✅ SOLVED Bullet help

[TNGUNS]

Found this in an area where I have dug Merrill Carbines and a 3 ringer but not sure what it is. Of coarse it is fired but seems very heavy for caliber. It is only 45 caliber.




Is this a percussion cap....the ears are rolled up unlike others I have dug and seen.

 

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[TheCannonballGuy]

Your bullet is a US .45-70 Springfield Model-1873 Rifle (also called "Government" Rifle) bullet. Your specific version of .45-70 bullet was first manufactured in 1873, and continued into the very early 20th-Century. Because the .45-70 "Government" Rifle was (and still is) so popular with civilian game-hunters, .45-70 ammo is still being manufactured today. Modern .45-70 bullets are copper-jacketed. Yours appears to be really-old lead, so it dates from the early period, rather than being a modernday copy. (You can buy modern molds to make all-lead .45-70 bullets.)
.45-70 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I'll include a photo of two varieties of 1870s/1880s fired-but-undamaged .45-70 bullets, dug at the Indian-Wars era Fort Custer practice range, so you can see what your bullet would look like with almost no impact damage. Based on the amount of lead your bullet shows above the three body-grooves, I think you found the long version, which is called a .45-70-500, with the "500" part referring to the weight of the cartridge's gunpowder charge).

The other object you found is the copper jacket from a "partial jacket" bullet (the bullet's lead nose is not covered by the copper jacket). It got stripped off the bullet's lead body by impact, which curled the copper jacket's front edges back.

 

[TNGUNS]

U R tha Man CannonBall. Think you are dead on on the bullet. I have worked in and around the gun industry for many years. Been forturnate enought to dig lots of CW relics and knew it was very heavy for caliber. Plus the only thing I could find in 45 cal was a Whitworth variant with lube rings but not heavy enough for that little monster.The copper item does not appear to be a bullet jacket. No rifleing and is swelled at the base more than I would expect especially to get jacket seperation. Extremely uniform for it to have been an impact. I does measure .30 so may be rifle jacket. Sorry my pics are pretty rough. You may be dead on, just doesn't look similar to what I have seen in past. Would be an awful heavy jacket which could be why it stayed so uniform. Thanks for the input. See if I can't get out today and find one that will stump ya. Unlikely.

 

[TNGUNS]

Crow Eating Time

You are dead on CannonBall. Cleaned a little more and used some magnification and the rifleing marks are there. Man you are amazing with your ID's.

 

[releventchair]

TNGUNS, looks like tophat style cap. Musket style, dixie gunworks should still sell them. TheCannonball Guy, no disrespect , 45 cal,70 grains of powder,500 gr.bullet. 500 gr. Of powder Won,t fit case,would be surprised if bullet could be seated over a hundred gr. Charge.even though case looks like something from oscar meyer.

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

Releventchair wrote:
> TheCannonball Guy, no disrespect , 45 cal,70 grains of powder, 500 gr.bullet.

You are correct... and I knew it. [Deep red blush of embarrassment on my face.] I inadvertently transposed the bullet-weight and powder-weight, because I tend to remember such details less clearly when I post after midnight. I should have gone to bed and posted my ID of the bullet this morning, after the coffee took effect.

I appreciate your good manners in phrasing your correction gently. Having said that, I want you (and other readers here) to know that I do not take Fact-correction as disrespect. When somebody posts proof that a statement I made is Factually incorrect, that person did me a favor. In a now-dead internet forum, my signature-line was "The man who proves that I am in error has helped me, not insulted me." People who choose that view of Fact-corrections will accumulate a lot more knowledge than people who do not.

 

[attempted recovery]

Releventchair wrote:
> TheCannonball Guy, no disrespect , 45 cal,70 grains of powder, 500 gr.bullet.

You are correct... and I knew it. [Deep red blush of embarrassment on my face.] I inadvertently transposed the bullet-weight and powder-weight, because I tend to remember such details less clearly when I post after midnight. I should have gone to bed and posted my ID of the bullet this morning, after the coffee took effect.

I appreciate your good manners in phrasing your correction gently. Having said that, I want you (and other readers here) to know that I do not take Fact-correction as disrespect. When somebody posts proof that a statement I made is Factually incorrect, that person did me a favor. In a now-dead internet forum, my signature-line was "The man who proves that I am in error has helped me, not insulted me." People who choose that view of Fact-corrections will accumulate a lot more knowledge than people who do not.

cannonballguy,


I have been monitoring this site for a couple of years, and to say the least i am amazed and impressed with your knowledge, you are one of the very few on this site that keeps me wanting to come back to this site to see what you have to say about " an item", thank you cannonballguy for sharing the knowledge with me.