S&W Bobcat???

C

Coolray

New member
A friend of mine says he was given one of these. It is supposed to be a .357 8" bbl (He thinks its a 629) that has an extra cylinder that is a .44mag with Sabboted .357 bullets. I have not seen this gun yet and I'm supposed to get some photo's especially of the .44mag cylinder and ammo. The round is supposed to be .44 mag with a nylon/plastic sabot and 158gr .357 bullet

The .44 mag cylinder is .44 on the brass end and .357 on the bullet end. Sounds very odd to me.


Has anyone ever heard of one of these?
 
M

mikey357

New member
Gee, sounds almost like the old .357/.44 Bain&Davis...not known to work real well in DA revos, the cartridge (a .44 mag "necked down" to .357--REALLY--!!!) attained somewhat of a "Cult" status used in Ruger SA's in Kali during the late 60's-early 70's...sounds like a problem (or problem{s}) waiting to happen, if you ask me....mikey357
 
J

Jim Watson

New member
I recall reading about these years ago. The gun had a .357 barrel and a .44 cylinder. It was a standard .44 Mag cylinder and was not ".44 on the brass end and .357 on the bullet end". The nylon sleeve was not actually a sabot. The brass WAS necked down from .44 to .357. The plastic sleeve went on the OUTSIDE neck of the case to make it fill the standard .44 chamber. This was supposed to give the case volume of the bottlenecked round, but without the problem of the bottleneck case backing up and binding cylinder rotation. The nylon sleeves might split on the first shot or they might be reusable. Getting a supply of them for any amount of shooting would be a real problem.

There was another version in which the brass was NOT necked down. There was a bushing or sleeve, not exactly a sabot because it did not go through the barrel, that fitted INSIDE the .44 brass and held a .357 bullet. Upon firing, the sleeve moved forward against the breech end of the barrel, closing the gap and centering the bullet into the barrel. Original sleeves were brass, later ones were plastic. You could probably have a supply of this type made up without too much cost.

The .357-.44 Bain & Davis was the .44 mag necked down to .357 and shot in a .357 cylinder that had been rechambered for the bottleneck case. No sleeve or bushing adapters were required, but that would give the appearance of a cylinder " .44 on the brass end and .357 on the bullet end." It required the usual care in degreasing chambers to be able to shoot a bottleneck round in a revolver.

You might could use the first two types with their different sleeves in the same gun, but the B&D with bottleneck chambers is entirely different.

All, especially the Bobcats with sleeves, are pretty advanced handloading projects. I would hate to have to reinvent the wheel with any of them and not have the original articles and loading data to read.

Bobcat guns could be either .44 Magnums 29 or 629 with .357 barrels or .357 M27 or M28 with .44 cylinders. The barrels would have to be refitted for the longer cylinders either way.

A Bain & Davis would be a M27 or 28 .357 rechambered. But it worked better in a single shot like a Contender .

You could probably build the same thing on a Ruger.
 
W

WESHOOT2

New member
KNOW WHAT IT IS

BUT suggest it's just a hobbyist's esoteric cartridge to brag about, because we've got the handgun-cartridge field pretty much covered (although the 41AE really needs to be more widely accepted).

Kindalika9x25inawheel.
 
S

ShootistBob

New member
.357/44 Bobcat cartridge

I own a Blackhawk revolver that was converted to this wildcat cartridge, and love it. Despite what you may read in other chat rooms, this cartridge does not use sabots, and is not made to fire from a 44 Magnum cylinder. The original conversion required boring the chambers of the .357 Magnum cylinder (either original or replacement) to .44 caliber, except for the front of the chamber, which remained .357 caliber.The PVC collar around tne top of the cartridge was to eliminate the problem encountered with the .357/44 Bain & Davis cartridge, which tended to stick in the chamber when the brass expanded the bottleneck after firing. The PVC collet doesn't allow the Bobcat brass to expand against the metal chamber, making it easy to eject the spent brass. The collars are mandatory for reloading and shooting these cartridges. I looked for years to find a supply of these collars, and even considered making some myself. Thank god that I found a supply of the original collars. Making the collars from PVC tubing would not be that easy,since the original collars are beveled inside both ends to fit snuggly over the bottlenech portion of the case. Since these collars can be used over and over (even when they crack on one side), I will never use them up in my lifetime. I had considered selling some on Ebay, but they have too many rules about reloading components. This cartridge can be loaded to produce muzzle velocities of up to 2400 FPS. I load my target loads to 1750 FPS, and there is virtually no bullet drop at 50 yards.
 
I

IraIII

New member
.357/44 bobcat cartridge

Hi, I am new to this forum so please point me in a better direction if I get sidetracked. I am interested in rechambering a S&W 28-2 I have. I was going to go with the .356 GNR wildcat which is from Gary Reeder, but the .357/44 bobcat is very interesting. The .356 GNR is based on a necked down .41 mag case. Is there anyplace to get the collars for the bobcat. If I am correct you use a .357 cylinder and ream it to .44 mag case size, but leave the barrel end at .357, could you use a .44 mag cylinder and reduce the length to .357 cylinder dimensions? Would there be too much pressure loss, also the possibility of chambering a .44 mag and trying to send it down a .357 barrel not good. I am interested in any feedback I can get on this, as this is something I think would be a hoot to shoot.
 
