.455 Webley Revolver

The British .455 caliber Webley revolvers served from 1887 when the Mark I was accepted for service, through 1936 when the .455 caliber Mark VI was replaced by the .38/200 cartridge. The gun was still a Webley but the .455 cartridge was honorably retired. Many of the old warhorses were sent to America where there seems to be an insatiable appetite for handguns, be they beautiful and handy or homely and cumbersome.

Whatever you think of the Webley you have to admit that they are rugged, steeped in history and different enough to be interesting. I own two of them and would have several more if the prices were more reasonable as I love to shoot them. I find it almost impossible to shoot the Mk I without seeing the opening scenes from the movie The Wind and the Lion running through my head and saying "damn" after I have fired the last shot.

Both of mine have been modified to accept either the .45 ACP cartridge in half or full moon clips or the .45 Auto Rim. I normally reserve the .45 Auto Rim cases for the Webley because I load them lighter than ammo for my 1911. This makes the light loads easy to identify and keep separate. The guns rarely give me any trouble regarding function and parts breakage has been limited to a broken latch spring. Accuracy, however, has been far less delightful than I had hoped.

After cycling through several bullets, powders and loads I reached the wrong conclusion that nothing I did was going to get the guns to shoot as long as I was pushing .451 bullets down a .455 bore. I went so far as to look for bullet molds in .455 caliber. Thankfully, I hadn’t found one before I decided to slug the bores. Imagine my surprise when one bore slugged 0.451 and the other 0.450. I generally refer to these missteps as "jumping to contusions" because they usually leave my wallet black and blue.

That’s when I started doing the research I should have done before I started looking for elegant solutions to problems that didn’t exist. According to several Internet sites I visited all the .455 Webley barrels were made with 0.450 to 0.452 diameter bores. Then why did they call this round the .455 Webley? I suppose for the same reason the .38 Special bore measures 0.357. Bullet diameter wasn’t the entire problem. 448 gauge would not clear all chambers.

Every cylinder checked produced one or two chambers under 0.448 diameter. 450 to 0.451. Now that I had wasted enough time and effort chasing wild geese I started to actually look for problems rather than simply assume I knew what they were. It didn’t take long to discover that the cylinder throats were not only inconsistent, they were universally too small. I got together with a shooting buddy that owned two Mk VI Webleys and we measured the throats of all four of the .455 Webleys we owned.

Each one had at least one chamber that would not take a 0.448 gauge and none of them were larger than 0.450. Upon firing the gun the .451 diameter bullets were being forced through the cylinder throat and resized to the throat diameter. From there they entered a 0.450 to 0.452 bore and wandered down range. No wonder accuracy was disappointing! A call to Dave Manson at Dave Manson Precision Reamers (mansonreamers.com, soon had a .45 caliber Cylinder Throating Reamer with a Mr.

Manson knows his business much better than I do. After discussing my problem and listening to my bore and cylinder measurements, he

4525 to 0. 453 fast and easy. picked the reamer that would do the job. The reamer arrived two days later and quickly cut every cylinder throat to a consistent 0.4525 to 0.453. Now bullets would not be deformed exiting the chamber and the forcing cone could do its job sizing them to a tight fit in the barrel. Most of the Webleys out there have been converted to shoot .45 ACP rounds loaded in moon clips or .45 Auto Rim ammunition. That is, in theory, a great idea as .45 ACP ammo is easy to find.

Unfortunately it is also far to hot for the Webley. Using .45 ACP or .45 Auto Rim cases is fine but they should be loaded with lead bullets and .455 Webley pressures. The original loading for the .455 was 18 grains of black powder under a 265 grain lead hollow based bullet propelled at 650-750 FPS. The proof load for the .455 was 18,440 PSI with service ammo producing about 13,000 PSI. The .45 ACP is proofed at 21,000 PSI and loaded to around 19,000 PSI.

In other words, every .45 ACP round loaded to normal specs is much hotter than the Webley was designed or 451 pin gauge. proofed for! The fact that Webleys have held up to these abuses is a tribute to its rugged design but firing it with a steady diet of what amounts to proof loads is not conducive to accuracy or longevity. With all that straight we come to bullet diameter. The original Webley bullet was a 0.450 diameter hollow based lead round nosed bullet, sort of like a Minié ball.

Upon firing the bullet was forced through a 0.450 chamber mouth before entering a 0.451 to 0.452 bore. The hollow base was supposed to expand to fill the rifling and produce "reasonable" accuracy. All well and good depending what you consider reasonable accuracy. In my somewhat limited experience I have found that each gun seems to have it’s own preference.

Some guns will shoot well with .451 caliber .45 ACP cast lead bullets but mine will not, giving me groups that averaged about 7.5 inches before I reamed the chambers. I have found that it wants an oversized bullet and have had the best luck with .452 caliber bullets meant for the .45 Colt. I have not tried a hollow base design yet. Check the Internet for loading data. Keep pressures around 13,000 PSI and velocities between 650-750 FPS with lead bullets and I think you will find some improvement.

In my case, groups have been reduced to an average of three inches after reaming the chambers. Still not target accuracy but at least headed in the right direction. This is an old design and just because you can hot rod it with .45 ACP jacketed ammo doesn’t mean you should or that it will shoot well.

Accept the gun for what it is, respect its limitations and load it with lead bullets at the pressure and velocity it was designed for and it should pay you back with much better accuracy and along, pleasurable relationship. Shooting for this article was done from an early production Hyskore Rapid Fire Precision Shooting Rest (hyskore.com). Although not a gunsmithing product, I mention it because it solves the problem of test firing rifles with pistol grips and extended magazines.

It also provides a solid platform for test firing handguns and should prove useful to the gunsmith. AG