IDescribe

Don't use a factory crimp die. Don't use a case gauge. Problem solved. As was already stated, you don't actually have a problem. You have a gauge that creates the appearance of a problem. With lead, the FCD can do more than groove the bullet. The FCD resizes the case all the way down with the bullet inside, and it can swage lead in the process, reducing bullet diameter, reducing accuracy, even causing tumbling. I never case gauge, and the number of failures I have had related to cartridge dimensions is ZERO in I don't know how many tens of thousands of rounds. Keep something in mind: When a case gauge fails a cartridge, it's suggesting to you that it's done its job. The more cartridges it fails, the better it appears to be doing its job. But if you take a step back and think about it, the tighter the gauge gets, the more perfectly good cartridges it fails - - tighter cases gahges are NOT better at their job. There are guys out there, serious competitors, who use an FCD with .355 jacketed bullets and a Hondo to eliminate the last little possibility that a cartridge might ruin all the time and effort they put into a season of practice and matches. And I get that. I still think it's not worth it, but I get it. I wouldn't fault anyone for it. But that isn't most of us. Most of us with Hondos and the like have bought a case gauge that culls out perfectly good rounds, then think they need an FCD to make cartridges that work perfectly well in their gun fit a gauge they don't need to begin with. Every time this conversation comes up, I think of the old comedy cliche: Man: "Doc, my elbow hurts when I do this..." [demonstrates arm movement that causes pain] "What do you advise?" Doctor: "Stop doing that." Stop using a case gauge.

9mm SAAMI spec is max OAL 1.169, and that's supposed to be the longest the magazine will accept. Obviously, thr magazine isn't as fine as a thousandth of an inch, but as you ha e discovered, neither is your press or your bullets. Generally speaking, for a standard 9mm, I wouldn't load longer than 1.160. NOW... I will also say that with the exception of FMJ, most bullet variation can be found in the nose, snd with coated bullets, the variation is even more pronounced. You are probably also using a seating anvil that seats off the ogive, which maximizes how much bullet variation shows up in OAL, but it minimizes how much variation shows up in seating depth, which is more important. Target 1.160, and don't sweat the variation. DO everything Sarge described to maximize consistency, but don't sweat the variation. All that said, that is not the bullet I'd be using for 9mm major. I wouldn't want the coating gunk in my comp, and I'd want a bullet that seats shallower. You'd be better off with FMJ. Lengthening OAL for a particular bullet lowers pressure, but it's not because the cartridge gets longer, it's because the bullet is seated shallower into the case. In all probability, a typical FMJ-RN of the same weight at 1.14 seats shallower than that bullet at 1.17. You are trying to load longer to lower pressure, but you've chosen a bullet that starts you at a deficit. That bullet seats deep. Food for thought.

Too late highhope, the OP died in June.

Okay, so that bit of advice from Bear Creek on burn rate, velocity, what constitutes slow VS fast in terms of velocity, and the implication that fast burning means hot - - that is all so generalized and lacking in context as to be meaningless. Ignore it. It's worthless.

AA5 IS a slower (I'd say the slower side of medium) powder, and where did you see that moly bullets like slower powder? And where did you see AA5 burns hot? AA5 isn't one of the powders I hear about being a hot burner -- but I can't say I know, and I haven't seen the idea that moly bullets like slower burning powders ever.

Correct, springback is a possibility with alloyed lead. Another option, though. If the measurement you get from slugging tells you that you should shoot .356, but through testing you found your pistol did best with .357, would you shoot .356 anyway? Same for .357 VS .358? And if you would shoot what shoots most accurately anyway, regardless of what the slugging told you, wouldn't the more relevant test be to buy some 124/125gr coated lead bullets sized 356, 357, and 358, and simply see what does best in the pistol? ACME has good bullets at .356. BBI tend to be a little oversized at .357, even though they say they're .356. You can order .357 from Ibejiheads, I think. And you can get .358 from Blue Bullets under their .38/.357 caliber offerings.

We see a lot people's chrono results here and in other similar forums, extreme spreads of 30+ with mixed brass are common. It's not rare to see people report 50+. An extreme spread of 8 is worth 1PF with 124/125gr bullets, and 7 feet/sec is 1PF with 147gr bullets. So an ES of just 30 is worth a PF spread of about 4. People should keep that in mind when they start to get it in their head that they like a particular PF because the truth is that they experience PF swings of at least 3 or 4, if not 5 or 6 or 7, from one round to the next, and they never notice in practice. In other words, a PF of 130 is more than likely a PF of 128-132 (or even broader), and if with the same powder and bullet, you think you can tell the difference in feel between Load A with a PF range of 128-132 and Load B with a PF range 130-134, you're nuts - - they overlap. And if you're giving up accuracy to chase that average PF load of 130 because you've convinced yourself that the extra one or two tenths of a grain of powder that knocks it up to an average PF of 132 or 134 is going to impact your times... If that's the case, the action shooting internet hive mind has played a terrible trick on you. When you think about this stuff, always remember that there are guys at your matches shooting .40 major at PF170+ and killing you on splits. Recoil control is about grip and stance., not shaving off a few measly foot-pounds at the muzzle.

