What bullet diam is suggest for Uberti '73win rifles ?

[Marshal Deadwood]

.452 or .454..which of the two do most end up useing ? My '73 is not as accurate as it outta be and I been shooting 'National Bullets' .452 rnfp,,,,and,,this is with Trail Boss. Almost dinner plate size groups at 50 yards,,,pretty dang bad I think. Could the rifle have an issue ? Bore is pristine,,,no cutter marks,,,looks perfect...smooth as a babys butt on cleaning patches...so ?

Go any suggestions how to attack this accuracy prob ?

MD

[bear tooth billy]

it,s usually recommended to shoot a bullet .001'' over your bore diameter. If you have too small of
a bullet you are probably going to get leading in the bore. Are you shooting off sticks or sandbags?
What sights do you have? If you're not keeping the same exact hold every time that may be
part of the problem. On our buffalo guns we have $600 worth of open sights to make them
shoot really well

[Ottawa Creek Bill]

Mike......

Bench it first to see what kind of groups you are getting and then shoot it off hand......

SASS rifle targets are close & big......NCOWS rifle targets are small and are not close......so if you shoot NCOWS, you need to get that gun grouping pretty tight.

William's 1873 (my son) will hit four inch squares or smaller at a 100 yards all day long with 34 grains of compressed (1/8th inch compression) Goex 3F, a 210 grain bullet on top of a SPG lube wafer and a .030 fiber wad. This is also a good deer load.

What load are you using?

Bill

[w44wcf]

MD,
Good advice from the pards. I don't own a '73 in .45 Colt but I have a '94 Marlin Cowboy with a barrel that slugs @ .4525".
It shoots .454"+ bullets the best. As was suggested, best to slug the barrel to see what the groove dia. is.

Quality of some of the store bought bullets that I have seen is not the greatest. They can vary in diameter, weight and non fill out.  You could try loading 10 selected bullets ....flat bases - no voids , weight + - 1/2 gr., well filled out,  same diameter and see if that changes anything.

If you pm me your address, I could send you some .454" bullets to try for comparison.  Also, I have found that the Hornady swaged .45 Colt bullets shoots really well with smokeless.


w44wcf

[Marshal Deadwood]

Bill,,how are ya hoss ?

I slugged the bore, gents,,,its .450...I've been shooting a 'known' casters bullets,,,250gr, .452's, smokeless lube, trailboss loads at appx 750fps, CCi standard large pistol primers. Shooting from Cadwell rest,,and sand bags,,,,at 50yds. appx 8" group. Terrible. Can all but cut holes with my other iron sight rifles.

This is a 30" barrel '73win,,,,after fireing a tube,,,the bore does not seem excessively dirty. And, the bore looks pristine,,no dents or cut thurs near any of the dovetails,,etc. ,,,,cleaning patches run super smooth and give no indication of bumps , snags or any 'flaws'...

...Accuracy probs can run a man to loose his religion, eh ?

Ottwa Creek Bill,,hang tough pard, tell the family howdys for me,,and hope to see ya down the trail sometimes,,,been awhile,,,need to raise our glasses against evil forces again before we leave the earth hoss,,,,

Michael

[Will Ketchum]

Well after nearly 40 years of loading for the 45 Colt I have never found not pre-war, post-war not Italian clone that didn't shoot better with the .454 bullet than it did with the .452.  The only possible exception is the Freedom Arms model 97 which is made to such close tolerances the larger bullet won't allow the round to chamber.  My 30" barreled Uberti 73 is very accurate with the .454 bullet and Titegroup powder.

Will Ketchum

[w44wcf]

MD,
I would suggest increasing the velocity for better accuracy.  5.8 / Trail Boss / 250 shot pretty darn well for me.
Also try using selected bullets per my above post for your accuracy trials.

As Will mentioned, going to a .454" bullet may improve things as well even though your barrel is .450".  One thing the larger diameter bullet does, which often is not realized, is that it helps to more accurately center the cartridge in the chamber.

Good luck,
w44wcf   

[Marshal Deadwood]

Roll Crimp,,,,heavy ? ,,or as lite as one can do and still be sufficent ?

w44wcf,,,did you get my pv't message , sir ?

One more question,,,since I load for my '73SAA's,,,would the .454 persent any problems with the revolvers ? And,,,,would the heavier bullets (.250gr) be more accurate than the lite'er bullets (200gr,etc) ?

Thank you all for your assistance in this perplexing (to me LOL) situation !

MD

[Ottawa Creek Bill]

Ottwa Creek Bill,,hang tough pard, tell the family howdys for me,,and hope to see ya down the trail sometimes,,,been awhile,,,need to raise our glasses against evil forces again before we leave the earth hoss,,,,

Michael

Mike.....same here bud!!

I think if you try the real black powder and a .454 bullet over a wad and SPG lube.....you'll get the results you are looking for.

Stay away from the smokeless loads and fake black powder.....you'll appreciate that 1873 that much more.

Bill

[Marshal Deadwood]

Bill,,I'm gonna do just that. Go black,,,,spg,,and .454...and live or die on the 'real stuff'...I been telling myself for two years to do this,,,so,,,thats just how I'm gonna approach this accuracy thing,,,fix it from the black powder angle to beging with,,and I wont have to 'redo' my methods later...be done with it. And,,you're right really,,this IS BP technology anyways,,so why not ?

Maybe someday we can do the 19th century stuff like we used to do the 18th. I'd like to get out ya'lls way to shoot sometime.

BTW, Bill,,,do you load the brass shotgun cases for BP too ? I've never did this,,always just shot the cheap skeet loads,,,but thinkin' I need to go black in the double barrel too. I DO love shootin' BP in my .44colt 'army' Open Tops,,just feels,,,right.

Take care hoss,

Mike

[KCSO]

Take a bght light and check the bore just under the front sight.  I have found several 45 Uberti's that had the front sight presses in and this made a lump or deformation in the bore right under the sight.  If this is the case yo won't shoot really good groups till you set the sight back and get rid of the problem.  For factory cast bullets i want a bullet that goes 2 thou over bore diameter for the most part, but a recent Charles Daley gun shot astounding groupps with a .452 bullet in a 451 barrel so there is a little wiggle room.  A GOOD 45 colt rifle should give you 1 1-/12" groups at 50 yards if you can hold that close.  The Charles daley rifle I spoke of is putting 5 shots on a playing card at 100 yards and shooting into 1" at 5o from a bench and sand bags.  Black Powder groups from this rifle are under 3" at 100 yards.  I prefer to cast my own bullets as i find a lot of factory bullets are cast too hard.