What did you do in the reloading room today?

Rockchucker said:
Reloaded my first 9mm rounds. 124gr Gold Dots over 4 gr of TiteGroup. Didn’t blow my hand up so it was a success

@Toprudder. Check out the velocities it got below from a G34. I’m thinking I’ll go up just a bit (.1 or .2gr) to get me above 1100fps. Seems my SD is better than WWB but not as good as Federal. No issues with cycling or returning to battery.

Open to any thoughts from any of you who’ve been at this longer than I.
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I'm sure your brass and primers look good at that charge weight. Most load data that I have referenced shows a 4 inch barrel for their load recipes and so, with your G34 and its extra .5 inch you may get just a little more velocity with not much more powder. If it were me, I would bump it up .2 of a grain.

The other thing to consider is how temperature sensitive is Tite-Group? I don't know off the top of my head but with the low temps we have been having, that might be a consideration once its gets much warmer.

What is your OAL? Speer data shows an OAL of 1.120 and at max charge weight of 4.4 gr of TG a velocity of 1095 out of a 4 inch barrel. If you bump it up some, I would make sure that you load a little longer if you are loading unusually short. I usually shoot for on OAL of 1.125-1.130 for the 9mm that I load.
 
Rockchucker said:
Reloaded my first 9mm rounds. 124gr Gold Dots over 4 gr of TiteGroup. Didn’t blow my hand up so it was a success

@Toprudder. Check out the velocities it got below from a G34. I’m thinking I’ll go up just a bit (.1 or .2gr) to get me above 1100fps. Seems my SD is better than WWB but not as good as Federal. No issues with cycling or returning to battery.

Open to any thoughts from any of you who’ve been at this longer than I.
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Depends on what you want from your ammo. For my wife, I load 115gn somewhere between 1000 and 1050 fps, for soft recoil target practice. Cycles the gun fine, is reasonably accurate, and doesn't beat up the gun or the shooter. For myself, I would probably not increase the charge any, unless I just wanted the data for future reference. But if you are looking for something to mimic factory loads, then I think you have some room to play with. If I were trying to mimic factory loads, though, I would probably use something besides Titegroup.
 
@Toprudder & @ncav8tor Thanks for the feedback

Yep, Brass and primers are show no pressure signs. I’m in the 1.120-1.130 range. Not sure if it’s me or if I’m still in a learning curve on the seater die. Seems like I was able to get it dialed in to roughly 1.24ish somewhat consistently towards the end of this small run. I’m seeing the same in my Speer manual and will go up some but I don’t want tomuch. Basically looking for the right load to get through this 10 lbs of Titegroup I aquired as part of the equipment purchase. After seeing some actual numbers on the factory load vs how often I was hitting the 6in target at 30 yards, I’m fine with this particular load being a bit slower than the factory ammo I’ve got stashed away.

My Dillon powder check should be in today. I’m hesitant to load too many until I have that. Got the led lights installed and can def see in to cases way better but the peace of mind the powder check will bring is needed.

Thanks again
 
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Next project is to get my 9mm turret together & work up some warm-ish 124gr plated HPs over WSF that hopefully will work well in my G26 & G34, my LC9s & the missus' Walther CCP.

Need to buy another turret plate & powder measure so I can put together a .357Mag turret (I like dedicated turrets & plug & play caliber conversions). I've got a bunch of 180gr LWFNs & want to compare 'em over 4227 & 2400 side by side.
 
started reloading 45 Colt. Had a ton of cast .452 252gr SWC that I couldn't get to shoot in .45 ACP, but will work in the .45LC wonderfully I think.
Lubed and sized em with 50/50 and then tumbled with BLL liquid alox mix to seal off the sticky lube. Then discovered I have very few 45LC cases.
SO I got on Castboolits and found a vendor that sold me 250 cases cheap.
 
