the turn of the Century, time to get them used up.
I also have a few .44 PP moulds that I use for the other .44 calibers I shoot with 1/16, 1/17 and 1/19 twists with different profiles and lengths.
I want to start a sort of catalog of loads that will work with these different twists, bullets, and powder charges for my .44's that are chambered in the .44-75 Ballard, .44-77, .44-90BN and the .44-100 Rem St..
Down the line my Son and Daughter will have these rifles so they will have some sort of a guide on how to load these cartridges and I hope they get the enjoyment from them as I have.

This Farmer has some quirks that show up with just about every outing that I have not quite figured out what is causing them. The same load can shoot flat out well and fall on it's nose the next time out no matter which bullet or load I use in it so I will do some ladder loads with every bullet and powder I have. This might take me the rest of this year to go through this project and maybe into the next.
Yesterday I started with the KAL bullet that shoots so well in the .44-100 Bryan build Shiloh that shoots this bullet so well and both of these rifles have the same ROT but the barrel lengths are different.
The photo below target shot with the .44-100Rem was shot close at 135 yards using the 1.460" long bullet that is a little undersized at .430" diameter but it shoots well in this rifle.
I used this bullet in this Farmer with the same ROT with a ladder load at 200 yards yesterday with three different loads of 1.5 OE. 75 gr, 77 gr and 78 gn and again a bunch of vertical showed up that I don't like but the 5 shots are workable but I have seen better with this rifle but it's not consistent.


       

[Don McDowell]

The bullet is to long. Go to a 1.35 bullet and it will shoot pretty well to 6 and maybe 800 max. Get the length to 1.3 and it'll hold well to 1000.

[Kurt]

It might be Don. I have used this bullet during the time before the match at the MT 1000 and it stayed on the iron using the 19 twist .44-90bn but the 17 twist 100 st. Tollefson rifle held better in the white the same day but the lesser powered .44-77 might make a difference.
I have shorter moulds that will get tested with this project.
I have a ladder load using 2F OE with the same bullet I will do the next run with maybe tomorrow. The range is down for work day today.
The left oblique 75 gr load and the right oblique 77 gr load I think is more like what I call fat fingering, but this is what I want to find out because the 78 gr load is more like it should be. More of a round group. But they are all at 3.5" horizontal and I did not change the sight setting for all shots fired.

When I get all bullet profiles shot I will get the adjustable mould out and go from a 1.3" long to 1.55" long and see where the 1/17 twist starts to fall apart. But I'm limited to 200 yards but it should show some signs at this range.
I know the .44-90bn with a 16 twist holds the 1.55" out to 600 yards I have tested it at.
But for now I want to get the Farmer reliable so I can use it for the midrange type matches.

[Don McDowell]

Kurt, with having the ability to test loads from set the target on fire to 1000 yard plus. I can guarantee you that going past 1.3 inches long in the 19 twist 44-77 will give you nothing but grief the closer you get to 800.
I also found that a small bullet and heavy paper to be extremely detrimental to accuracy. Thinner paper and a bullet no more than around .004 under bore diameter eliminates 99% of the unexplained dirt diggers.

[Kurt]

Don I envy you guys that can test at those extended ranges. That's only something I can do shooting a match.
You guys with the long test ranges should develop loads that hold thew X ring and not stray past the 10 ring at every match. LOL.

With my Bryan build .44-77 light barreled Hartford with their standard chamber and 19 twist I shot the 50 small bullets you gave me and they shot very good here at home and my adjustable mould casts almost an identical profiled bullet like it I have set it below 1.3" around 400 gr and they also shot very good at 200 with the Hartford .44-77 but the 1.3 would not hold the Q buffalo when I took the best I that shot well here at home. The 1.330 .486 gr all held good on that 805 buff at the Q as well as the 3.25. In that 19 twist I have not found anything that will outperform the 1.325" out at the Q or the 1226 target at Baker. And you know what the breezes are like at those two ranges.
As far as the thick or thin paper I use both. But I only use the thin in the .40 cal. .40-65 and .45-90 Douglas barrels with the .003" deep grooves I ordered. I know two guys that use printer paper and I wouldn't stand in front of the target at a 1000 yards with them shooting those wrapped bullets in there .45-70.
Hey It's all in fun past time doing this till the matches start up again. And I want to leave behind something that works and don't work in my particular rifles for future reference.

[Don McDowell]

You can come up with loads that will suffice for a gong match, and not be able to hold paper in a target rifle match. The big advantage of testing on steel here at home, I can set up my caldwell camera and keep track of every bullet strike, Stop if I need to and go up and look at the target to see that all the bullets are striking point first and not leaving sideway imprints. Repaint and start all over again. Hard thing to do at a gong match
I look for loads that will hold about 2 minutes vertical , the horizontal not so particular as the problems there can come from wind gust and shooter error. But the vertical needs to be as little as possible.

[Kurt]

Don, I cant agree with that. If the shot misses the iron it will miss the paper.
If that was the case hard holders like Gullo or the other good shooters that end up on the top of the leader boards would all clean the Quigley or Baker irons.
On iron a hit is a score and paper it just gets counted by as close it hits center. And iron it makes no difference where it hits but at the end when they shut down to paint a lot of hits are in the white dot also. They just use different numbers but in the end it's still the best shot wins the pot.

[Kurt]

You could carry this a little farther also.
A paper match you get as many sighter shots to taste the conditions and adjust your sights for the conditions. Plus you have wind flags and all the time you want to take to wait out the conditions if you want. At the Q you don't have those options. All you have is a few seconds when your name is called to make your sight adjustments according in which way the shooter before you smoke flew or the way the grass is leaning or the feeling of the wind changing from hitting your cheek and moving to the back of your head before squeezing the shot off. The Gong shoots I think are more challenging than paper matches. And there is a lot more shooters trying to get ahead of you to the top of the leader board.
Now I'm not saying that paper matches are a cake walk, they are not but you do have advantages with them over the Gong shoots.
I like both venues.

[Don McDowell]

On the other hand someone that uses the entire gong gets the same points as the shooter that wipes out the white... Target rifle don't work that way, you can shoot a target clean shoot a 60 and loose the match by a wide margin.

[Kurt]

Round#2

The 200 yard target frames in the pit were down for work so I had to set up in front of the pit at 185 yards from my previous laser shot at that point but I don't think 15 yards will show any difference.
This trip I used the same KAL 507 gr 1.460" long bullets as I did in the first post but I used 2F OE and I had couple other loads using the Sharps profile 1.325" long and at 485 gr I use in the 19 twist hunting rifle. I only shot a few because the sky was starting to fall again. But I will do the then another day and I might dig out the chronograph for the next run.
Today it was dead calm, it took a while for the smoke to drift away it was that quiet. I made no sight changes start to finish but I saw a bunch of vertical show up again so after the fifth 5 shot run I took the forearm off the rifle to see if It would quiet it down and it helped. Maybe some pillar or full length betting might correct this. But all in all with all those loads shot the groups were not that bad for 185 yards. The one shot on target #7 got away on me.