You can drive the gun just as fast with 124/125 (or faster) as you can with 147. The idea that a cartridge that moves the slide slower and returns the slide to battery later is somehow by default faster is preposterous. And remember, at the end of the day, there are guys at your range shooting .40 major, smoking you on splits. Get the 124gr and practice practice. Recoil control comes from grip and stance, not how the recoil "feels" in your hands.

If they work in your gun, maybe ditch thr hondo.

You are likely to see a decrease in velocity, going down a thousandth in bullet diameter, when the other relevant factors are equal, equivalent to somewhere between .01gr and .02gr of powder. If you care to know why: First is simple -- the bigger bullet obturates better (fills the rifling grooves) and thus contains gas better. The second reason is a little more complicated -- smokeless powder burns faster the more pressure it's under, and the faster it burns, the faster it builds pressure. It's a positive feedback loop. So if you do anything to slow the acceleration of the bullet at the beginning of the burn (such as you do relatively speaking by using a fatter bullet that resists entering the rifling more), you end up with higher pressure for the same mass of powder through the burn, and you end up with a higher muzzle velocity. People often think if do something to make it easier for a bullet to pass down the barrel that it will result in a faster muzzle velocity, but in practice a slower initial acceleration results in higher pressure and a higher muzzle velocity. All that said, there are a number of variables that affect powder burn, and when you switch bullets, typically all else is NOT equal, so in terms of how much of a difference you'll see, no one can tell you. Could be MUCH slower, or a little slower, or pretty much equal. It is also possible but unlikely that the narrower bullet will end up faster.

Why did you use a published OAL for an SWC load with an RN bullet?

Because there's more that feeds into accuracy than just that. I'm not saying that anything that decelerates into the transonic range is automatically inaccurate. And I'm not saying that that is THE defining factor in this case. I'm simply saying that there is a possible explanation (and I am sure many possible explanations) as to why your load did best at 1090 OTHER THAN simply CFE liking light loads. Something you see ALL THE TIME in the forums is people seeing a correlation between two things and bassuming that correlation means the one thing caused the other. I see it all the time in both ammo tuning and trouble-shooting. CFE Pistol MIGHT like light loads. Or you might have had the faster loads going transonic and affecting accuracy negatively. Or that bullet with CFE PIstol in that pistol has an accuracy node from 1075-1095 because... mysterious inexplicable physics. All you can really say with a sample size of one is that CFE Pistol at a light load didn't kill accuracy in this particular case. NOW, if you want to test 15 different bullets of different weights and types and you discover that with 12 of the 15 bullets, the most accurate load was at 85% +/- 3% of max load, then we can start to say "Hey, CFE Pistol really seems to do well with light loads." And if you want to conduct that test, please come back and share the results. I'd be interested to see it.

There's a reason your 1090 might be the more accurate load that has nothing to do with the powder liking light loads. I don't have time to explain it in detail right now, but above and below the sound barrier is a "transonic range" that you want to stay out of for the sake of accuracy -- the range runs from maybe maybe 15-20 feet/sec below the sound barrier to 15-20 feet/sec above. You want the bullet to start off fast enough (high enough over the sound barrier) that the bullet does not decelerate into that range before striking the target. If it passes into that range, it gets pushed around by a destablizing bow wave of compressed air, affecting accuracy negatively. Everyone has seen pictures of videos of fighter jets going transonic -- it looks like the fighter jet is passing through a disc of water vapor. Go look at high end .22 target ammo. There's a reason 99% of it is 1100 feet/sec or slower -- it's so that it starts off UNDER the transonic range and takes that out of the equation. So the reason your bullet liked the "light load" is not necessarily that it likes light loads, it's the you loaded it slow enough that it left the muzzle under the transonic range, whereas the few tenths you went above it took into the transonic range, or it took it above the transonic range, and it decelerated into the transonic range before getting to the target. Again, target ammo is generally 1100 feet/sec or under, OR it starts off WAY over supersonic so it doesn't fall into that transonic range. For example, for 50 yard Bullseye, it's common to drive 115gr bullets over 1200 at the muzzle, so it's still above the transonic range at the target.

You can download light bullets stupid soft for Steel Challenge, you just have to find the right recoil spring that will cycle the action. That said, it's 9mm. If it's in any way for practice, pick up some normal weight bullets and let her practice, but if it's just for fun and doesn't matter, she can shoot a .22 and get what you're looking for.

It's not so much that. It's the often dirty, inefficient, inconsistent burns you get with a powder that slow in a 9mm minor load.

If I had been using TG and got tired of the smoke, I'd look for something in a similar burn rate range, as TG is of an appropriate burn rate for 9mm minor, and given that smoke was an issue, I'd be inclined to try Alliant Sport Pistol first. People use CFE Pistol for 9mm major, and generally speaking, powders suitable for 9mm major are poorly suited to 9mm minor. Food for thought. ?

What are you loading these rounds for? What's the application?

