I have had a number of requests about reloads for the 444 and the 375BBs. Even though I have written about these two fine calibers before it was always from the perspective of the rifles they are chambered. Lets take a look at them from the other side.....reloading first.....

One of the unmentioned facts about these two rounds is the cartridge cases themselves. There are three ultra strong rifle cartridge cases manufactured today...the Winchester 220 Swift..the 375 Winchester Big Bore case and 444 Marlin cartridge case.....plenty thick and plenty strong.....

As much as I am not in love with muzzle energy figures...because like most I feel they can be misleading....I do think they give us a good point of comparison with known calibers that have been tested on the heaviest and biggest game. For example, energy figures fail when we look at a hot loaded 22 centerfire giving 1500 ft. lbs and a 30-30 giving 1500 ft.lbs, and we know generally the 30-30 is a deer and black bear killer and the 22 centerfire is not. Yet we can compare the 45-70/400 grain bullet with a muzzle velocity of 2100 fps and 4000 lbs of punch to the 458 Winchester’s African load of a 500 grain bullet and 4875 ft.lbs...they are close and with the rightly constructed bullet we know the 45-70 can easily take the same animals the 458 does....

And I think it is imperative that we understand that bullet construction be matched to the animal hunted. Speer for example manufactures a 300 grain bullet they call a soft flat point...but this bullet is more like a solid because the jacket goes all the way up and around the nose, thou it will expand at reasonable velocities....Speer also suggested that 55.5 grains of H335 will push this bullet to over 2200 fps. That is over a ton and a half of muzzle energy with a bullet that will take any thin skin game animal alive if we do our part. And that load is safe in the Marlin 336/444.

Yet Richard Lee’s book MODERN RELOADING...tells us that 57 grains of the same powder will generate only 39,600 cup...around 37,000 psi. From my long barreled Marlin 444 (24 inch) that load gives 2300 plus fps...and 3500 plus ft. lbs. of muzzle energy......a standard rule for heavy thick skin game is around 4000 ft pounds.....but again it is the bullet we need to worry over. I would have no problems hunting the big bears of the north with 330 grain hard cast bullets at over 2000 fps from the 444. And I feel the big bears are the premier dangerous game animals in the world bar none....when you get the awesome power of a 1500 lb bear with the ruthless aggressiveness in his character, even the vaulted 500 lb African cats can’t compare. And the bears have an agility that the elephant and the Cape buffalo can’t come close to. You add those characteristics together and you have a killing machine that is hard to stop. But that 444 load will stop them...when we do our part.

Pressure works like this...take our load above, it runs 37,000 psi, and the base size of the 444 case (not the rim but just before it) is .465 parts of an inch. That’s what caliber is...parts of an inch. So you multiply .465 by 37,000 and you get 17,205...that is 17000 plus pounds of pressure that the bolt face gets hit with every time we pull the trigger with that load. That’s why we need to know the strength of the leveraction rifle we are using....by far the 444 Winchester Big Bore will sustain 50,000 psi over the Marlin’s 40,000 psi limits....that’s over 23,000 pounds against the bolt face of the Big Bore per shot.

If I could get a cast bullet mold of 350 grains to 375 grains in the LBT style in .430 cal., I would push the bullets hard cast at 2000 fps and hunt the world. Now that Verl Smith is out of business, I wish that Lee would pick up the LBT style...they would be perfect in design...weight...and price. Lee would sell multi-thousands of them...

I have been using Cast Performance .430 caliber heavy weights...325 to 330 grains. We attempted to stop one with over 40 inches of wet telephone books....at 2000 fps it sailed right thru....back to the drawing board. The radial wound pattern in the books was over 2 ½ inches all the way.

Once years ago while shooting with Jim Taylor using a 340 grain SSK designed 45 caliber bullet from my Freedom Arms 454 at 1600 fps. I broke the leg off a steel pig that was securely welded to a steel base. At 100 yards plus...you can imagine what it would do at 2000 fps plus....like the 330/.430 from a 444 leveraction.

