.500 Phantom ?
Is the .500 Phantom dead ? Anyone have any info on it ? I sent a email off to Marty but I know he is "on the road" and out of the country right now. I also sent an email off to Quality Cartridge about brass and they said "Possibly later this year". Anyone doing dies/barrels/uppers or bolt guns in this ?
Yes, sad to say, it is all but dead. TJ has dropped the round and while there was said to be more brass to come from Quality, they have never put it on their web site. It can be made from .500 Jeffrey brass but it takes a lot of work, besides having the heads turned, the easy part, dies can only be gotten from CH-4D and they are backlogged about 6-9 months on custom dies and then you have a lot of neck reaming and trimming that has to be done. I am doing a load of that now for my .470 Rhino and it takes a lot of time, and the Phantom is shorter than the Rhino so it will need even more reaming. I had my Phantom made on the LR-308 action so I could shoot M33 ball bullets but it works fine in the AR-15 with standard hunting bullets and puts the .50 Beowulf to shame. However with no brass it is not much use and none of my cache of brass is ever going to be for sale, that's for sure.
You might get Marty to put you in touch with a person who can do the barrel for you but brass is the big headache. The bolt is also a big problem in the AR platform and not real easy on the LR platform. In the AR you need an Olympic upper/bolt to start with. In the LR you need to open up the .308 bolt to accept the larger case head, not a big deal but DPMS no longer makes bolts for the RSAUM which is the size you need (magnum head size).
For all intent and purposes, the Rhino and Phantom are about as dead of rounds as you can find, and that is a real shame, especially the Rhino series.
Big-Bore thanks for the info. I was really hoping this was not the case.
