Magna-port a 4" 44 Mag?

[cal44mag]

Alaskan Ironworker,

To answer your question on the lead shaving thing, take a look at the front sight on cal44mag's gun. You can see the lead on the side of the sight base and on the insert. My experience, thats just a few shots too, or the gun was sort of cleaned. It takes a good bit of work to get the lead off.

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Right. Maybe 1/2 a box of shots at the time of the picture. I did partially clean it, but didn't try to scrub it completely.

Not sure if it's lead however, or just burned powder. Never felt any shaved lead.

It's really not much worse than trying to clean the area around the front of the cylinder holes on any stainless revolver.

 

[darkcloud]

I had a 425 Tracker that was factory ported. It made recoil manageable for its purpose and that was a "never leave it in the truck sidearm in bear country". The grips it came with helped in the comfort department and I would think required to prevent nerve damage if shot much. The real issue was it was OMG loud with hot handloads for "protection" purposes. Porting works wonders but be reminded those sound pressures go to the side and back and not forward and away. I shot it one time just to know what it was like should I ever need to discharge it to save my sorry carcass. Trust me once was ENOUGH to know!

 

[AK103K]

I definitely get lead on mine, and its a pain to get off. I usually "push" the bulk of it off with the tip of a brass slotted tip. The fouling usually wipes off with Hoppes, but there is usually a significant bit of lead there too.

Plated bullets reduces this considerably. I still get powder fouling though, and some copper from the bullets. Nothing like the lead though.

 

[Ramone]

Back in the mid '80s, a friend sent a Python off to be Mag Na Ported, and I ( and he ) found it a great improvement. I probably only put about 30 rounds through it before, and about the same after, but I found the reduced muzzle rise a lot more comfortable than itsi previous handling. It wore rubber grips, if that makes a difference.

 

[BSA1]

Not splitting hairs. I'm taking your words literally.

So are we friends again?

 

[CraigC]

Not sure if it's lead however, or just burned powder. Never felt any shaved lead.

Probably mostly bullet lube.

So are we friends again?

Were we ever not?

 

[BSA1]

Were we ever not?

 

[jamesjames]

may i suggest something for the other end of the gun? Karl Nil grips are over-sized and come in a cover-the-backstrap version. I bought a pair for my 629 trailboss and carved&sanded them down carefully until they were a custom fit to my hand. broader rear surface distributes recoil over wider area into the web of the hand. Helps to tame recoil.

If you want excitement, try buying a new pair of grips for $200 and carving them down to fit your hand. Now that's taking a walk on the wild side!

 

[1MoreFord]

I have four compensated pistols from my IPSC days and one ported Dan Wesson revolver. All of 'em reduce felt recoil and muzzle rise. Recoil/muzzle rise is a function of the burning gases from powder combustion. It you vent some upwards it doesn't contribute to recoil anymore so recoil is reduced in proportion. I don't find vented pistols to be that much louder either but then again I've been using hearing protection. My .44Mag Dan Wesson should not be shot with lead bullets because of the barrel and shroud situation. The compensated pistols have Ten's of thousands of rounds of lead bullets through them.

 

[mcb]

Preface this statement with the realization that internet discussions of recoil always seem to turn into a burlap bag full of angry bobcats...

Ports in pistols (and shotguns) really can't reduce recoil impulse (change in momentum) much. Look at the proportion of mass in the bullet vs the mass of propellant. You can't do anything about the recoil impulse of the bullet that is simply physics. The bullet leaves with X amount of momentum and you can't change that unless you change the ammunition.

In a 44 Mag your propellant is roughly 10% of the mass of the bullet. Now the propellant usually contributes more to the recoil impulse than just it weight percentage since a fair portion of the propellant leaves the barrel faster (and some slower) than the bullet. A common accepted estimate for a handguns is ~1.5 times the propellant mass is typically used. So a 240gr bullet pushed by 24gr of H110 propellant, the propellant only contributes ~13% of the total recoil impulse or ~ 24% of the free recoil energy.

A real world muzzle break or porting is never going to redirect all the gas sideways (thus eliminating all the recoil contributed by the gas) you always have some gas escape with the bullet out the muzzle. Even a brake/porting that directs some of that gas backwards angle in the direction of the shooter to increase efficiency even more is not going to to eliminate all the recoil from the gas due to some always exiting the muzzle. So in this example it is nearly impossible to achieve even a 13% reduction in recoil impulse from a ported barrel.

Now keeping muzzle rise from happening breaks/ports on a pistol do that fairly well and that can have its own positive effects on felt recoil while not actually reducing recoil impulse significantly simple do to better ergonomics of recoil

Recoil impulse = change in momentum = mass times velocity, a simple number that just tells you what the ammunition is producing.
Free recoil energy = the kinetic energy the gun would have due to recoil if fired with nothing touching it, see ballistic pendulum. This number is nice as it account for the difference if recoil energy due to the weight of the gun firing it in addition to the mass ejected.
Felt recoil = nobody knows since it is very subjective to the user's own perceptions.

-one rambling bobcat...

 

[BSA1]

Many years ago Guns & Ammo magazine conducted a test proving the effectiveness of Mag-Na-Porting revolvers.

They set up a Ransom Rest with a large chart beside it with different degrees of angles drawn it so when looking sideways you could see how much the barrel rose when a round was fired in the gun. As I recall they tested several unported guns, photographed and recorded the guns showing the degree of the muzzle rise. They then sent the same guns to be Mag-Na-Ported and then repeated the same tests with them. The tests clearly proved and showed the reduction in the muzzle rise.

I keep wondering why The American Handgunner does not repeat this test. My guess is since Mag-Na-Porting is not the latest, greatest thing in the world of plastic frame pistols it isn't worth the ink.

 

[CraigC]

No one doubts that it decreases muzzle rise but that's not recoil. Porting just redirects recoil forces, it does not mitigate them. Rather than contributing to muzzle rise, recoil is more straight back into the shooter, increasing muzzle blast and recoil into the palm. In other words, there are no free lunches.

 

[BSA1]

Yep.

Reducing the muzzle rise helps to get back on target quicker. Mag-Na-Porting, Pro-Porting, rubber grips are not a substitute for practicing with magnum loads