500 S&W Velocity

[Dog214]

I was curious about the kind of velocity others are achieving with 350-grain Sierra JHPs. I am loading with H110 and CCI LR Mag primers. I am shooting a Taurus Raging Hunter with a 6.75" barrel. I am in the low to mid 1600s. Is this about average? When I loaded a bit hotter, still within the Sierra Manual recommended load data, I started to get casings a bit sticky in the cylinder and was not gaining much, if any, velocity. This is significantly lower than the "advertised" velocity in the manual. I realize they may have used a 10" barrel or even a carbine, which is why I am posing this question to get real-world velocities with the same length barrels so I can have a more apples-to-apples comparison. Any information you may have would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

 

[Bulletman]

They used a 10.7" length barrel so that's part of the velocity differentiation. I know from experience that a HARD crimp on this cartridge usually increases velocities, sometimes substantially.

 

[Dog214]

Interesting and thank you for the reply. I was actually gonna get into that next. I was wondering what effect the crimp had. I am new at straight wall and crimping in general. I have been handloading for about 30 years, but always bottlenecked and never needed to crimp. I know in a previous post I have been advised multiple times to be sure to crimp due to the recoil of this round etc. That said, can you over crimp? Is there a standard other than appearance to know what is the correct amount vs too much and to little.

 

[WV Hitman]

I'm not an expert on velocity, chronos, etc. That said, I've loaded for & shot hundreds of head of game with my .500 Raging Bull, .500 Smith, .475 Linebaugh, .454 Casulls. I look at the loading data in Nosler & Hodgdon manuals & load 2-3 grains below max. Not scientific. Sure, but I've never had cases stick or signs of overloading with the primers. I don't want max loads. Too hard on the gun.
I'm sure I'll get some adverse comments about this, but my 1 shot brown bear, 2 shot rhino, hundreds of deer, turkeys, groundhogs all with straight wall cases died pretty quickly.
I use Lee dies for all these revolvers that includes crimps with the seating die. That works pretty good on every case that has a cannular. The ones that don't I buy a separate Lee crimp die for that caliber.
"Cheap" Lee dies. Not quite. I've used them...along with others, for 50+ years of reloading. I trust them.