The all around jacketed bullet I like from the 444 is the 265 grain Hornady flat point (#4300). Deer...black bear...elk...and if I had nothing else in the gun and a moose got in the way, I would take him too. I can easily push this bullet in the Marlin with 53 grains of ReL#7 to near 2400 fps....and almost 3400 ft.lbs. Think for a moment what does the .308 push the 220 grain softnose bullets at....? Around 2200 to 2300 fps tops....anyone ever say that we shouldn’t use the .308 on heavy game like moose? Yet this 444 load surpasses even the .308....and is even with the 30-06 and the 220 grain softnose loads in muzzle energy. And these are comparable.

Yet the argument out there is these large bore leveraction rounds are brush gun loads..how demeaning. The 265 grain 44 bullet has a B.C. of around .200 to .210 or so....with a 2400 fps muzzle velocity and a 3 inch high at 100 yards it is down a little over a foot at 300 yards (15 inches at actual target). Brush gun my butt....! By the way it is carrying more energy at 300 yards then a 44 mag 240 grain commercial handgun load at the muzzle. And the 30-06 220 grain load with a 3 inch high at 100 yards is down ....12 inches at 300 yards.....my..my. Yes after 300 yards the 44 caliber bullets really begins to drop off. But three hundred yards is a very far piece...most game is shot a great deal closer. So if you are going sheep or antelope hunting take a .270 or some such...for really extended range. Anything else can be taken a lot closer than 300 yards....

Winchester loads shouldn’t be mixed with Marlin loads....don’t fire Winchester loads in the Marlin. Some of these loads are top pressure in my rifles...so you have to go slow....in reloading.....start at the very least 10% below....

Range cattle are not huge as cattle go...Brahma and Black Angus top them by as much as a third in weight. And you can’t go around shooting other folks cattle in Az...it’s called rustling or poaching......but back in the late 1970s before the dog food companies moved in, TexMex or wild feral cattle, were not wanted on the range. Ranchers didn’t want there $25,000 Angus or Brahma females impregnated by these rangy, yellow beef bulls....and until the dog food companies started buying up these beasts, we were able to shoot them off the range. Now the meat wasn’t wasted....it may not have been good enough for five star restaurants but the native schools sure took care of it...those kids didn’t mind their burgers a little chewy.

We once took the shoulder bone and knuckle out of one we shot and removed all the meat and weighed it...it was over 20 lbs. I have had both cast and jacketed bullets from the 444 go completely thru both shoulders on these big beasts. And they run from 1000 lbs to 1500 lbs. Brush gun...that term hits my gag response....almost as badly as the word clinton or algore....

If I ever went back to Africa...and the only thing that stops me is money...or the lack of it. I would certainly take two leverguns with me...a 444 and a 375 BB.....the third would be a handgun...454 Freedom Arms.

Why the 375 BB? Because there is a bullet being manufactured when pushed from the Winchester Big Bore rifle with top loads would be deadly on all thin skinned game up to several thousand pounds in weight. Speer’s S/Spitzer 235 grainer is a top bullet for the levergun....I flatten the tip so it can be loaded in the tube. A simple load of 35 to 36 grains of ReL#7 gives 2100 plus fps from my rifle...and that’s Speer’s suggested load and at 45,000 psi or so it’s well below the top loads for the Big Bore. This bullet has a B.C. of .317 again at 300 yards with a 3 inch high at 100...it is down 14 inches. And still carrying near 1100 foot pounds of energy....about what a 240 grain 44 mag handgun gives at the muzzle. And that is not a top load.....

This is a tapered bullet with a soft point. I tap the point with a small hammer to make it flat so it can be used safely in the tube magazine. ReLoader #7 seems to be made for the 30-30 class of cartridge cases...and the 38-55 or 375 cases are no exception. The bullet created for the 375 Leveraction was the 220 grain flat nose....I’ve worked up to 40 grains of ReL#7 in 38-55 brass and 2311 fps and over a ton and a quarter of muzzle energy. Another good load for larger deer and black bear....

