The Rumors From All Those Years Ago Really Were True

[Hunter-Habib]

My late friend, Tanzanian white hunter Terry Irwin often told me that the Winchester brand bullets for their .458 Winchester Magnum ammunition were inconsistently sized. And that this frequently impacted terminal ballistic performance. My white hunter Lionell Palmer told me the same thing during a Safari to Botswana in 1975. I didn’t actually think much about it, all these years until today.

A friend (who owns an FN Mauser Series 300 chambered in .458 Winchester Magnum) recently bought a ton of vintage ammunition at an auction. Amongst the ammunition variants, were pre 1969 Winchester Super Speed 500Gr round nosed steel jacketed FMJ solid factory loads and 510Gr soft nosed factory loads.

The powder inside the cartridges (Winchester ball powder) had predictably clumped (hardly surprising in compressed loads due to the .458 Winchester Magnum’s relatively small case capacity). So the bullets were pulled for reloading.

I remembered Terry telling me that he used to insert .458 Winchester Magnum bullets into the ogive of his rifle and found that the Winchester brand bullets used to go into varying depths (while those of Remington or Hornady brand were all consistently sized). So I asked my friend to run similar tests with two boxes of Winchester brand FMJ solids and soft points.

I was genuinely surprised to see that Terry & Lionell were right all along. The bullets really do go into different lengths into the rifle’s ogive. Even bullets found within the same box of cartridges. By contrast, Federal Premium Trophy Bonded Sledgehammer Solid 500Gr flat nosed factory loads had bullets which were all going into the same depth consistently. This explains why Winchester eventually gave up producing their own .458 Winchester Magnum bullets and began outsourcing from Hornady in 1970.

Aside from giving you all this historical anecdote, my point is this- A caliber is only as bad or as good as the bullets & powder which you load in the cartridge. Contrary to the hatred directed towards it in some circles, the .458 Winchester Magnum is not a bad caliber. And definitely can hold it’s own today (even though it’s not amongst my favorites). With proper bullets and powders, it can consistently be used against the Big Five of Africa without any ill effects.

Back in those days, our favorite recipe for the .458 Winchester Magnum used to be 500Gr Hornady bullets in fresh hand loads employing extruded powders (assembled shortly before the Safari and whatever was leftover after the Safari was always pulled apart for future use). Today, employing 450Gr-480Gr bullets in the .458 Winchester Magnum (along with modern extruded powders) has made it a very suitable contender for dangerous game hunting. The 450Gr Barnes TSX factory loading remains a personal favorite of mine for use against Cape buffalo or hippopotamus.

I’m definitely not asking any of you to have a new custom rifle built to order in .458 Winchester Magnum. But next time you see a beautiful rifle on the secondhand market which is chambered in .458 Winchester Magnum, don’t let the caliber deter you from buying it.

And please, for the love of God… if you plan on using vintage ammunition/bullets on a costly African Safari (especially for dangerous game hunting)… reconsider your choices very carefully. You are paying top Dollar to go hunt in the Dark Continent. The bullet is the only thing which actually touches the game. Invest in good quality fresh modern ammunition/bullets.

The Author With Cape Buffalo Shot By Him With Belgian .458 Winchester Magnum Boxlock Ejector Double Rifle, Ugalla Game Reserve, Tanzania (1978)

 

[HuntingGold]

Sir,
Thanks for sharing your knowledge and experience!

 

[Hunt anything]

Very interesting

 

[Est.1970]

Quite the variation in diameters!

 

[grand veneur]

@Hunter-Habib

Interesting report.

This problem was already reported on several times decades ago. The clumping of the powder, caused by extremely high compression loads used to try to achieve unrealistic muzzle velocities, combined with the poor quality of Winchester bullets, greatly contributed to the bad reputation of the cartridge 458 Winchester Magnum. The cartridge managed to hold its own despite everything, perhaps due to the fact that there were hardly any alternatives at that time. In the meantime, the current factory loads seem to be of good quality, and loaded with slightly lighter bullets, as you wrote, this cartridge can be optimized. Winchester ultimately got lucky with this cartridge. Nowadays, with a such designed cartridge, things would have turned out very differently.

