Any Forum Members Into Wildcatting

This is pretty interesting! How do you form your wildcat cartridges with OTS dies?
 
Sweet! What can you tell me about the 50 Dislocator? What gun shoots it, and what projectile and velocity do you get?

Also that 25 RUM reminds me of this

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The 50 Cal I use 500 S&W dies
The first die is for the neck and shoulder and the second is a gutted die for full length sizing
The 338 Edge I use 338 RUM & 375 RUM dies Made with 300 RUM brass
The 6.5 RUM I use 6.5 WSM & 7 RUM dies Made with 7mm RUM brass
The 25 RUM I use 25 WSSM& 7 RUM dies Made with 7mm RUM brass
The 6mm Mach IV I use 243 WSSM & 264 or 7mm Win Mag dies and brass
The 6mm-06AI I use 6BR dies and any 06 based brass
The 6.5 X 55 I use 6BR dies and 6.5 X55 swede brass, you can get Lapua brass for $70.00 per 100 It is the first case Lapua ever made, I like this case because it holds almost 10gr more powder than a 308 based case and still fits in a short action, and is always in stock even nowadays.
The 22 X 55 I use 22BR or 223 WSSM dies 6.5 X 55 brass it has to be necked down to 6mm first then 22cal.
I think I got everything if not let me know if you have any other questions.

Dean

Fascinating stuff!

How do you chamber barrels for your wildcats?
 
What kind of velocities are we talking about? What kind of bullet drop? Intrigued, so far, although the only wildcatting I've done was to hook up with some cougars.
 
I've messed around with wildcats as long as I've been into contenders. Some include the 30 Herrett, 357 Herrett, 7 TCU, 309 JDJ and 375 JDJ. All of them in pistol configuration with 14 in barrels except the Herretts, they are 10 inchers.
 
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I had to learn reloading when I inherited my grandad's closet.

* 1917 Eddystone in 35-Whelen Improved.
* 1885 Winchester High Wall in R2-Lovell (it's a wildcat of a 22-3000 which is a wildcat of a 25-20SS)
* 30-40Krag: Not a wildcat, but the selection of ammo is piss poor so I load my own.
 
The 22 cal sends a Sierra 77gr HPBT over 4000fps, 26" 12 twist
The Mach IV sends a 105gr Amax over 4000fps and a 58gr Vmax over 5000fps, 30" 12 twist
The 25 RUM sends 85gr Noslers over 4700fps and 100gr noslers over 4300fps and 70gr blitz kings over 5000fps 30" 14 twist
The 338 Edge sends a 160gr Barnes TTSX Over 4200fps 32" 10 twist
There is no bullet drop until almost 500yards.

Dean

PS: you should see the vapor trail these things leave it looks like a tracer round.
DAMN!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
For the first 500 rounds it is a match target rifle, then from 500 to 750 it is a good Varmint rifle, then from 750 to 1000 it is a hunting rifle, then I take the barrel off, cut an inch off they chamber end, and rechamber it you can do this 5 or 6 times, the rifling does not really wear out just the throat, that is why I start with a 30" barrel. when I first shoot it, it is a 1/4 moa then by 500 it opens up to over 1/2 moa and by the time I reach 1K it is over 1 moa.

Dean
Does it regain 1/4 moa after you cut it and rechamber it?
 
There is a guy at my club who always has something interesting in wildcat cartridges. One of his favorites is in .14. I believe that one is a necked down .223 case. I supply him with IMI cases because he said they are the best for that one. He has had them with a 4400 fps at the muzzle, but they were disintegrating before they got to the target so he had to slow them down to around 4000.
 
I have a Wildcat reloaders bible that was a friend's. Pretty amazing what can be made if you're so inclined.

-Proud to be dad every day, a licensed plumber most days, and wish I was a shoemaker on others.
 
The 22 cal sends a Sierra 77gr HPBT over 4000fps, 26" 12 twist
The Mach IV sends a 105gr Amax over 4000fps and a 58gr Vmax over 5000fps, 30" 12 twist
The 25 RUM sends 85gr Noslers over 4700fps and 100gr noslers over 4300fps and 70gr blitz kings over 5000fps 30" 14 twist
The 338 Edge sends a 160gr Barnes TTSX Over 4200fps 32" 10 twist
There is no bullet drop until almost 500yards.

Dean

PS: you should see the vapor trail these things leave it looks like a tracer round.

Holy shit!!!!!!
 
