.454, .460 for personal protection?

Load it with .45 Colt self defense loads, not that hard... Federal,Winchester, Remington, and Hornady make such loading as well as others.

labnoti said:

Ok, I know it's practically absurd,

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Could have stopped there.

There is no scenario I can possibly think of where 454 or 460 magnum would be nessecary or appropriate for home defense. Even at starting loads both will be excessively loud, and likely over penetrate. Using 45 Colt or 45 Schofield ammo is about your only chance to deposit a slug in a home invader and not have a pass through. Maybe a fracturing bullet loaded light would do it, but in any of those situations, a 460 magnum gun isn't warranted.

A 45 Colt is a much better choice unless your home is being robbed by a dinosaur.

My ears hurt just thinking about it.

labnoti said:

Ok, I know it's practically absurd, but suppose a person wanted to consider one of these big revolver loads for home defense

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Tell the person it's practically absurd.

A 41 or 44 mag with full loads is absurd for people defense.

If that's what the guy has use 45 Long Colt defense loads, full weight bullet about 1000 fps.

I'd be more inclined to use my 460 mag as a club than shoot it inside my home.

And a fine club it would be.

I own both and would rather have either than nothing

Yes it is absurd and E. Cowboy had the answer.

JR24 said:

My ears hurt just thinking about it.

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HUH? I can't hear you............

Then there is the scenario where you need to take out the block of the intruder's 1972 Chevy pickup truck, I might want my 460XVR in hand.

My 8-3/8" 460XVR is a bit unwieldy for a home defense gun. The four or five inch versions may be better but they are still a big revolver.

I'd not feel under gunned in my house with a 45 Colt N-frame or 44 Special L-frame.

That's kind of like saying would a AA Fuel Dragster be OK to take down the street to the market for a quart of milk? Sure....you COULD do it, but there are LOTS better options out there. Come to think of it....I bet the drive-thru at McDonalds would just love a fuel car to cackle in then have the driver try to yell his order over the noise. That would be sweet!

I would go with something lighter and handier, like an 1903 springfield for instance.

My SRH in .454 is about as unwieldy a handgun as one can get...the X-frames are even bigger. At least in .45 Colt recoil is "combat controllable" . In .454? I better hit my attacker well with the first shot because it's recoiling towards the sky in a hurry. If I had no other choice then I would look for a bullet that'll handle the speed of a 10 yard impact without a surface disintegration.

CAN it be done? Absolutely. SHOULD it be done? If nothing else is on hand that is better suited to the task, then yes. WOULD I do it or recommend someone else do it? Not unless there is no other option available.

Hopefully you will be able to get the perp to politely wait a few minutes while you put in your hearing protection, put some glasses on to reduce the flash and call your neighbor so they can climb in their cast iron bathtub before the bullet comes hureling through their walls.

Simply put, there isn't a load for those fire breathing monsters which will perform anywhere near ideally in a man-sized target at HD ranges. You're either running light-for-caliber bullets at insane velocities which will cause them to come apart, or using appropriate bullets which will most definitely over-penetrate a somewhat normal sized human being. Either way, you're also dealing with tremendous recoil, muzzle blast & flash, none of which are conducive to effective self defense. I don't even want to think about the misery of touching off a .454 or .460 inside my bedroom, let alone without hearing protection.

For a defensive handgun, it really doesn't make sense to step beyond the .357 mag/10mm auto power level.

I have a .454, I have multiple .44 mags. My HD pistol is a suppressed Remington RP45 loaded with 230 gr. JHP.

What's with the half measures? Step it up to .500 mag!

The only answer I can think of is use 45 Colt ammo I loads. Anything else would be, ummm, completely absurd.

If you missed it would certainly scare the cra* out of the intruder.

I could see it being used as home defense, if one lived in Alaska, and the possibility existed that a home intruder might be a grizzly bear.

> How would you load it

One of my ancient "Gun Digest" type books has an interesting article on the .38-200 and .455 Webley cartridges. The author said they were developed by Enfield Lock using feedback from combatants in various parts of the British Empire.

What the reports showed was that the most effective loads were low velocity with heavy bullets. The best results seemed to be with a velocity of around 800fps and the heaviest bullet that would fit.

While this is the exact opposite of modern Armerican thinking, the Brits came to that conclusion by trial and error in actual combat, not shooting goats or ballistic gelatin.

If I was using a .454 or .460 for defense, I'd think about having Mountain Molds make up some 400 or 450 grain wadcutter molds, cast some soft lead bullets, and load them down to 800-ish fps.

TRX said:

What the reports showed was that the most effective loads were low velocity with heavy bullets. The best results seemed to be with a velocity of around 800fps and the heaviest bullet that would fit.

While this is the exact opposite of modern Armerican thinking, the Brits came to that conclusion by trial and error in actual combat, not shooting goats or ballistic gelatin.

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I believe they were limited to non-expanding bullets, per the Hague 1899 convention. They tried to justify the use of "dum-dum" bullets but failed, so they were stuck with non-expanding bullets. We are not limited, so higher velocity bullets that expand are available to us to use.

Blanks

Have you shot a 454 in a revolver? How fast can you recover from the first shot? I shot the round in a rifle and that experience convinced me I did not want to shoot multiple rounds through my revolver. Fortunately I have a 45 mag cylinder and I like that round. I was using a 1400 lb. round bale as a backstop. You should have seen the stuff pop out of the back of that bale. That 454 did not even pause to say, "Excuse me".

Make sure you keep your ear muffs and sun glasses next to them in the nightstand and you should be all set!