 

[grand veneur]

A praise to the cartridge 458 Winchester Magnum in the Gun Digest of 1960. There was hardly any competition, as the classic dangerous game cartridges disappeared one after the other.

Gun Digest 1960 14th Annual Edition

 

[Sarg]

My late friend, Tanzanian white hunter Terry Irwin often told me that the Winchester brand bullets for their .458 Winchester Magnum ammunition were inconsistently sized. And that this frequently impacted terminal ballistic performance. My white hunter Lionell Palmer told me the same thing during a Safari to Botswana in 1975. I didn’t actually think much about it, all these years until today.

A friend (who owns an FN Mauser Series 300 chambered in .458 Winchester Magnum) recently bought a ton of vintage ammunition at an auction. Amongst the ammunition variants, were pre 1969 Winchester Super Speed 500Gr round nosed steel jacketed FMJ solid factory loads and 510Gr soft nosed factory loads.
View attachment 745642View attachment 745643
The powder inside the cartridges (Winchester ball powder) had predictably clumped (hardly surprising in compressed loads due to the .458 Winchester Magnum’s relatively small case capacity). So the bullets were pulled for reloading.
View attachment 745645View attachment 745646
View attachment 745644
View attachment 745647View attachment 745648
I remembered Terry telling me that he used to insert .458 Winchester Magnum bullets into the ogive of his rifle and found that the Winchester brand bullets used to go into varying depths (while those of Remington or Hornady brand were all consistently sized). So I asked my friend to run similar tests with two boxes of Winchester brand FMJ solids and soft points.

I was genuinely surprised to see that Terry & Lionell were right all along. The bullets really do go into different lengths into the rifle’s ogive. Even bullets found within the same box of cartridges. By contrast, Federal Premium Trophy Bonded Sledgehammer Solid 500Gr flat nosed factory loads had bullets which were all going into the same depth consistently. This explains why Winchester eventually gave up producing their own .458 Winchester Magnum bullets and began outsourcing from Hornady in 1970.
View attachment 745649View attachment 745650View attachment 745651View attachment 745652View attachment 745653View attachment 745654

Aside from giving you all this historical anecdote, my point is this- A caliber is only as bad or as good as the bullets & powder which you load in the cartridge. Contrary to the hatred directed towards it in some circles, the .458 Winchester Magnum is not a bad caliber. And definitely can hold it’s own today (even though it’s not amongst my favorites). With proper bullets and powders, it can consistently be used against the Big Five of Africa without any ill effects.

Back in those days, our favorite recipe for the .458 Winchester Magnum used to be 500Gr Hornady bullets in fresh hand loads employing extruded powders (assembled shortly before the Safari and whatever was leftover after the Safari was always pulled apart for future use). Today, employing 450Gr-480Gr bullets in the .458 Winchester Magnum (along with modern extruded powders) has made it a very suitable contender for dangerous game hunting. The 450Gr Barnes TSX factory loading remains a personal favorite of mine for use against Cape buffalo or hippopotamus.

I’m definitely not asking any of you to have a new custom rifle built to order in .458 Winchester Magnum. But next time you see a beautiful rifle on the secondhand market which is chambered in .458 Winchester Magnum, don’t let the caliber deter you from buying it.

And please, for the love of God… if you plan on using vintage ammunition/bullets on a costly African Safari (especially for dangerous game hunting)… reconsider your choices very carefully. You are paying top Dollar to go hunt in the Dark Continent. The bullet is the only thing which actually touches the game. Invest in good quality fresh modern ammunition/bullets.

View attachment 745655
The Author With Cape Buffalo Shot By Him With Belgian .458 Winchester Magnum Boxlock Ejector Double Rifle, Ugalla Game Reserve, Tanzania (1978)

Funny this, only last week I was shooting/testing the exact same vintage Winchester .458Win Mag ammo, it felt strong & shot very well to point of aim but was a bit light through the crony.

I haven’t shot any Big game with it but 100s with the White Box ammo, always worked well for me, much much better than the same vintage Remington, I think they were trying to ruin the .458Wins rep ?

But I tell you last season I shot a couple of big wounded bulls, one on dark heading into Croc infested swamp & had to stop him.

I was using a new box of Norma .458 Swift A Frames 500gr @ 2150-2180fps & it threw them to the ground like a normal .500NE, I was very impressed.

