zoommb said:

I just bought a pair of them last week.

On 2 May, our 40th anniversary, my wife bought me a NIB Wildey in both calibers (.45 Win Mag and .475 Wildey Mag).  Then she said "is that it now?"  To which I replied that I would never find an Auto-mag.  I would not purchase one unless I had the opportunity to disassemble it personally.  Too many of them have been abused.

On 23 May we went to a gun show. About 150 tables mostly filled with classic and/or antique long guns and replicas.  Not many pistols at all.  Then, at the end of the last aisle, the last table, there they were; 3 NIB Auto mags.  Not only NIB but limited editions as well.  These were all from the Lee Jurras Custom 100 series. That was a series of 100 .357 AMP Auto-mags.  For each of those, the purchaser could have a .44 AMP Auto-mag with a matching serial number.  One of the .44's was SN 72.  The other .44 was SN 71; the .357 was SN 71.  The numbers 71 came home with us.

Now I've got to get some ammo for both so we can shoot them.

-Mike

Good luck with your Wildey, I could never get mine to shoot right so I sold it for about half of what I paid for it. I had the 475 and the 45 wildey magnum. It's a wonderful looking gun but when it comes to function and accuracy it falls short for my tastes. I'm just wondering, do the shell cases hit you in the face when you fire it? keep in mind that if you do any mods to it like widening the ejection port and relaxing the ejector spring that the problems only worsen. And that last shell case that gets stuck in the gun when the clip is empty is due to the magazine follower being too short. You would think that they would fix that problem after all these years but according to the factory the gun works flawlessly for them, lol. It's a good thing that starline now makes the brass because I was paying 2 bucks each for Norma brass from Kaswer Custom which was a small home based business that supplied loaded ammo for Wildey prior to them offering their own version.

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zoommb said:

SMF:

So far I've only shot the .45 Win Mag receiver/barrel.  It takes a while to get the gas adjusted correctly.  I think I need one or two more clicks here.  The recoil seems to be less than my .445 SM.  It's a really heavy gun, but all of the weight is at the back so it's easy to hold and shoot.  It drops the empties right down the front of my shirt.  It's a good thing that I wear a t-shirt so I don't get burned.

I just got some .475 Wildey Mag ammo, so next range day I will be setting that one up.  I think this one will kick a "bit more" judging from how much more the cartridges weigh.

I'll email you with how it feels.

-Mike

 

The best way to adjust the gas system is to start your first shot with the ports closed and then increase 1-2 clicks until the slide cycles fully. Once it's adjusted you will notice that the gun malfunctions a good bit. Don't bother calling Wildey because every problem is a gas adjustment to them. The gun was never perfected beyond the prototype phase and from what I can gather it was designed around the 45 win mag which I'm sure functions better over the 475. When you begin shooting the 475 ammo be ready for flying brass to come right at you. I left the range one day with a 1st degree burn from a case that lodged between my face and my shooting glasses. Most days I left the range with my forehead covered in little tiny black half moon soot marks from the case mouths whacking me in the forehead. When I called Wildey about the problem they claimed that the gun was twisting up and to the left causing the brass to hit me and that it was my fault for not holding the gun firmly. Not the case what so ever, they never tuned the ejection system to eject in the proper way. Another problem that I noticed was that the extractor would leave the case rim damaged. It never led to any real issues so that one I would ignore.

What ever you do, never ask Wildey to install a scope base on an 8 inch barrel. Wildey claims that you can mount a base on their 8 inch vent rib but it's pure fantasy. When I ordered my eight inch barrel I had them install one. They drilled and pressed in a little threaded fitting right in the center of the weakest part of the rib because it was the only place it could be mounted. It took 3 full power 45 wildey mag loads to snap the vent rib in half. When I called Wildey they claimed that no such thing has ever happened in the history of their company, and that they would gladly sell me another vent rib drilled and tapped for my base. Notice I said "sell", they didn't want to live up to the truth and do the right thing for me. The longer barrels can be scoped without incident and the scope helps to deflect some of the brass that's headed for your face but over time it will damage your scope finish. Go with the lowest rings possible because the high rings can't be sighted in because the vent rib sits too high off of the barrel for the scope to compensate for.

Some other things to note is that the factory misrepresents the ballistic data for the 475 and the necked down versions based on it. It's easy to get 1900 fps from a 230 grain bullet with a 10 inch barrel with Blue Dot powder. Once you go up in bullet weight Blue Dot is a waste of time. And Blue Dot is the only powder that doesn't gum up the gas system. The wildey factory ammo is only marginally more poweful than than 44 mag when you use bullets over 230 grains because it's all loaded using Blue Dot. I found that when using W296 and H110 with 260 and 300 grain bullets that I had to load everything up to maximum pressure in order to keep the gun from fowling up due to the dirty burn of those two powders. When the pressure was high enough it would blow out the residue and clean itself enough to keep shooting.

Now I mentioned that Wildey misrepresents ballistic data on the 475. Bill Kaswer of the now out of business Kaswer custom told me that Wildey never chronographed anything and that the ballistic data sheet that I received with the sales literature was determined by computer software. Prior to finding this out I had blown up my 475 barrel attempting to duplicate the bullet speed that they advertised. I was young and foolish and I hadn't take the time to educate myself enough about case head expansion and high pressure signs. if you use H110 the safest top velocity that I achieved with a 10 barrel was about 1450 and that was pushing it. I even tried forming my own brass from 284 winchester brass using large rifle primers to gain an edge but that failed as well. The lyman forming dies only ream the case enough to accept a 250 grain bullet. So I had the bright idea of sending a spare reamer out to another company called Forstner (I think) to have it modified to my specs. When it came back everything looked great so I started testing. With all my work I was averaging 3 shots before the case head separated. I also noted that the reformed brass drove the pressures up because the base of the case was still thicker than the factory brass which reduced its capacity.

When I finally got tired of flying brass and the need to carry a tool kit just to fire off 50 rounds I gave up and sold my gun. It sold in 2 months and when I went back the store to drop off another handgun that I was selling I asked the guy at the counter if he has heard from the guy who bought my Wildey. He said yes, he came back in a month later complaining that the gun wasn't working right. I told him that was the reason why I sold it and that it only worked well in the movie Death Wish 3.

I feel a little bad about sharing my bad experience because I know you are still in enjoying your new gun. I just have to be honest about my experience with mine. I think you will have better luck with your 45 win mag barrel than the 475. Your best bet on load data for the 45 win mag is from the Speer reloading manual number 12. They use a 10 inch barrel Wildey pistol for their test data. The top velocity from the 260 grain HP speer bullets is 1609 fps with H110. You might find that the 45 win mag is your best chance at getting that gun to work. If you don't have that manual on hand I would be glad to send you all the data for the 45 win mag, just pm me.

Have fun.

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