I was asked that if the overall length of the 375 cartridge loaded, had to be around 2.56 inches, then how would the longer 38-55 brass help. Mainly because the 375 Win/leveraction brass is so thick...the 38-55 is not and will take about 3 to 4 grains more powder. Even so the 38-55 brass is plenty strong. I have been using heavy loads in my Winchesters with this brass for 20 plus years and yet to have a case failure from pressure. When considering large animals like big elk and moose, I have loaded the 235 gr jacketed bullet to 42.5 grains of ReL#7 in 38-55 brass. This gives both my rifles just under 2400 fps and 3000+ lbs. of energy! Anything in the Americas will fall to this load...remember we are talking about the Winchester Big Bore model 94 leveraction. It was built to take a lot more pressure then the standard 94...but the ammo producers are keeping there ammo down to the standard safe pressures for the standard 94....

One of the things I do at gun shows is too check out any molds for sale. Usually they are relatively cheap and you can sometimes get some good ones. Also NEI for a few years produced a mold that you put a pre cut jacket into and then the lead...and you cast a jacketed bullet at around 240 grains...I still have mine and still use it. It’s a killer of a bullet because you can cast soft lead, and push them at 2200 to 2400 fps and no leading....41 grains of ReL#7 gives 2260 fps from my 20 inch rifle. I not only never lost a game animal hit with this load...but I have never had one go beyond about fifty yards. That soft large nose just transmits fantastic amounts of shock.

I got a hold of an old Lyman/Ideal .378/300 grain mold that was pitted. Very carefully on a drill press I ran a .375 drill (3/8ths) down to the crimp groove, cleaning out the lube rings. Then cutting 3/8ths inch tubing to length to fit the new cavity...the tubing cutter leaves a flange that the lead forms around and you can’t shoot the lead out of the jacket....all this is easily available. I buy only straight tubing...not the coiled stuff..I can’t seem to get the coiled straight enough again even for short pieces . It sure beats the prices of jacketed bullets. I can make about 400 for the price of 50 cheap jacketed bullets from any ammo producer.

One of the other loads I have fun with is taking two .378 lead, hard cast balls, at 80 grains each putting them over 3 grains of Bullseye gives around 990 fps.....that’s 160 grains at that velocity...anyone say 38 special power...and quiet. I load one ball into the case mouth put a dab of lube over it and load the next one on top of it. I have gone to 5 grains of Bullseye and 1352 fps...does need a good lube...but it is an excellent rabbit load...and other vermin...two legs or four.

I have found that 4198 powder(IMR) is also very good...I have a 155 grain Lyman mold...cast hard with 35 grains of this powder I can send this bullet at over 2600 fps and a real flat trajectory. Winchester back around the turn of the century... before and after, produced ‘Gallery Molds’...multi cavity cuts....I have one that was manufactured in 1898, a seven cavity beauty. Bought it at a gun show for $40...it drops 250 grain bullets....and I can make hundreds in no time. The bullet is very accurate...in both my .375s and from a Marlin 38-55.

My accuracy load for the recut mold’s 300 grain plus jacketed bullet, is 36 grains of H335 it gives 2020 fps...and near one hole accuracy at fifty yards...only an inch and a half group at 100 yards, three and a half inch group at 200 yards and five inches at 250 yards....gads that’s good for peep sights.

This bullet was inserted into the butt...a very big butt at that...of a feral bovine bull in 1982 that was really fouling up a number of Black Angus breeding cows that belonged to Stuart Anderson, the restaurant owner and pure beef cattle producer. I was asked to eliminate the problem.

At well over 125 yards I caught him sniffing around one of the breed cows.....The bullet cut his tail almost in half, going in...it ripped a four inch radial wound channel from the top of the hams to the front of the back legs (20 plus inches), then coned down to three inch radial thru to the back of the left lung along the bottom of it, and out the lower chest with a two inch exit. The animal turned at the shot...surprised....suddenly put it’s head down and fell. Never gaining it’s feet again...the cattle scales topped it 1800 plus lbs....it’s the biggest critter I ever took with this round...but it shows what the 375 and the right reloads can do. That load gives just over 3000 lbs of muzzle energy.

I shot a Cape Buffalo with the afore mentioned solid 300 gr 375 from the double rifle. The bullet went high but thru BOTH shoulders. With both shoulders shot he came after me...at fifty yards I shot him again, aiming for the nose but was high again and the bullet went in below the boss of the horns..it turned him slightly to my good fortune. Because instead of ramming me head on, he hit me with his shoulder as he went by...I went a good 10 feet into the brush. He stopped to find me, but couldn't see me....I reloaded faster then anything else I ever did in my life up to that time.....I finished him with two 300 grain soft noses...one in the butt and the other in the chest when he whorled around fully. That one ruptured the spine...

