Daryl, when I had my .450 Watts built back in the early 1970's, I followed John Buhmiller's advice and went with a 22" twist, instead of the 14" twist used, unnecessarily in my opinion, by Winchester. John said that the slower twist would allow .458 Winchester Magnum ammunition to be fired accurately in the Watts chamber. This proved to be the case, at least with my rifle, a pre-64 Model 70, originally a .375 H&H.

The donor rifle had a checkered past. I bought it locally in Nashville from a man who said that he had opened the chamber up to .375 Weatherby Magnum himself. It was equipped with a Lyman Alaskan scope in an Echo side mount. Closer examination revealed that the scope had evidently slipped in the rings, and to prevent this, the rings had been drilled and tapped for set screws and notches filed in the scope tube to accommodate the screws. The chamber proved to have .021" excess headspace.

This was still the "good old days" and I sent the rifle back to Winchester with the request that they replace the barrel and receiver, and return the original barrel and receiver to me, which they promptly did. I had the Echo mount removed from the original receiver and replaced with a Griffin & Howe side mount and sent the Alaskan scope back to Lyman, who obligingly replaced the tube and refurbished the scope. I managed to come up with the parts to complete the action and had it re- barreled in caliber .450 Watts, using a Douglas Premium barrel and sent it to Fajan for a "Classic" stock. It accompanied me on my final trip to Africa, and performed satisfactorily in all respects.