I'm not sure why CFE would be the replacement for TG. They're not similar powders. I have loaded CFE with only 115gr bullets, and it took 5.1gr with the 115gr Hornady HAP to get to 1080 feet/sec. I'd expect about the same to get a 124gr coated lead bullet to a similar velocity, and I would expect it to take more than that, probably 5.3/5.4gr, to get a similar 124gr JHP to the same velocity, and 1060-1080 is is where I typically load 124/125gr bullets. So I'd expect that depending on the 124gr bullet, I'd be somewhere between 5.0gr and 5.4gr to get it to the 9mm minor PF I'd want to use. BUT I have seen a variety of people experience significant differences in chrono results with CFE, particularly when loading light, and if you're trying to use CFE for 9mm minor (not sure, you didn't say), you're loading light. If this is for 9mm minor, I'd look to a different powder.

It's clumped powder and powder position. When you chrono, two things you can do to improve SD: Tap the loaded mag back side down against the table a few times to make sure any clumped up powder breaks up. When you chamber the first round, slingshot the slide. Don't let it forward easy. Don't start with the slide locked back, then use the slide stop lever to drop the slide. Start with the slide forward, then yank it back all the way and let it go, letting the recoil spring slam it home so the the powder will experience as close as possible the same forces as it will under the subsequent shots and recoil cycles. These two things work together. The forces sent through the pistol on the first shot plus that first recoil cycle will break up any clumped powder for every round after the first, and set the powder position similarly for every shot after the first, so your manually breaking up the clumps for the first shot and setting the powder position by slingshotting will go a long way to improve your chrono results relative to the first shot. SOME PEOPLE go the extra distance of pointing the muzzle straight up before each shot, then lowering it back down to firing position slowly before firing the shot, so as to get powder position as consistent as possible, but personally I have seen negligible results with this as long as I'm tapping and slingshotting the first shot of each string. I've never heard anything about the last round in the mag.

BigEd, where did that chart come from? I would recommend no one pay attention to it. Rather than lay out every possible pitfall of a chart like this (there's a boatload), I'm just going to say as a specific example: It is absolutely preposterous to think that a load for .270 Winchester with 59gr of 4831 driving a 135gr bullet at 3,000 feet/sec will show a 0.36 feet/sec difference per degree Fahrenheit difference in temperature AND a load for .300 Weatherby Magnum with 75gr of 4831 driving a 200gr bullet 2,850 feet/sec will then magically show the same 0.36 feet/sec per degree Fahrenheit temp difference. There is NO WAY that is going to happen. A chart like that is useless with the same powder in the same caliber but different bullet weights, much less the same powder across different calibers, MUCH MUCH less from one powder to the next, and MUCH MUCH MUCH less from one powder to the next in different calibers at different starting temperatures in different rifles at different elevations with different primers under different phases of the moon. This looks like something someone threw together with their own loads. And we don't even know what loads were used. Another clear example of the weakness of this chart: H4831SC has a difference of .08 feet/sec per degree F? Really? So a hair more than 1 foot/sec per 12 degrees Fahrenheit? Think about that. How was that measured? I'm pretty sure if you made a 40 round batch of 30-06 with 4831SC, cut it in half and chronoed the two 20-round batches of the SAME load that you'd get more than 1 foot/sec difference at the same temperature, so I'm wondering how someone measured that you get 1 foot/sec difference per 12 degrees F difference in temperature. That's a fraction of the standard deviation for a single batch. There's no way that was accurately measured. There's no way to measure that at a resolution where something as precise as 0.08 feet/sec per degree F means anything. And now that I think about it, H4831SC and H4831 are the same chemical composition, so if temperature sensitivity were based on nitro content alone, AND this chart were meaningful, 4831SC and 4831 would have the same velocity diff per degree F diff instead of 4831 being almost 5 times higher than 4831SC. Basically, BigEd, there's just no way for a chart like this to mean anything.

Eh... there's more lead in the lead styphnate in the primer than what atomizes on a bare, uncoated lead bullet. This isn't a leading issue.

I do NOT shoot 9mm major. But as a generally safe practice, if I were going to try to repeat the process to figure out what happened, I'd be reluctant to heat up working 9mm major loads to see if I could duplicate the pressure. Seems like asking for a problem. I'd be inclined to download them, THEN conduct a test. There's no reason to risk pushing them up that high with your normal loads, not really knowing what temp they were at when they reported such high velocities, and not knowing whether or not your attempt to heat the next test batch will end up even higher, and run the risk of a kaboom. That said, producing a higher velocity with the same gun and the same bullet and the same charge weight means it was accomplished with higher average pressure, and more importantly higher peak pressure, and given the extra 180 feet/sec, MUCH higher peak pressure. It's difficult for me to imagine with the pressures 9mm major typically run at that you would have driven those up to 1557 without serious signs of overpressure, so I would guess here that the chrono gave you a bad reading, for whatever reason. OR... you could test loads from the same batch under normal conditions, and if they test as they should in normal conditions, just make sure you use them in normal conditions forevermore. Be safe, sir.

Look at the charge in the case before you seat the bullet, with all presses, with all drops, period.

Look at the load data for whatever caliber you want to shoot it with. Then look at powders that reach the similar velocities at SAAMI max standard with a similar charge weight and similar/same bulllet, and there you go.