Hand Loads for Ruger 77/357

[vlavalle]

I have owned a 77/357 for about 5 years now. IMHO, 1-2" groups, depending on the load, are what you can expect fron any pistol- caliber carbine/rifle. My best load for my gun uses a 158 gr. SP/HP loaded over 16 gr. of H110; this load averages 1740 fps with an SD of 6 in my rifle. It consistently averages 1" groups at 50 yards. If you need better accuracy than this, you need to look at a true rifle caliber. The stubby, poor ballistic coefficient bullets used in a .357 Magnum will never equal the long-for-caliber, high ballistic coefficient bullets designed for rifle calibers. That said, this is still one of the most fun rifles that I own. If I want to hit the 12" steel plate at 1,000 yards, I use my Masterpiece Arms BA in 6.5 Creedmoor. Once I've doped the wind correctly, it can hit the steel with every trigger pull.

Impressive shooting! And the Creedmoor caliber is quite powerful also. But it is a bit silly comparing medium powered handgun ammo (.357 Mag) with a high powered rifle one. Although, there are exceptions, and that is when you get up into the very high powered handgun 'cannons' like the S&w .460, and the S&W 500, and the new handgun 'King', the .500 Bushwacker. While these do not have quite the same velocities as high powered rifles, they can come close (the S&W .460 at 2,200 fps and 2,300 for the Bushwacker vs. 2,700 fps for the typical Creedmoor).

This is all in my ballistics file.

 

[the_leper_colony]

... and the new handgun 'King', the .500 Bushwacker...

Yeah, that one will be about as useful to most handgun shooters, as the .700 Nitro Express is to most rifle shooters! But where there's a will (and a big enough budget), there's often a way!

As always IMHO, FWIW, YMMV, etc., etc.