Do you want me to pull one & measure pill & powder ?

Also it sure as Hell wasn’t doing 2130fps as on box but it is very old ?

 

[Pondoro]

I have shot 4 ele with .458Win.. I used Federal factory from late nineties with 500 grain Woodie solids and compressed reloads with Hornady DGS solids. It works with modern powder/bullets, but I have landed on .375H&H, .416 Rigby and large bore double rifles.

 

[Hunter-Habib]

Funny this, only last week I was shooting/testing the exact same vintage Winchester .458Win Mag ammo, it felt strong & shot very well to point of aim but was a bit light through the crony.

I haven’t shot any Big game with it but 100s with the White Box ammo, always worked well for me, much much better than the same vintage Remington, I think they were trying to ruin the .458Wins rep ?

But I tell you last season I shot a couple of big wounded bulls, one on dark heading into Croc infested swamp & had to stop him.

I was using a new box of Norma .458 Swift A Frames 500gr @ 2150-2180fps & it threw them to the ground like a normal .500NE, I was very impressed.

Do you want me to pull one & measure pill & powder ?

View attachment 745716

Also it sure as Hell wasn’t doing 2130fps as on box but it is very old ?

View attachment 745717

@Sarg

I'll actually take you up on that very considerate offer (for research purposes). Can you check one yellow box of cartridges and see if all the bullets go into the same depth of your rifle's ogive ?

The white box will definitely NOT have any undersized bullets. Because these were produced from 1982 to 1994. And Winchester was already using using .458 caliber 500Gr Hornady bullets starting from 1970 (which were all consistently sized). The problem only manifested itself in the bullets which Winchester produced in-house (pre '69).

 

[Mark A Ouellette]

@Hunter-Habib and All,

If your photos of the bullet (projectile) in the bore are from cartridges out the same manufacture's lot, that is pretty darn extreme! Way back when the bullets were made, maybe there were those significant ogive variances in each lot.

This could have been a big factor in the reported low muzzle velocities of some .458 Winchester ammunition.

Alternatively, could cartridges in the subject box have been mixed and matched over the decades since manufacture, i.e. a combining half boxes of ammo together in one box? Its all the same .458 Win ammo, right? Think "chain of custody" in an investigation...

If the cartridges are from different lots, the variance would affect the freebore resulting in different maximum chamber pressure. That pressure should however have been measured during a manufacture's lot sample test.

Unless bullets projectiles are turned on a CNC lathe, one will find SMALL variances in the front ogives. In normal manufacture cup and core bullets, ogive variances are common.

When setting up bullet seating dies, a comparator in used to measure the maximum cartridge length and the the bullet seating depth is set to the desired freebore.
https://www.hornady.com/reloading/p...s-and-gauges/lock-n-load-bullet-comparator#!/

For normal hunting and target shooting small variances in ogives resulting in small variances in freebore will produce acceptable extreme velocity spreads and group sizes. The amount of freebore will affect maximum chamber pressure. The variances caused by small ogive differences of the same lot of bullets is not significant.

For benchrest and long range shooting be it target or hunting, obviously smaller or no ogive variances are better.

Additionally, if one weighs each bullet in a box there are usually small variances of a half grain or so from lightest to heaviest. This in most cases produces acceptable accuracy at normal hunting ranges.

Even with variances in freebore, when the bullet is swaged into the rifling lands, that is when chamber pressure peaks. As the bullet travels down the barrel, the "closed cell pressure vessel" increases in size and pressure drops, even as powder continues to burn. Higher pressure makes powder burn faster which is why the pressure curve peaks as the bullet starts it swaging, i.e. more pressure results in faster powder burn raising pressure even higher...

The resulting pressure curve combined with the bullet weight, bullet hardness, friction in bore, and probably a few other factors combine to produce muzzle velocity. Consistent muzzle velocity is desired for accuracy.

Example of Rifle Barrel Pressure Curve vs. Bullet Velocity​

 

[grand veneur]

People in the past had a more relaxed view of such things than we do that nowadays, regardless of the caliber. Even if all bullets in the same series had the same diameter, which was also not always the case, there were often significant variations depending on the manufacturer. There were concepts, there are no longer ours, regarding the ratio of bullet diameter to barrel diameter. Back then, all bullets were designed with a much thinner jacket than today. The bullets adapted to the barrels, but it is sure that precision and accuracy was another matter. One must always put oneself back in time and consider the concepts of that past eras, especially regarding rifles and ammunition. Much of it is no longer comparable to our concepts nowadays.

