Thinking outside the box

Ok, this is for those with ton's more expirence than I (not like that isn't hard). There are a couple folks here, dartfreak I do know have done this, that have taken rounds smaller in diameter, and with the use of sabots, loaded them in a much bigger case.

Hawcer, you may know with the large bore AR as you have a 450 bushy, Reload3006, you may know with your years of reloading expierence, and to others that I have not really gotten to know all that well yet,

Do you all think that it would be possible to take a sabot designed for a 50 caliber muzzle loader, load a .452 diameter bullet (kinda like Hornady XTPs are saboted for muzzle loaders now) and then load the sabot .452 into something like the 50 Beowulf case and saftly shoot it?

If so, how does one come up with load data for this? I am aware that .500 bullets are plentiful, not really all that expensive, well yea it is lol, however, I was sitting here looking at this bag of sabots that I have for both .452 to 50 as well as .430 to 50 and wondered if a person could do it without suffering loss of accurasy or distance....

Well... what say you?

I have never done it. I am not sure that it would be imposable. But I am not sure either that the sabot for a muzzle loader would take the pressure that you would be putting on it. But then again people paper patch bullets up to diameter so I dont think you are entirely off base. IT can be done.

I don't see why not with a round like the Beowulf or 450 Bushy. Both are right on par with 50 cal ML ballistics.
I looked real hard at doing this, just haven't tried it yet.

# things to be cautious of...

1) A flash hider might grab the sabot as it exits the barrel and cause the sabot to separate from the bullet prematurely and cause poor accuracy or damage to the flash hider.

2) Cartridge powder has different burn characteristics than black power...so heat damaged sabots my result in poor accuracy of become lodged in the barrel.

3) The high pressure of gas entering the gas port on the barrel might burn off a little of the sabot base as it passes the port and can plug up the gas system.

I would start with trying to duplicate the ballistics of a 100gr ML charge...most modern MLers can be loaded up to 150gr....so 100gr should leave you with plenty of headroom to work with.

I think...but could be wrong on this....muzzle loaders use a much slower twist rate than cartridge rifles. So keep that in mind also.

hawcers made a good point you can not use any type of muzzle break or flash supposer with sabots if im not mistaking the company i bought mine from says not to!
the other thing you may run into is feed problems! im not sure how well they will feed!

hawcer wrote:I don't see why not with a round like the Beowulf or 450 Bushy. Both are right on par with 50 cal ML ballistics.
I looked real hard at doing this, just haven't tried it yet.

# things to be cautious of...

1) A flash hider might grab the sabot as it exits the barrel and cause the sabot to separate from the bullet prematurely and cause poor accuracy or damage to the flash hider.

2) Cartridge powder has different burn characteristics than black power...so heat damaged sabots my result in poor accuracy of become lodged in the barrel.

3) The high pressure of gas entering the gas port on the barrel might burn off a little of the sabot base as it passes the port and can plug up the gas system.

These are rather compulsory things you need to remember !

I have shot lots of .30 cal sabots shooting .223 bullets from my various .30 caliber guns.

My favorite .30-20 (.32-20 with a .308 bore) and .30 Herrett will both group about 1.5" at 100 yards shooting 55 gr mil surp pulled M855/SS109 bullets.

Same warnings about flash suppressors and muzzle brakes from the manufacturer of the sabots. Also from the manufacturer of the muzzle brakes and flash suppressors who also advise against gas checked bullets.

A few years ago I was involved with a multi branch service attempt to convert Barrett M82/M107s to fire saboted SLAP and SLAP-T rounds.

Barrett specifically advises not to shoot either version of (or any) saboted rounds in their rifles due to the muzzle brakes. Well the Army and Marine Corps just had to try and a couple Jarines got hurt when parts of the sabot got ejected to the side from the soup can-sized muzzle brake.

The Army took the muzzle brakes off and tried to shoot the M82/M107 without a break which caused some personnel injuries.

Muzzle brakes and sabots just do not mix well.