The 22 cal sends a Sierra 77gr HPBT over 4000fps, 26" 12 twist
The Mach IV sends a 105gr Amax over 4000fps and a 58gr Vmax over 5000fps, 30" 12 twist
The 25 RUM sends 85gr Noslers over 4700fps and 100gr noslers over 4300fps and 70gr blitz kings over 5000fps 30" 14 twist
The 338 Edge sends a 160gr Barnes TTSX Over 4200fps 32" 10 twist
There is no bullet drop until almost 500yards.

Dean

PS: you should see the vapor trail these things leave it looks like a tracer round.

Do you get more than 500 shots before a barrel is shot out? Ha.

This is amazing performance. But people should understand that when you push a small bullet out of a huge case full of powder, barrel life is a fraction of a more standard caliber. The sad thing is I bet some of those .25s are a real pleasure to shoot in volume.
 
For years I shot a 270 Ren. in Hunter Pistol silhouette. That was a .22 Hornet necked up to .270 and shortened to the same length as a .375 Mag.. It was a pain as the hornet brass is very thin and if not aligned exactly you could crumble a case like a newspaper page. I used 90 grain Sierra HP and it shot well but noisy. Finally sold it!
 
Great points Dean.

Its one thing if your throat is shot out and you need to buy a new $400 barrel.

Its another if you just cut an inch off the chamber end, recut the chamber, and rethread the outside of the bbl.

For those that don't know, a good .308 barrel has a useful life of 6-8000 rounds. At least thats what Lilja told me.
 
Do you get more than 500 shots before a barrel is shot out? Ha.

This is amazing performance. But people should understand that when you push a small bullet out of a huge case full of powder, barrel life is a fraction of a more standard caliber. The sad thing is I bet some of those .25s are a real pleasure to shoot in volume.

True, but these are bolt rifles. When I had my Savage 308 and 7.62 x 51 was cheap I used to shoot that thing a "ton" in relative terms and by the time I got rid of it I don't even think I had put 700 rounds through it. The "barrel burning" stuff, IMHO, is a much bigger consideration for a gun that you're going to be blowing off 200 rounds in a sitting (eg like an AR-15) vs under 100.

-Mike
 
Ah No, The throat erosion is accumilative over time each round adds to the "Burn" doesn't matter if is 10 rounds over fifty sittings or all at one time.

I understand that- What I was talking about was vs time. If I have an AR-15 over a 5 year interval and a bolt rifle over the same interval, the AR is going to have a lot more rounds put through the pipe because of the nature of the beast. Unless you've got a hard core competition thing going or you're retired and you hit the range with the gun 3 times a week, round count isn't going to accumulate as fast.

-Mike
 
I agree with you to some degree.

I had a bolt .223 and shot that thing thousands of times. It was nothing to shoot it 100+ shots in a sitting. If it had detachable mags, I'd have shot it even more.

In contrast, I'm lucky if I shoot my Mosin 20 times in a sitting simply because it beats me up.
 
I understand that- What I was talking about was vs time. If I have an AR-15 over a 5 year interval and a bolt rifle over the same interval, the AR is going to have a lot more rounds put through the pipe because of the nature of the beast. Unless you've got a hard core competition thing going or you're retired and you hit the range with the gun 3 times a week, round count isn't going to accumulate as fast.

-Mike
Indeed. It's not uncommon for a serious shooter to blast off a couple hundred rounds via an AR in one sitting...that's ten loaded mags. Not so common with a scoped bolt gun where there's generally more care and effort put into each shot.
 
Do you get more than 500 shots before a barrel is shot out? Ha.

This is amazing performance. But people should understand that when you push a small bullet out of a huge case full of powder, barrel life is a fraction of a more standard caliber. The sad thing is I bet some of those .25s are a real pleasure to shoot in volume.
I would think the barrel life is really kind of a moot point, since you have to make your own barrels to take the odd cartridges anyways.

As the OP said, you just rework your own barrel again.

Too much work for my taste, but pretty damned cool.
 
great boobies!

have you tried different barrel manufacturers, button rifled vs hammer forged vs drawn rifling?

With length reducing, i'd assume that should change barrel harmonics. Do you see that as an issue, do you develop a new load for the new length or does it even matter?
 
I under stand usesing a few reamers for saving cost on stuff your testing out .
But why not get reamers made if ur gonna keep shooting the same round and rechamber it?

Honest question.
 
most reamers are 100-200, I'd imagine a quality made reamer costs like 5-10x that.

I don't understand how people rent reamers. Reaming chambers is not exactly something you just pick up in an afternoon and there is some learning curve that would make a big difference later.

Your machinist friend should try making a custom reamer. That would be very cool and definitely a challenging precision job.
 
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