 

[pilar]

I probably don’t know dukey, but 60 year old ammunition imo should be considered for the trash bins, I had some M1 30 carbine and British 303 WW2 vintage ammunition that was garbage ( corrosive primer and stick propellant that looked like sawdust)
That ammunition has reached the expiration date by 40 years?

 

[Mark A Ouellette]

I probably don’t know dukey, but 60 year old ammunition imo should be considered for the trash bins, I had some M1 30 carbine and British 303 WW2 vintage ammunition that was garbage ( corrosive primer and stick propellant that looked like sawdust)
That ammunition has reached the expiration date by 40 years?

Sometimes…

The old .458 Win with compressed powder charge is great to pull the bullets, dig out the powder with a large wood stick from those big cotton swabs, pop the primers and reload the brass. The bullets are for practice.

I’ve shot .30 US Government otherwise known as .30-06 from the 1950’s that performed as intended. Proper storage history is very important for old ammo.

Your mileage may vary

 

[Hunter-Habib]

@Hunter-Habib and All,

If your photos of the bullet (projectile) in the bore are from cartridges out the same manufacture's lot, that is pretty darn extreme! Way back when the bullets were made, maybe there were those significant ogive variances in each lot.

This could have been a big factor in the reported low muzzle velocities of some .458 Winchester ammunition.

Alternatively, could cartridges in the subject box have been mixed and matched over the decades since manufacture, i.e. a combining half boxes of ammo together in one box? Its all the same .458 Win ammo, right? Think "chain of custody" in an investigation...

If the cartridges are from different lots, the variance would affect the freebore resulting in different maximum chamber pressure. That pressure should however have been measured during a manufacture's lot sample test.

Unless bullets projectiles are turned on a CNC lathe, one will find SMALL variances in the front ogives. In normal manufacture cup and core bullets, ogive variances are common.

When setting up bullet seating dies, a comparator in used to measure the maximum cartridge length and the the bullet seating depth is set to the desired freebore.
https://www.hornady.com/reloading/p...s-and-gauges/lock-n-load-bullet-comparator#!/
View attachment 745722

For normal hunting and target shooting small variances in ogives resulting in small variances in freebore will produce acceptable extreme velocity spreads and group sizes. The amount of freebore will affect maximum chamber pressure. The variances caused by small ogive differences of the same lot of bullets is not significant.

For benchrest and long range shooting be it target or hunting, obviously smaller or no ogive variances are better.

Additionally, if one weighs each bullet in a box there are usually small variances of a half grain or so from lightest to heaviest. This in most cases produces acceptable accuracy at normal hunting ranges.

Even with variances in freebore, when the bullet is swaged into the rifling lands, that is when chamber pressure peaks. As the bullet travels down the barrel, the "closed cell pressure vessel" increases in size and pressure drops, even as powder continues to burn. Higher pressure makes powder burn faster which is why the pressure curve peaks as the bullet starts it swaging, i.e. more pressure results in faster powder burn raising pressure even higher...

The resulting pressure curve combined with the bullet weight, bullet hardness, friction in bore, and probably a few other factors combine to produce muzzle velocity. Consistent muzzle velocity is desired for accuracy.

Example of Rifle Barrel Pressure Curve vs. Bullet Velocity​

View attachment 745724

Mark,

Your educational insight is always highly revered by me.

But I have one observation. The Remington, Hornady & Barnes Origanal brand .458 caliber bullets from the 1960s were always consistently sized (they would all go the same depth into the rifle’s ogive). So it appears that the sizing inconsistency was limited to Winchester ?

The phenomenon completely disappeared when Winchester quit making their own .458 bullets and began outsourcing them from Hornady in 1970.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Wow that is almost scary to think of the varying performance those would have exhibited. Nice to have modern manufacturing practices.

