Thread: A conundrum

I'm trying to get a 38/55 going before the big bore and can't quite figure out what's going on.
250 grain cast flat base bullet with 6 grains of trailboss shoots nice 2 inches groups at 50 yards and is only doing 890 fps and sounds like a FART.
15 grains of 4227 gives me 1475 fps but the bullets are tumbling giving large oval holes and no group.
There is no leading in the bore. The rifling twist is 1: 25 the Greenhill formula shows that this bullet requires a 1:22 twist but I don't think that's the problem.
I'm stumped, in my experience as speed decreases instability increases not the other way around as there's less gyroscopic spin to stableise the bullet.
I could always stick with the mouse fart load and accept a bit of ridicule but a bit faster should in theory be better.
Anyone got any ideas.

A sub-40 caliber going at "mouse-fart" speed and you expect "a bit of ridicule"...



How about trying heavier load of TB, provided you have space in the case ?

I do have a heavier one and that keyholes at any speed but nothing lighter than the 255 which is the std weight for 38/55. I might try paper patching sometimes that fixes issues like this.
No matter what I expect some ridicule @ebf even if it is just for the hat.

When we were working soft loads for the 7.62x39 we found that if we went over 1100fps (or about) we needed gas checks. at about 1200fps we found the lead was "melting" in the bore and after about 4 or 5 shots he had turned his rifle into a smooth bore by filling the rifling with lead. Once the lead was removed and gas checks fitted to cast loads it went well. I do not know if this is what is happening to you as you mention that you have no lead fouling, but it could be worth checking into...

Greetings Marty Henry,
Are you sure that the projectiles are big enough for the barrel. Some 38-55 rifles have huge groove diameters. I see that Hodgdon lists TB plus three of the ADI/ Hodgdon powders but not 4227. I guess you could try black powder to bump up the projectiles if they are a bit small. You may also need to try a softer lead mix. As a last resort perhaps some musical ear muffs to drown out the chatter from the peanut gallery. Always liked the 38-55 after I shot a Remington Hepburn in that calibre. Regrettably one has not appeared in the rifle cupboard yet.
Regards Grandpamac.

Hello grandpa Mac the casts are .380 and the bore slugged .375 land to groove. The alloy is admittedly a bit of a lottery, 3 parts lead 1 part wheel weight with tin added at 5% by total weight. It works fine for all my other casting including round balls.
4227 is recommended in an old Lyman manual i sort of use as a bible. It also has the universal cast bullet load of 10 grains of unique. I may try that along with some BP.
In case nothing works I may have to resort to your last suggestion of the earmuffs and possibly play a recording of a 105 howitzer beside me.

Originally Posted by Marty Henry

Hello grandpa Mac the casts are .380 and the bore slugged .375 land to groove. The alloy is admittedly a bit of a lottery, 3 parts lead 1 part wheel weight with tin added at 5% by total weight. It works fine for all my other casting including round balls.
4227 is recommended in an old Lyman manual i sort of use as a bible. It also has the universal cast bullet load of 10 grains of unique. I may try that along with some BP.
In case nothing works I may have to resort to your last suggestion of the earmuffs and possibly play a recording of a 105 howitzer beside me.

Greetings Again,
Have just been looking through some 38-55 data and wonder if 15 grains of IMR4227 might be a bit light. Ken Waters used 18 grains behind a 246 grain cast flat base in his 1976 pet loads for what he called weak rifles. He didn't list IMR4227 for the moderately strong rifles (including 1894) but did list 4198 and 4895 (probably Hodgdon). Sometimes non case filling loads can give spotty accuracy,
Regards Grandpamac.

Doing a bit of loading tonight to try tomorrow and I'll go up a few grains with the 4227 like you say, also trying 55 of BP, 10 of blue dot and a case full of trailboss I'll also try a couple paper patched. Last chance saloon stuff.

Lyman cast bullet manual list 24 grains of IMR 4198 with their 375248 mould 249gr FP as the accurate load,
I have that mould and it has proved to be very accurate in a number of guns, I would be happy to send you some to try.
Cheers
Robert.

Thanks Robert I already have a wodge of your standard 255 grain ones that are no problem in another rifle hopefully some of the buggering around outlined above will produce an acceptable result. By the way those lighter 9.3s worked out ok. I will pm you about getting some more and probably a few of those lyman ones.

I think I'm ready now. As I told grandpa Mac it slugs .375 but that was driven through from the muzzle end so I dropped one in the breech it goes several inches before it stops so either it's got a very long leed like a martini or its a bit worn. So I thought either a good fast kick in the bum to get them seated or paper patching might be the best options.
Paper patched a few, it's fiddly but seemed to sort it out but was a bit hit and miss. I also loaded 6 with 15 grains of blue dot for a good swift kick.
This is what happened with them at 50 yards shot off a rest.
Aim point was the red dot, all landed in the green, the one in the red is after a sight adjustment. Pretty happy as you can guess and they sound "proper" too.
Thank you gents for the ideas, a team effort .