The .25-20 New Adventures in Loading - Hand Loader

Guns Magazine, Feb, 2002 by Charles E. Petty

Long before I wrote about guns, I collected them. Before that, I was a serious competitive pistol shooter. So it's logical that my circle of friends has quite a few folks who share those interests. At a gun show not long ago, one of my buddies who knows of my fondness for the old "dash" cartridges, came up and said, "Come with me Charlie, you need to see this gun." It was a Winchester Model 92 SRC that I had already seen -- and dismissed -- since it was chambered for the .25-20 WCF.

"The last thing I need is another cartridge to load," I said.

But during the course of the day he nagged and kept saying, "Charlie, you need that rifle."

I went to visit it a couple of times and, after some serious consideration and negotiation, it tagged along with me on the way home -- with a detour by the gun shop for a box of ammo. Then came the necessary ordering of materials: dies, brass and bullets, all of which are readily available.

Unlike most of the other old dash cartridges like the .44-40 or .32-20, the .25-20 was never available in a handgun. It is really nothing more than the .32-20 case necked down -- just as the .38-40 is a necked down .44-40. You might call it the first varmint cartridge -- for it was something of a hotrod, pushing an 86-grain bullet at over 1,400 fps. There was also a 60-grain load at over 2,000 fps.

My order was for dies, brass and bullets: the 75-grain Speer softpoint and some bulk Remington 86-grain JSPs that are used in the factory ammo. While waiting for all the loading stuff to get here, I shot a little factory ammo and quickly concluded that this was going to be another really fun gun.

We are often told that these old bottleneck cartridges are hard to load because of the thin case mouths. I guess that's true if you're careless, but the .25-20 is treated like a rifle cartridge in loading, so two die sets are offered. Since we don't have to bell the case mouth, that helps a bunch, although we do need to lightly chamfer and deburr the case mouth.

Loading data is plentiful. And even though the case is small, we'll still be using rifle powders. Older data shows 2400 as being used, but it seemed to me that powders commonly used in the small PPC and BR cases would work. Sure enough, the Speer Manual listed a load using Accurate 2015 BR for their 75-grain bullet, and Hodgdon had one for H-322 with the 86-grain Remington. Both are powders that have worked well for me.

Sometimes we get lucky with initial load choices. Speer's data showed a starting load 13.5 grains of Accurate 2015 BR for the 75-grain JSP. Hodgdon shows 11.3 grains of H-322 as the starting point with the 86-grain Remington. Just because I like to keep things simple, I began with 11.5. With a few rounds of each charge, it was off to the range.

My litmus test for this sort of fun plinking is a 6-inch diameter steel plate that is 70 yards from the firing line. My very first shot with a factory load had resulted in a satisfying clang. Now the same thing happened with the H-322 handload -- and with the Speer bullet as well. There simply was no need to change the load. Both met my needs without adjustment and have become standard. I never even bothered to chronograph them and probably wouldn't have done so had I not decided to write about this pleasant little cartridge.

The H-322 load delivers 1,450 fps, the Accurate 2015 BR charge gives 1,412 fps from the Winchester's 20-inch barrel. Since those are comfortably close to the published factory speed of 1,460 fps, they did what I almost always want them to do: duplicate a factory load. But the next time I went to the range, I picked up a box of factory ammo by mistake. And after shooting the handloads, it felt kinda puny. The chronograph showed only 1,180 fps for the Remington factory 86-grain JSP. We have to remember that the standard test barrel length for the .25-20 is 24 inches so the saddlering carbine's 20-inch barrel accounts for some of the difference, but we also need to keep in mind the simple truth that factory ballistics come from something other than real-world guns. The numbers are nice clues, but don't hang your hat or bet money on them.

And, in this case, while it would have been possible to reduce things to get to the actual speed of the factory ammo, there just isn't any need to change the handloads. They were doing what I wanted anyhow, and since they are the starting loads, it's best to shrug and go on.

The beauty of the .25-20 is negligible recoil and outstanding accuracy. References describe it as a small game and varmint cartridge and another speculates that it might just be, "the ideal turkey cartridge." While there is no current production rifle chambered for the .25-20, it isn't hard to find older Winchester, Savage and Marlin rifles. Everything else is readily available. I probably won't take it turkey hunting, but that gong better learn to duck.