njl

I happened to run into someone at the range about a week ago who was shooting steel, and since our range forbids jacketed ammo on steel, I was curious to find out what he was using. Turns out he uses jacketed for most of his ammo, but for the steel, he uses Bayou. These were 115gr 9mm. Though I'd never seen them in person, I recognized them as Bayou and asked him about them. He told me a local commercial reloader I'd never heard of loads all his ammo. He gave me one for examination. At first glance, I was pretty sure it was overcrimped. It almost looked like it had a roll crimp rather than taper. I finally just got around to a detailed examination. Bullet weight: 115.7gr COAL: 1.0855" Crimp: 0.369" Bullet base diameter: 0.356" Bullet crimp ring: 0.346" Brass neck thickness: 0.011 Powder charge: 4.4gr unknown "metallic flake" powder There was a pronounced overcrimp ring around the bullet forward of the lube groove. The bottom of the bullet was 0.356" and forward of the crimp ring, it was again 0.356". I wish I'd gotten the guy's contact info now, so I could tell him to complain to his reloader. Are Bayou's standing up on end when they go through the baking/drying process after coating? i.e. is the coating on the base always "messed up"? This one looks like the coating on the bottom was torn away, as if it was left behind on whatever the bullet was resting on when baked.

I'm curious if anyone here has a 30S and if so, if you load .45 minor, have you found the 30S to be much more tolerant of minor PF ammo than the 30?

Interesting. How long before all the gamers are reaming/drilling their flash holes to gain a free 20-30 fps without having to use more powder? I assume there was no noticed difference in recoil.

The children are of no value (anyone can make them) unless they're old enough to work and have skills. Can any of them work a RL550B or at least pick up brass as it falls (but also stay reasonably safely out of the way)?

Ah. Do you have similar data for the 160s with those other powders? Do they shoot noticeably softer than 147gr? 147gr in the 880-900fps range is already so soft, it's hard to imagine a 9mm shooting much softer.

I assume they shot really soft (softer than 147gr 9mm)? I ran into someone shooting some Bayou bullets for the first time today and he gave me one to disassemble/examine. At first glance, the coating seems very different from BBI and Precision. The look and feel is more like the bullets have been coated with nail polish. Your groups with the reloads were not even as good as factory ammo. That seems kind of disappointing. One of the things you often hear about reloading is you'll get more consistent, more accurate ammo. What happened?

Titegroup and 147gr plated bullets for a new reloader? Were those your friend's suggestions? If so, are you sure he's your friend? But seriously, you should have started with a harder combination to blow up. Plated bullets require a lot more care than jacketed to load properly. 147gr bullets leave you the least margin for error. Titegroup is too easy to double charge. I'd put all that stuff away for when you're more comfortable reloading and get some 124 or 115gr jacketed bullets (if you can find any) and a powder like Universal Clays that will not allow a double charge with the lighter bullets. i.e. if you throw a second charge, it'll spill out all over the shell plate and you will notice it. You can still make a reasonably low recoil (less than factory) round with the above stuff. It won't be as light as 147s with titegroup, but it'll be safer.

That's as I figured...and why these mods can be done on a 650, but not on the 550. The 550 sh ts where it eats. As can be expected, this can cause a variety of issues, particularly decapping residue fouling the priming system.

I've never seen a 650...but from what I've read, the only similarities in the priming systems are they use a tubular magazine and feed primers. Does the 650 advance on the up-stroke and prime in station 2 at the end of the up-stroke? The 550 decaps and primes in station 1, then you manually advance it and drop powder in station 2.

I don't even pick up S&B any more when I find it.

Hodgdon will tell you it's not a suitable powder for 9mm. If you search here, you'll find lots of load data though. I've used it with 124, 130, and 147 gr bullets. I prefer Universal though for 9mm, and save the WST for .45acp.

Maybe I'm confused, but I don't see how this could possibly be applied to the 550. Since the 550 primes and decaps through the same hole in the shell plate, if you were to stick anything into the hole, you'd be unable to prime, and actually unable to even lower the shell plate, since your tube assembly would interfere with the primer slide.

Isn't the SS600 just for rounding the edge at the opening of the primer pocket, making it easier to start seating a primer? Once they're going in, the swaging done should have no effect on seating depth. Or am I missing something?