J

Jekyll

New member
.357 Bobcat is a great cartridge that was touted in the early 80's. You need to have your gun modified to accept this. One of the prime candidates was/ is the Ruger Blackhawk in .357 because it was one of the few revolvers with enough beef in the cylinder to maintain strength after reaming the chambers out to .44. I bought a convertible Blackhawk (.357 and 9mm cylinders) specifically for this purpose. The 9mm was intended to receive the Bobcat modification and I would have the 2 cartridges available. I ended up spending a lot of time out of the country in the service and never got around to it. Maybe someday! I was a little worried about availability of the collars.
 
C

crowbeaner

New member
The 357/44 Bobcat was the design of a fellow named Bob Booth back in the 80s and written up in Shooting Times magazine. It was the 44 mag case necked down to 357 and a polycarbonate sleeve was installed on the shoulder to make up the difference in the diameters. His gun was a convertible 357/9mm Ruger NM Blackhawk with the 9mm cylinder rechambered for the round. As I recall the muzzle velocity with a 140 grain Speer hollowpoint was in the 1750 to 1800 fps. range using Olin 296/H110 powder. It made an impressive mushroom with the Speer bullet. Basically the same as the Bain&Davis 357/44 but without the backing out of the chamber problems that the B&D cartridge could develop if loading instructions (read scrupulously clean chambers) were not followed. This same problem plagued the 22 Jet cartridge in the S&W M53 revolver. As an aside, B&D would only rechamber a Smith & Wesson M27 or M28 as they felt that other guns didn't have sufficient "meat" in the cylinder for their conversion. I have often wondered why the concept hasn't been utilized to make a long barreled 256 Win Mag revolver on the S&W "N" frame with the 8 3/8" barrel. CB.
 
I

IraIII

New member
I was rereading this thread, as I miss things the first couple of times. Jim Watsons post said that there was a version that used collars inside the 44 cartridge, This seems like it would work well. Does anyone know the name of the wildcat that used the internal collars, and did this work out well. It seems that in a S&W 27 or 28 you could surface grind a 44 cylinder to the length of your 357 cylinder and use the internal collars. A side benefit of this would be no b-c gap if the collar moved forward with the bullet, as long as drag did not increase and stop cylinder rotation, also no cartridge setback as this would be a straight walled cartridge. What am I missing?
 
J

Jekyll

New member
The answers are in there. It's called the .357 Bobcat and yes, it works well. The collar goes around the neck so that the neck is the same diameter as the back of the .44 case.
 
I

IraIII

New member
In the second paragraph Jim talks about another version, which uses a collar that goes between the bullet, and the case. This version uses a straight walled .44 magnum case not the necked down .357 bobcat. I have never heard of this version with the inner collar, and hope that someone can point me to a name , or some information on it.
 
H

HighValleyRanch

New member
My thread on this

I posted as thread on this a couple years back:
http://thefiringline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=264402&highlight=bobcat


My brother has a old style Blackhawk that someone modified.

ruger-bobcat.jpg


The frame and barrel are .357 but the cylinder chambers have been bored out to .44 mag.
The cases are .44 mag, necked down to .38 with a plastic ring that matches the .44 diameter.

This this shoots with some wallop, but extrememly accurate. I was easily getting two and half inch groups dead on from 15 yards one handed. The gun has pachmyr grips, so it's pretty comfortable to shoot. Of course the gun ends up pretty vertical!

I only have two more boxes of ammo for it, so will want to reload for it.
You can't buy any ammo for this, can you? With a cartridge like this, would I need to resize both the .44 portion of the case and then the .38 portion?
Where would you purchase the plastic ring?
I'ver reloaded lots of straight wall ammo, but not any necked stuff.
Here's the loads I was shooting as he labeled it:
.357/44 Bobcat magnum
140 gr. sierra JHC
22.8 gr H-110
New WW cases OL 1.585"
No idea what velocity these are going out at.

Also, would it be possible to purchase a .357 ruger cylinder and just put it back in. How much does the cylinder have to be fitted to a particular gun?
Can a .9mm cylinder go in as well? Since a black hawk can be modified to have a .357/9mm combo, it might be pretty neat to have a .357/9mm/357-.44 wildcat combo! Would make a great woods/ hunting piece. It's got the longer barrel.
__________________
From the sweet grass to the slaughter house; From birth until death; We travel between these two eternities........from 'Broken Trail"
 
3

32 Magnum

Member In Memoriam
Nothing wrong with that! Thanks for the picture. I've been shooting for over 50 years and never heard of this combo. Always nice to learn something.
 
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