Big Bore Addiction Group

Cal,
You've finally been drawn to the light.
Welcome to the best forum mate.

Everyone reading this,
Cal's books are excellent "coffee table" type beauties, full of interesting facts and great photos.

Cheers,
Velo Dog
(Paul Ard)
 
(y)Welcome to AH Cal! From the end of the road (Seward) Looking forward to your contribution here.
 
Gents:
I'm new here and let me make a few points and comments as to what has been written:
1. In the short video of me and the 4-bore, I'm 6' not 6'3". The recoil was so bad as it was a heavy bullet (2100 grains), a heavy charge of FFg black powder (400+ grains), and the rifle was a light single shot (about 16 pounds). The heaviest recoil I have felt is in my double Hughes at 22 pounds with a 1900-grain conical and 440 grains of FFg GOEX. Rob's single I fired was the heaviest I've ever felt.

2. A comment on heavy doubles and an automatic safety. In my limited experience I have seen far more doubles with an auto safety than a manual safety. It is the same argument as single trigger vs. double trigger. It is either or, no right or wrong, but it is sound wisdom to keep all of one's rifles with the same number of triggers and the same type of safety. In my personal experience, my first several vintage doubles had an auto safety. It became natural to slide the safe button forward as the rifle is being shouldered when hunting. It is habit now. And, when I have a rifle now with a non auto safe, I forget to put the rifle on safe as that has not been ingrained in me. I've had 14 hunts if Africa (and two vacations) and three to Australia and many years in Alaska. Doubles have been used exclusively the past 10 years or more and all with auto safes. My last four international hunts were with my .600 Wilkes and it came with an auto safety in April of 1914. (It makes a damn fine plains game rifle albeit a tad over-powered).

3. For the gent who was disappointed with me downloading my 4-bore, 8-bores, and .600. Nothing personal--all I can do is offer my apology. About 15+ years ago a hairy chested he man who said his .458 was mild, took a shot with my 8-bore Locke with a 1620-grain conical and 400 grains of FFg. The rifle nearly flew out of his hands as he lost his balance. If someone drops the rifle, I can guarantee no one will offer to replace or repair the rifle. After that experience when folks whom I do not know I download the big ones by 10-20% in the bore rifles and 10-15% in the .600.In my bore rifles, I only load a ball and not a heavy conical. That's ok in many folk's opinion. After all, most want to say they shot a 8, 4, or .600, just to say they did it. It is not the quality of the rifle nor it's history. Folks don't care my .500 was Jack Lott's rifle, my .450 no2 spent several decades at White Hunter's Africa Ltd., my .600 was owned by a well-known elephant hunter in the post WWII era, or the history of my .500 Holland Royal whose owner was speared to death by natives in 1907. No, folks just want to shoot a big rifle. If they were interested in quality doubles they would want to shoot a .350, .450-400, etc. So, to allow folks I don't know the experience to shooting the biggest doubles from the vintage years and to protect my investment (they are rather expensive) I download them. That said, many of my friends have shot full house loads with my rifles, but they are men with both experience to handle them correctly and the means and character to repair a damaged rifle. At last year's shoot a gent (who was with us this year) had my .600 double on him with full loads. 320 grains of IMR 4831 and 1800 grains of lead!!! He knows how to shoot and he held on to the rifle and kept his composure!

It was a pleasure to hold this shoot and I do hope others will fly up form the flat lands of the tropical lower 48 states and join us. Alaska has many fine collections and it's an honor to get together once or twice a year to play with our toys and let others do so, too.
Cheers, mates.
Cal

That's extreme generosity on your part, Cal, EXTREME generosity!

And yes, when buying a double, unless buying from a known, reputable maker with a long-standing history (you know the ones of which I speak...and yes, be prepared to parts with lots and lots and lots of $$$), go vintage. They're better made, anyway (better than anything new, from anyone). And, if you REALLY want something special, at an attractive price, look into the medium bore crowd. These are, in my opinion, the finest of the fine and are almost always less money than the classic heavies.
 
Gents:I will be moving my posts and threads to double rifles as that is where my stuff belongs.
See you there!
Cal
 
So my addiction strikes....

I have long wanted a rifle in the classic cal 404Jeffery and finally made the decision to order myself one. Sadly there is a fair bit of waiting for this rifle to arrive (4-6 months) but they say that waiting is good for you....

So what did I order?
A Mauser M03 Africa 404 Jeffrey LH with all the whistles and bells on it :)
Will be sporting a low powered 1-? illuminated reticle scope.
Been reading a fair bit about bulletchoices in the caliber and have more or less settled for either the NF cup point and softpoint or the a-frame and the new swift solid as combos to shoot in this rifle.

I ordered the rifle a few days ago so it will be a long wait I expect. I guess I will have some fun getting all the reloading gear, scopes etc sorted for it while I'm waiting.

The addiction strikes again...
Early this morning @hunthardsafaris ( thanks you bastard! :sneaky: )pointed out a nice ruger no1 in the interesting caliber 458 Lott. It looked so lonely in the pictures I decided it needed a new home where it could feel appreciated!
Said and done the ruger is now mine, just waiting for the license to come through.

I blame all of you for making me want more rifles in the big bore category!

Ruger one pictures, more to come when the rifle gets home.

8157699197.jpg
8119046265.jpg
 
congratulations on the new Mauser and Ruger! both the 404 Jeffery and 458 Lott are excellent proven DG cartridges that will serve you well.

as for bullets, both North Fork and Swift make excellent bullets so you really cant go wrong with which ever you end up with. I plan on using the 570gr Swift A-frame in my 505 Gibbs for a cape buffalo later this year.

