44 BBS On A Range

[JEBar]

on 3-6-18 I met John ( Shakey Jake ) for a morning of rifle target shooting at Blackwood Gun Club in Conroe, TX ===> http://www.blackwoodgunclub.com/rangesRifle_pistol.asp .... it was a pleasure to meet John in person; not to mention, getting to see and fire his Henry 327 .... his is the only 327 I have seen and I must say, Henry did a great job building it .... it has a solid bark, minimal recoil, and it is very pleasant to shoot .... I took our Henry 45-70 and 44 Mag .... while uncasing them I found that the screws that fasten the scope rings to the mounting rail were loose .... retightening them wasn't a problem but it necessitated resighting the scope .... picture 1 shows the target used for sighting in the rifle ... it was fired at 25 yards, from a bench with my left elbow resting on the table .... there was a fairly strong right to left wind .... after firing the 3 shots in the 9-ring on the left, the scope was adjusted .... the remaining shots were fired after the adjustment .... my biggest surprise of the day can be seen in the second picture .... it shows the results of 10 out of 10 rounds of our low power target loads using 240 gr lead bullets fired at 200 yards .. .. I must say that I was surprised .... with the wind and all things considered, I had no clue that after figuring out how high to hold the crosshairs we could put so many rounds on paper .... the last picture shows 15 out of 15 hits (all in the 9 ring or better ) of our jacketed 240 gr Nosler JHP hunting ammo fired at 200 yards .... that target is making me completely reconsider my long held beliefs as to the hunting range capability of our Henry 44 Mag .... I did fire a few rounds through our 45-70 to test its modified trigger pull .... bottom line, outstanding, a truly major improvement .... I'm looking forward to spending extensive time with it after our return home from Texas

[Sir Henry]

Sounds like a fun day and it looks like you shot great.

[North Country Gal]

That is some great long range work with a 44 mag in anybody's book. Well done. I've also done a little 200 yard work with the 44 mag and was also surprised at what the 44 could do, way put there. Those big 240 grain bullets carry a lot of momentum.

[Sir Henry]

What is the fps of those 240 grain bullets at the muzzle and at 200 yards?

[JEBar]

That is some great long range work with a 44 mag in anybody's book. Well done. I've also done a little 200 yard work with the 44 mag and was also surprised at what the 44 could do, way put there. Those big 240 grain bullets carry a lot of momentum.

kind words appreciated .... it really was a good day .... I'm looking forward to linking up with John ( Shakey Jake ) and spending some time on a range when we are back down here next year .... as noted, firing our 44 BBS at 200 yards was a unique, eye opening experience .... the cross wind didn't help accuracy but it did help to demonstrate that a 240 gr, far from aerodynamic, relatively slow moving, Jacketed Hollow Point bullet can be an effective hunting bullet at 200 and probably more yards .... I'm thinking about trying to do some penetration testing at that distance but that can't happen for a while

[JEBar]

What is the fps of those 240 grain bullets at the muzzle and at 200 yards?

we've been using the same 44 mag hunting load since the mid 60's .... they work so well that I won't even consider trying any other load .... I've run them through our chrony but all that data is back home ..... as best I remember the muzzle was around 1700 fps but that could easily be way off .... I don't have any way to measure velocity other than at a few feet from the muzzle .... what I can do after we get back home is to confirm the muzzle velocity and then use a ballistics calculator to come up with a probable speed at most any distance .... I've never gotten into researching it because in my mind a 44 Mag was something over a 100 yard hunting round .... that was based on taking deer at 60 - 70 yards with our Ruger Redhawk and seeing first hand how the same hand loads performed .... I never dreamed of it being effective at 200 yards (or more) .... as also noted, with the cross wind I was expecting much more drift .... in fact, that still has me puzzled

[Sir Henry]

I've always thought the wind wasn't a factor closer than 200 yards and really didn't come into play until 600 yards. At least wind on the bullet. The wind has blown me around where I can't sit still enough to shoot straight.

[JEBar]

I've always thought the wind wasn't a factor closer than 200 yards and really didn't come into play until 600 yards. At least wind on the bullet. The wind has blown me around where I can't sit still enough to shoot straight.

well understood on trying to hold steady with the wind blowing .... I was under the impression that wind had a larger affect on slow moving bullets with a highly inefficient ballistics coefficient .... I honestly never gave it much serious consideration because (as mentioned) I simply hadn't entertained the thought of using a 44 mag at anywhere near that distance

[JEBar]

I just ran come calculations based on Nosler's current manual for their 240 gr JHP bullet, pushed by 23.8 gr of W296 or H110 .... using their listed muzzle velocity of 1724 fps with a zero at 150 yards the bullet would never get over 3.9" high out to 150 yards and be 9.6" low at 200 yards where it would still deliver 658.7 ft lbs of energy .... on paper, that should do the job on a deer .... based on firing ours yesterday, I'm pretty certain the bullets traveled a bit flatter trajectory which seems to indicate a somewhat higher muzzle velocity

[Sir Henry]

I just ran come calculations based on Nosler's current manual for their 240 gr JHP bullet, pushed by 23.8 gr of W296 or H110 .... using their listed muzzle velocity of 1724 fps with a zero at 150 yards the bullet would never get over 3.9" high out to 150 yards and be 9.6" low at 200 yards where it would still deliver 658.7 ft lbs of energy .... on paper, that should do the job on a deer .... based on firing ours yesterday, I'm pretty certain the bullets traveled a bit flatter trajectory which seems to indicate a somewhat higher muzzle velocity

Thanks.

[GFK]

Nice work!

[JEBar]

kind words appreciated .... our Henry rifles have been cleaned and put to bed for our trip back home from Texas .... I'm sure looking forward to waking them up and taking them out for more exercise ...

[Shakey Jake]

Sure was nice to shoot with you! Next year I'll arrange it so we can have the whole day. As it turned out we could have. My client didn't show up until around 6 in the evening. I'll get my .44 dialed in with the Skinner sight and hopefully do as well as the .327.

[JEBar]

a pleasure for me as well .... being there all day sounds mighty good .... I'll have to make sure to pack more ammo ..

[JEBar]

I knew I had one more target from our day at Blackwood .. .. late today I found it under a seat where it had evidently fallen during our ride back from the range .... when I decided that I was going to fire my final target of the day, I decided to burn every 44 round I had with me at the target (shown below) placed on the 200 yard line .... all 11 holes above the horizontal number line (the row of 8's & 9's) were made by our practice rounds ===> 240 gr Oregon Trail cast RNFP powered by 7.2 gr Bullseye .... crosshairs centered an estimated 4 - 5" above the target .... all 20 holes below that line were made by our hunting rounds ===> 240 gr Nosler JHP pushed by 23.8 gr of W296 .... crosshairs were held dead center of the target .... I'd like to contribute the spread to a stiff cross wind but I suspect that after several hours of firing and not having a very good rest, that target is about as good as I was able to shoot .... next year I fully intend to bring a shooting rest from home