 

[grand veneur]

I probably don’t know dukey, but 60 year old ammunition imo should be considered for the trash bins, I had some M1 30 carbine and British 303 WW2 vintage ammunition that was garbage ( corrosive primer and stick propellant that looked like sawdust)
That ammunition has reached the expiration date by 40 years?

Not absolutely. It is sure, one must be careful and know where the ammunition comes from and how it was stored. Pulling bullets for looking inside a few cartridges can also reveal something about the condition of the ammunition, like it was quoted in our discussion. Unfortunately, that says little about the condition of the primers. I certainly would not fire old 458 Winchester Magnum ammunition for the know reasons quoted above.

By the way, Cordite ages extremely bad, so one must be very careful with such ammunition; however, 458 Winchester Magnum cartridges were never loaded with such a powder.

 

[Bill_D]

Would be interesting to shoot these through a chronograph…

 

[Sarg]

Well I must be a Heretic as I shoot a lot (I live in the country) almost every day & have lots of old rifles & old ammunition, some even loaded with Black Powder !

I put my earmuffs & shooting glasses on & shoot it off, I reckon 85-90% goes bang, if anything fails it is always the primer, very rarely the case & that is with hugely deteriorated cases (old obsolete rifles with dodgy chambers doesn’t help) & very stupid to even try, which i wouldn’t these days .

From 1880 Black Powder rounds, tons of military 6.5x53 7x57 .303 .30/06 & 8x50R.

6.5x53R has a high fail rate & it is flake powder, it is the primer the fails to ignite, I have never had Cordite fail, I don’t know why anyone would say it does, obviously doesn’t actually know, even if poorly stored from 1916-18 only the primer lets it down, I know because I pull it restack the strands into a new case with fresh primer & it fires !

Old powder normally still ignites, the primer & to a lesser extent the case on old ammunition is the weak link, I shot ancient .577 Snider ammo, pulled the slug & used new case with old gravel looking powder & shot it off, had significant power still.

I’ll be shooting this all off to shortly.

@Bill_D I did, very consistent, averaged around the 1985fps & all fired nicely & shot well, much lower than the on box advertised 2130fps but I have killed a lot of Buffalo & Bantang with 500gr bullets at 1850-75fps wouldn’t try a head shot on a Elephant with them !

 

[grand veneur]

Primers often fail by such actions, and sometimes pieces of the shells must be pulled out of the chamber. This should not happen while hunting DG, but it is not a major problem at the shooting range. I know all this because I have also often used old ammunition, especially 8mm Lebel, and sometimes even stocks from the WWI.

Regarding Cordite, it is known that this powder ages extremely bad and increases its explosive power in the process. I got many old cartridges loaded with Cordite with my DR caliber 577 Nitro Express and many of which were in poor condition. Since everything came from Nairobi and I don't knew the storage conditions, I destroyed all the suspicious cartridges. I held a lot of old Cordite that showed the typical changes: dry and brittle cords in comparison to the brown, slightly greasy cords, when they are in good condition. I destroyed all of this powder on a military site. I could have blown something up with it, but some people had already warned me before I detonated it. That did not stop me from firing a few rounds 577 Nitro Express loaded with Cordite myself, but the danger posed by the old Cordite should not be underestimated.

However, the cartridge 458 Winchester Magnum was never loaded with Cordite, so this danger does not exist with old ammunition.

 

[Sarg]

@Sarg

I'll actually take you up on that very considerate offer (for research purposes). Can you check one yellow box of cartridges and see if all the bullets go into the same depth of your rifle's ogive ?

The white box will definitely NOT have any undersized bullets. Because these were produced from 1982 to 1994. And Winchester was already using using .458 caliber 500Gr Hornady bullets starting from 1970 (which were all consistently sized). The problem only manifested itself in the bullets which Winchester produced in-house (pre '69).

Ok my friend, I tried all the 8 rounds I have left in the two .458Wins I have here & all went exactly the same amount into each muzzle.

All measured exactly .452 just in front of the case mouth & the pulled bullet was exactly .458 at the base.

Powder was free flowing (as I thought) no clumping & weight 67.5gr, which admittedly certainly isn’t a heavy load & could explain the sub 2000fps velocity ?

Oh bullet weight is exactly 510grs
Of note is it doesn’t look to be a Winchester Ball Powder either & these are genuine all the same factory loaded rounds.