-matt
 
Thanks matt,
The Lott will actually be purely for wild boar hunting over feed in the dark with a 7x50 illuminated Zeiss. Still hoping for that 600+ lbs boar to step out :)
Think I might try the 550gr Northforks for it to see what they can do :)

The 404 will be both a "backup" to my 470 and a rifle for driven hunting etc when the weather doesn't play along. For some reason I don't want to bring my double out into the snowstorms we can get here.

The 404jeff has long been a dream of mine so it feels very nice to be close to having it. I just love both the looks of the cartridge and the history of it.
 
ActionBob, catching up on post, congrats on the small army of RSM's you are collecting.
 
ActionBob, catching up on post, congrats on the small army of RSM's you are collecting.
Glad to have you back Enysse.
 
Count me in as another addict! I shot my Winchester M70 375 H&H for the first time today. Wow! My club has sand bullet traps and the 300 gr bullets made quite a dust cloud on impact. It felt more like calling in artillery than target shooting! The recoil was a little different than I expected. It was not a sharp jab to the shoulder like you get when shooting high brass 12 ga but it was certainly a very authoritative shove. So it was more of a total body recoil. Funny thing is that I can't wait to shoot this even more! I definitely need to get a better set of sticks because the Trigger Sticks collapsed after each shoot. The PPU ammo doesn't seem very good (no surprise given the price) but the Hornaday GMX shot well.

This site really needs some kind of warning posted that Africa hunting is highly addictive and soon that's where all your money will be going from now on! I've barely been back a month from my first trip and here I am buying a new rifle and putting a deposit down for a 2017 trip!!! :E Greedy:
 
Count me in as another addict! I shot my Winchester M70 375 H&H for the first time today. Wow! My club has sand bullet traps and the 300 gr bullets made quite a dust cloud on impact. It felt more like calling in artillery than target shooting! The recoil was a little different than I expected. It was not a sharp jab to the shoulder like you get when shooting high brass 12 ga but it was certainly a very authoritative shove. So it was more of a total body recoil. Funny thing is that I can't wait to shoot this even more! I definitely need to get a better set of sticks because the Trigger Sticks collapsed after each shoot. The PPU ammo doesn't seem very good (no surprise given the price) but the Hornaday GMX shot well.

This site really needs some kind of warning posted that Africa hunting is highly addictive and soon that's where all your money will be going from now on! I've barely been back a month from my first trip and here I am buying a new rifle and putting a deposit down for a 2017 trip!!! :E Greedy:

Well, I've already warned you that the .375 will lead to a bigger rifle, so don't complain about the next rifle!!! ;)

The .375 really is a long push. I would actually rather fire 20 rounds from the bench from that rifle than from my .30/06. By the 20th round I can feel the .30 more, which probably has to do with rifle fit more than anything.

Interesting on the ppu, my CZ shoots that stuff extremely well, but shoots Hornady (dgx), with a shotgun like pattern.
 
Well, I've already warned you that the .375 will lead to a bigger rifle, so don't complain about the next rifle!!! ;)

The .375 really is a long push. I would actually rather fire 20 rounds from the bench from that rifle than from my .30/06. By the 20th round I can feel the .30 more, which probably has to do with rifle fit more than anything.

Interesting on the ppu, my CZ shoots that stuff extremely well, but shoots Hornady (dgx), with a shotgun like pattern.

The long narrow powder colum of the original H&H version, not to mention almost no shoulder compared to the short fat powder column of all these Johnny-Come-Lately very "square shouldered" 375's might be one reason why the old H&H seems to "kick slower".
 
CorBon has alot of there big bore ammo on clearance right now for those of you who dont reload.
 
CorBon has alot of there big bore ammo on clearance right now for those of you who dont reload.

we already cleaned them out for the most part (i spilled the beans a few months ago). still some 416 RM, 470 NE, and 404 Jeffery ammunition left with good prices. their "DPX" bullet is just the Barnes TSX under Corbon's name.

-matt
 
The long narrow powder colum of the original H&H version, not to mention almost no shoulder compared to the short fat powder column of all these Johnny-Come-Lately very "square shouldered" 375's might be one reason why the old H&H seems to "kick slower".


Also this: when calculating free recoil energy, the ejecta mass is bullet weight plus 1.5X powder charge (varies somewhat depending on burning rate and bore diameter).

So, the powder charge has a disproportionate effect on felt recoil.

A powder hog's recoil seems to go up disproportionately because the ejecta mass is disproportionately powder (relatively speaking). Think jet effect.

This is why a 10% increase in muzzle energy from a 20% increase in powder charge increases recoil more than 10%.

That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

Tim
 
we already cleaned them out for the most part (i spilled the beans a few months ago). still some 416 RM, 470 NE, and 404 Jeffery ammunition left with good prices. their "DPX" bullet is just the Barnes TSX under Corbon's name.

-matt

Nice! I just ordered 70 rounds of 404 Jeff for the rifle I have yet to buy! lol

What our wives have to put up with!
 

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thriller wrote on Bronkatowski1's profile.
Until this guy posts something on pay it forward free I would avoid him at all costs.
sgtsabai wrote on Buck51's profile.
If it hasn't sold by next week I might be interested. Stock would have to be changed along with some other items. I'm already having a 416 Rigby built so money is a tad bit tight.
The35Whelen wrote on MedRiver's profile.
Hey pal! I'll take all the .375 bullets if they're available.
Thanks!

Cody R. Sieber
@DERIAN KOEKEMOER SAFARIS is proud to say that we are members of PHASA.
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