It's like getting sideswiped by a taxi cab...I was in bad shape for about two weeks. Remember that AZ feral bull's shoulder knuckle at 20+lbs? Can you imagine what a cape buffalo's shoulder knuckles must be like, and the 300 grain full patch went right thru both! The whole point of this trip down memory lane is that the 375 Winchester BB loaded with a 300 grain bullet can be pushed to 2100 plus feet per second. Not far from the velocity of the old cordite 375 H&H. Of course the H&H is loaded to a lot higher velocities today.

I'm not touting the 375 Winchester levergun as an African rifle for very heavy thick skinned game....I'm trying to show it's a lot more powerful then some kind of deer and black bear/short ranged woods gun, like a pregnant 30-30. Which you always read when a report is written about it. But never the real potential of the cartridge handloaded with today's components. In so many cases the rifle and cartridge is blamed for ineffective game harvesting...when it is the bullet that is a fault.

Just like my near disaster with the buff because I used solids and didn't hit the spine...it was the wrong bullet. I'm sure a soft nose 300 grain into the shoulders that day would have slowed him way down...probably to his knees. Certainly the two I did put into him changed his attitude quickly....

The only thing I don't like about the older Big Bore rifles was the stock, it was made high combed for scopes...that was always swapped out quickly...I can and do use scopes on leverguns without high comb stocks. I prefer peep sights on leverguns...almost exclusively. But I also like the idea of being able to put a scope on a Winchester or Marlin levergun if it's going to be needed. I have a 7 Waters that I turned into a scout gun. Even though it was angle eject and tapped for a scope over the action...I mounted the scope on the barrel. It's set so I can keep both eyes on the target and bring the gun up into the line of sight and the scope is on the target. With a very little practice it is very fast....

And that's the neat thing about peep sights...I especially like Ashley Outdoors Ghost Ring sights....they are fast and they hit right on target when I do the things I'm supposed to do...and they are made for just about any rifle...even for bolt actions (ugh)...and handguns...

The 375 like the 38-55 will give very good accuracy with mild loads also...many large capacity cartridges are hard to get decent mild loads in the handgun power ranges. But not these two...I like Bullseye...but WW231 and other fast powders do just as well. If you put a small amount of Dacron or pillow stuffing over the powder charge holding it against the primer. Some of the medium pistol powders like 2400 are also excellent...I won't use medium loads with powders like WW296 and H110 because Winchester states it is dangerous.

18/2400 under a 265 grain cast bullet will push it at around 1600 fps...and 22 grains will give it several hundred fps more...but with excellent accuracy and very little recoil. Yet we are talking muzzle energy in excess of the vaulted 44 magnum. And certainly with better range abilities....Both brands of 4227 will do about the same...and you can even get fairly mild loads out of 4198 with accuracy. The 38-55 original ballistics were around 1600 fps on the high side...so it's not unusual that these two would give good accuracy with these types of loads. Perfect for the youngster on his first hunting trip...or someone unable to handle recoil, yet where reasonable power is needed.

I have another NEI mold that casts a 260/265 grain bullet...actually it is two molds..because the nose is cast separately in soft lead....then the nose is placed in the second mold and the bullet’s body is cast in hard lead around the soft nose. Giving a soft nose cast bullet that won’t foul at higher velocities...neat! And they work real well...I cast a dozen or so soft noses for hunting, but cast the rest for practice out of straight hard lead...

One writer...I disremember who...wrote the 375BB was only 10 to 15% more powerful then the 30-30...he was comparing factory ballistics of the 375BB against reloads in the 30-30...that’s a tacky comparison...

The only way to test a hunting load is to harvest an animal then check the remains of the bullet for performance, and do a postmortem on the wound channel. With the 375BB and the right bullet for the animal you have a very powerful and efficient game getter in a compact, slim and easy to tote rifle. 10% more powerful then a 30-30...give me a break! 3000 lbs of muzzle energy with top loads and the right bullet, will take any of the plains game and much of the rest in both America and Africa! The 308 has to stretch to get to 3000 lbs......!!!!