Now I'm confused. I wanted to load some more ammo last night, and decided to recheck the OAL issue with my Glocks and Springfield 1911. I loaded a couple of dummies using both PD 185gr JHP and Zero 185gr JHP. The dummies were all loaded to 1.210". They all dropped in/out of the Glock barrel. They dropped in, and appeared to fully seat in the 1911 barrel, but had to be pulled out. Shooting a recent GSSF match with the above mentioned ammo that I ran back through the press to shorten to just under 1.200", I had several instances of the first round jamming (cartridge angled up and maybe half way into the chamber), as well as a few stovepipes. I'd shot the same load in the same guns at a match a month earlier...but I realized afterwards that the ammo that worked was Federal primers, and the ammo that stovepiped was CCI primers. I know from previous testing that CCI LP are "weaker" than Federal...so I'm guessing my load was just barely enough powder to cycle the the G30, and with the weaker primers, it was not quite making enough gas to run the G30. I ended up loading 100 Zero 185gr JHP with 5gr WST at 1.210". I'll see how they do (in the G30) next time I make it to the range.

That's not a flash hole. It's a flash cavern.

In a Glock 9mm chamber loading out to even 1.180" the round nose bullets I am using do not touch the rifling, much less get marred by it. At 1.170" you're not even close. The limit to OAL with Glocks is no question the mags. Above 1.171" they potentially bind when you load more than a few rounds. That entirely depends on the bullets. I've got some 9mm 130gr BBI that can't be loaded very long at all for my Glocks, and in the .45acp Glocks, 185gr JHP also have to be loaded well below max OAL to keep from hitting the rifling.

This poll needs a "maybe". With modern G34/G35 frames made since about late 2001, the frames are the same. Older ones (including some Gen3, and all earlier) the G35 has a "third pin" through the locking block, while the G34 does not. Glock added that to strengthen the locking block...so while you can put a G35 slide on 2-pin G34 frame, shooting it is not recommended.

Do any safety glasses claim they'll survive/protect against a .22 directly to the eye? The main thing we're concerned with as shooters is ricochets and either partial or complete bullets coming back after hitting a hard target. I don't know what typical ricochet velocity is, but the fully intact 230gr JHP that hit my nose after bouncing off a bowling pin obviously had lost considerable velocity as all it did was cut up my nose.

Drillspot, Harbor Freight, Grainger...whichever is more convenient.

It's definitely a good idea to learn reloading on pistol calibers first, but when I bought my press through Brian, I knew I'd eventually be reloading every caliber I shot (other than .22lr and shotgun)...so I ordered just about everything I thought I'd need through him all at once to save on shipping. Then, just put all the rifle stuff away until I was comfortable doing 9mm and .45.

What about .223 case gauge? Why are you ordering carbide .223 dies? What about a trimmer for .223 and a SuperSwage or other tool to deal with crimped primer pockets? Do you already have, or plan to buy someone else's case lube? Even with the carbide dies, you have to lube .223 before resizing. Most people seem to like to have multiple tool heads (at least one per caliber) and for rifle calibers its common to have 2 per caliber, one setup just for resizing/decapping, and a second setup for charging/seating/crimping.

How have the lenses held up? I bought mine after taking a 230gr JHP to the nose. I don't think I've been hit since.

I'm firmly in the "some guns don't like some bullets" camp. I tried (a few thousand) X-Treme 147gr plated bullets. I was quite happy with them from my G17. Then I dusted off the G34 with Optima2000, and found that the same load that was great in the G17 tumbles/keyholes frequently (like several per mag) from the G34. Both are older Gen3 guns. Both have thousands of rounds through them. Both work fine with every other bullet/ammo I've used...but the G34 doesn't like / won't stabilize the X-Treme 147s for some reason. I don't like the idea of having to keep track of which ammo is for which gun (beyond caliber), so the simple solution is don't use those bullets any more. The only problem now is that the panic/frenzy buying seems to have made it to reloaders, and now all my usual sources for the bullets I like are out of stock and/or 1-2 months behind filling orders. I just did a quick inventory, and unless things calm down soon, it looks like I'll be back to shooting 124gr in 9mm for a while. I'll run out of 147 FMJ in the next couple months or sooner.

MG CMJ are not electroplated. They're lead with a gas check and then a traditional jacket that wraps around the bullet and partially overlaps the gas check. For 124gr jacketed bullets, I've been very happy with Universal Clays.

BTW...for pistol brass, particularly with carbide dies, where lube is "optional" anyway, I found a nice way to lube the brass is to get a little pure lanolin on my fingers rub it in, and let the brass get lubed on the way from the brass bin to the shell plate. Doesn't work so well if you have a case feeder. When the sizing gets tougher, you need more lanolin on the fingers.