There were those that criticized the .480 Ruger as being nothing more than a over-blown, over-priced, over-hyped .44 Magnum since factory ammo delivered a 325 grain bullet at 1325 fps, something .44 Magnums have been doing since SSK introduced their sledgehammer cast bullets back in the 1980s. Arguments were raised that the .480 is of little value since the 454 Casull generates much higher velocities, and hence shoots flatter and hits with more kinetic energy than does the .480. Some wondered why, if Ruger was going to legitimize a new revolver round, why not just go with the known and respected .475 Linebaugh? And some defended the workman-like .45 Colt, which has been delivering a similar level of performance for years in strong, modern guns. Just like Disraeli's view of statistics, it's a question of how you choose to look at the issue. It's a question of perspective.

     OK, now let's look at the round: the .480 Ruger has a magnum length case of 1.29" (i.e. the same as the .44 , .41 and .357 Magnums), with a nominal diameter of .504". Ruger, Hornady and SAAMI settled on a peak operating pressure of 48,000 psi. Factory ammo is loaded with a 325 grain .475" diameter bullet leaving a 7 ½" barrel at 1350 fps. At first blush, this bullet might seem a little on the light side for the .475 bore since we're used to thinking in terms of 420-440 grain slugs in the .475 Linebaugh, but keep in mind the standard bullet weight for the .44 is 240 grains, and standard weight for the .45 Colt is 255 grains, so following that progression would lead to a standard weight of 270 grains for the .480. The choice of 325 grains is a compromise weight to keep recoil manageable, while still providing big game capability. A lot of American handgunners have developed a certain level of comfort/mastery with the .44 Magnum, and so Ruger chose to keep factory ammo at roughly the same recoil level.

     A lot of the criticism of the .480 Ruger cartridge seems to be aimed at the fact that it's not as powerful as the .475 Linebaugh. It's not, nor was it ever intended to be, nor does it really need to be. I think of this cartridge in a little different light. I view the .480 Ruger as being the .416 Rigby of the revolver world -- a large case, well-suited to moderate pressures, heavy bullets, and moderate velocities; not the absolute maximum that can be squeezed out of a holstered handgun, but rather a highly reliable big-bore sledgehammer. Coupled with 400 grain blunt-nosed bullets, this makes a hunter of the first water. Sure, in strong modern guns the .416 Rigby can be loaded up to modern pressure levels to make a .416 Weatherby, but the .416 Rigby can kill anything on this planet cleanly and it was intentionally loaded to moderate pressures to insure absolute reliability in the heat of the hunt. Likewise, the load data published by Hodgdon indicates that the .480 can be loaded up to a peak pressure of 48,000 psi to drive 405 grain cast bullets at nearly 1350 fps (http://www.hodgdon.com). But just like the .416 Rigby, the .480 Ruger is a formidable (and reliable) hunting weapon with 400 grain bullets loaded to more moderate pressures (35,000-40,000 psi). The value of moderate pressures for big game hunting loads has not diminished over the years, it's just that we don't hear much about it in this velocity-obsessed age of belted magnum mania.

     The importance of bullet weight to penetration was demonstrated by John Linebaugh as a part of his Linebaugh Seminar held in Cody, Wyoming (http://www.sixgunner.com/linebaugh/penetration_test.htm *Editors Note: This link is currently unavailable*, the results can be found here). In a nutshell, Linebaugh's results demonstrated once again that penetration of a non-expanding hard-cast bullet is a primarily a function of bullet momentum, which is the product of velocity times mass. In John Linebaugh's own words, "Velocity is constantly diminishing variable. Bullet weight is constant.", meaning for the hunter, penetration is a function of bullet weight first, and velocity second. This is a very simple and very valuable lesson when hunting large game with a revolver (the hunter of medium sized game, like deer and antelope, is probably better served with expanding bullets). Due to the space constraints imposed by a typical revolver's cylinder and the limited case capacity of revolver rounds, the heaviest bullets that can be effectively used in revolver hunting cartridges runs something like this:

     Therefore, in order to keep bullet length short enough to comfortably fit inside a standard length revolver cylinder, and still leave enough room for powder to operate at reasonable pressure levels, it is necessary to go to bullet diameters larger than .45 to get over 400 grains of bullet metal comfortably into a revolver cartridge.

     As is apparent from the Linebaugh data, a 400 grain .475" bullet at 1100 fps should provide very similar penetration to the heaviest 454 Casull load (360 grains), and considerably more than the popular high velocity 300 grain 454 Casull loads. Weight (more accurately momentum) contributes penetration depth, while the nature of the wound channel is a function of the meplat. The LBT .475 400 WFN, RCBS 475 400 grain SWC, Lee 475 400 grain FP, and NEI 475 TC (a shortened version of #357 with only 2 grease grooves, very reminiscent of the SSK designs), mould designs all combine these attributes very effectively.

     Hodgdon's loading data for the .480 Ruger (http://www.hodgdon.com) indicates that 405 grain cast bullets can achieve velocities in excess of 1300 fps from a 7 1/2" SRH and still stay within SAAMI pressure guidelines. I believe that the test gun used by Hodgdon was a "fast gun" as I haven't been able to reproduce their velocities with any given powder charge.

     Discussions with Taffin and several other .480 shooters suggest that my revolver is typical, and falls in line with their experiences. Load From a Disc calculations suggest that a 400 grain bullet at 1100 fps corresponds to a peak pressure of about 35,000 psi when paired with an "ideal" powder, and is in agreement that a 325 grain at 1325 fps corresponds to Hodgdon's measured peak pressure. Thus, I chose to target 400 grain cast bullets at 1100 fps for routine use in the .480 Ruger. In my gun, factory ammo provides case expansion of .509" and somewhat sticky extraction, the 1100 fps loads listed below give .508" case expansion (or less) and eject effortlessly, providing some element of corroboration to the theoretical predictions.