A friend is looking to use a Model 71 in Lever Silhouette and is looking for suggestions on a reduced load. There's not a lot of info out there. Lyman has a bit, Speer manual has nothing on this limited cartridge. Any info on experiences, starting point or other suggestions would be appreciated.

Ken

Ken Waters put together some CAST bullet reduced loads for the .348 and published the data in his 'Pet Loads'.
If you can't obtain a copy of the work, I can try to get it to you.
I owned a .348 and used it a good bit back about 30 years ago; but I loaded for hunting and not for targets so I never tried for reduced-power loads.
Mine was an early Winchester. Nice gun but not exciting for accuracy. I've 'heard' -- without personal experience -- that the Japanese/Browning rifles made more recently shoot pretty well.
Keep in mind that this case was developed from the .50-110. (.50-100?) I'd think that you'd want to be VERY careful loading 'light' with that much capacity -- especially with any of the slower powders...
Daniel T -- are you on here?
(If Theodore doesn't respond, I'll ask him for you. He's been playing BPCR with some unusual combos and may have tried some smokeless loads along the way.)
FWIW, I used to load some pretty mild stuff in a .33 Winchester M86 with 3031 and that worked well. The .33 -- a .45-70 derivative IIRC -- has significantly less capacity than the .348.

Thanks Nomad. I'll try to search the web for Ken Waters info.

The rifle in question is the Japanese Browning. I've shot it with factory loads and it's pretty accurate (as far as off hand goes) but it does kick.

My friend was thinking along the lines of SR 4759 powder to fill the volume, but couldn't get any info. Wish he had internet access. I hate to be the go between on areas I'm not real familiar with.

Ken

He tried some loads today. 27gr of 4759 with 200gr heads was looking pretty good.

Did he chrono that?
It would be interesting to hear what he's getting...
Some day I want to put together a .50 Alaskan. (But I don't think I'll use it for silhouette very much!) lol

Said he would chrono the load next week and sight in for animals next week. I'll let you know what he finds

Ken

Used 28 gr of 4759 with a 200gr jackedt head. Avg fps was 1920

Thank you.
That's appreciated.
Ernie

Take a look at this from Accurate Powder, the have light load of 5744.