Added an inline fabrication ergo roller handle to my LNL press, big improvement. Only ran 100 rounds with it to get the feel but, oh my goodness, why didn't I upgrade sooner. I like to really bear down on the handle to get the primers deep as possible, with the Hornady ball handle that gets old fairly quick. The inline handle seems to give me more leverage and more surface to push against. Probably do a 500 round run this weekend to really shake it out.

ewvQcBT.jpg
 
Got a new Redding 45acp micrometer seater from a seller on 1911 Addicts. Loaded 3 different loads under Nosler 185 JHP's. 5.9grs Titegroup shoot very nice groups but its a stout load. And still nothing I load shoots as good as Federal 230gr HST or the Fed 230gr GMM. It's their bullets. I've reverse engineered the loads and their projectiles are longer than what you can buy as a component and Federal wont sell the projectiles as a component...yet.
 
Cleaned guns from the trip to the range today. Sorted and decapped brass. I usually lose a few cases when I shoot my 10mm, but i came back with 5 more than I shot. Glad someone else shoots 10mm.
 
Broke two Lee decappers. Apparently when you buy brass you dramatically increase the odds of Berdan primed. Yay.

Sized 1100 or so bullets. Loaded 400, was hoping for a K but the decappers deflated my sails.
 
Beef15 said:
Broke two Lee decappers. Apparently when you buy brass you dramatically increase the odds of Berdan primed. Yay.

Sized 1100 or so bullets. Loaded 400, was hoping for a K but the decappers deflated my sails.
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I don't know if this will work with your setup, but I ran the Lee decapping die as far down as it would go in my press (Lee Classic Turret). This reduces the mechanical advantage of the press and allows me to get a better feel of the decapping operation - I instantly know if I am encountering more resistance than normal. It also shortens the stroke significantly so I don't have to move my arm very far. I've decapped probably 40-50k cases so far and have not broken the pin yet.
 
I deprimed 250 .45 Colt cases that I bought from a vendor on CB. Over half were Fiocchi G.F.L. headstamps :mad::mad::mad:

They were dry tumbled (aka not really clean) and I couldn't tell if all the primer flash holes were off center, but they deprimed harder than the rest of the bunch (mixed starline, A.P., CBC and a few others)
so I feel like I got screwed.
 
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degenerateJEFF said:
Thanks for the tip! Learn something new every day.
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Found a cracked case mouth tonight on a 38 Spl nickel case. I noticed it when I was seating the projectile as it went in way too easy. I immediately pulled the un-crimped round to take a look and this is what I saw:

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This case was range brass or something I picked up along the way. I can clearly see where whoever loaded this case before me put a pretty severe crimp on the case mouth. That crimp, combined with a hot load, probably did this case in.

Word to the uninitiated, if something "feels" wrong on your press, pull whatever you are doing and look carefully at everything (on your shell plate if on a progressive press).

 
I don't use nickel plated brass at all. I read about the brittleness issues when I started reloading & decided to just avoid that possible variable from the start.
 
Wife got me the Hornady camlock bullet puller for my bday, so I began pulling the 300+ rounds of .223 a friend loaded, and I don't trust the load.

Ordered 1k 147gr fmj for my .300blk supers. Only 12.6c each at RMR, can't beat that for a plinking round. Coupon code "2nds10off308".
 
Toprudder said:
Which one of those is going to hit the 1000 yard target? :p
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Like I said....anyone can hit a 1000 yard mark with a 308, 6.5 type and super dupper scope that makes the target look 1 ft in front of you. But you a badass when you can do it open sight 45 70! .......i just not a bad ass yet!
 
Wow, I need to get back out to the loading bench...and the shooting range.

I loaded up my first test run of 357 Maximum a couple weeks ago but haven’t got a chance to shoot them yet.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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Bullseye Baldee said:
Like I said....anyone can hit a 1000 yard mark with a 308, 6.5 type and super dupper scope that makes the target look 1 ft in front of you. But you a badass when you can do it open sight 45 70! .......i just not a bad ass yet!
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LOL. Before you become a "bad ass", you have to be a "lucky ass" first. And I don't think that has happened yet, either. :p

It would help if we could at least see where the bullets are landing. With the ground so wet, and the sun at the angle it was on Saturday, it was really hard to tell. Of course, maybe I was lying to you when I said I couldn't tell where they hit. :rolleyes:
 
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