124gr9mm

I use a Hornady taper crimp/seating die, and i don't get any flat spots like that. Maybe expand your case mouth a little more before seating?

Thanks.

Nice shooting. I haven't read any negative reviews about Brazos thus far, so for now I'll make them my go-to source. i don't shoot a lot at all, but i'll order for .38 special and .45acp as well, so I'll do what I can...

I'm a fan of plated bullets and I'm always chasing the lowest prices, so I decided to try out Brazos 125 gr rn plated 9mm. To now I've mainly used ACME 124 gr rn (new profile) and Ibejiheads 124 gr CN FB. Both cycle well in my Glock 17, EAA Witness, and KelTec Sub 2000 (yes, I use it for friendly/practice steel matches). I thought their packaging was a little odd (bags of about 835 bullets as opposed to 1000 for most others) but they have a 10% discount for new customers, so I ordered 2 bags. On first inspection the bullets seemed to be well/consistently constructed and the coating looked well done. There was some variation in the color, but there were no flakes or chipped pieces of coating in the bag and it did fine on my smash test. I weighed a random sample and they all came out to be heavier than the 125 gr advertised but otherwise they looked good. I was a little nervous about the "fat" profile compared to the ACME and Ibejiheads profile that I was used to, but they went through my press just fine and there were no issues with scraping/flaking of the coating. I loaded the first batch with 3.8 gr of Cleanshot powder with an OAL of 1.11. I shot it through my Glock first and the recipe was kind of smokey, but recoil and accuracy were the same as I'm used to with the other bullets. I tried it in the Witness next and it failed miserably. While the load passed my case gauge, the bullet got stuck just shy of going into battery and I had to pry the slide a little to get it open. Went back to the reloading table and tried 4.2 gr Bullseye at an OAL of 1.08. Much less smoke than with the Cleanshot and cycled perfectly in all three guns. Recoil felt a bit lighter than the Cleanshot as well, so I'll bring a chrono next time and see what I get. There's a local practice match this weekend (action steel), so between my daughter and I we'll put a bunch of rounds through both pistols. Thanks to the folks on the board who have been talking about these bullets and bringing them to my attention!

I've been looking at those but I was concerned about how effective they'd be indoors. I RO some friendly matches so I'm not sure how they'd be after a few hours standing next to pistol shooters...

Thanks for sharing. Helps me building a practice routine...

Looks like a good fit. I have a full size steel Witness and it's a pain finding holsters for it, so I would imagine it's similar for compacts.

For someone like you who's loaded many thousands of cases it's hard for me to believe that there's something suddenly wrong from a process perspective. Unless you've made a change to the way you operate I think the culprit would be somewhere else. How many times have you reloaded the brass? Is it possible that the cases are getting to the end of their lifecycle and splitting? How about your press and dies? Are they all tightened down? Any cracks or new damage that would cause imperfections to start creeping in?

Did you notice a dramatic difference with the additions you made?

" I also need to add that even if I go SLOW, I still can't make it happen. I set a par for 2.5 - 3 seconds and I hit start with my gun already in hand and pointed out on target, still have this problem. No matter how much I slow down I still miss the well, even if I'm not timing myself." Go slower. Start with a ridiculous time like 10 seconds and do it perfectly then go from there...

Thanks for linking that.

Like the others I was going to recommend take down, cleaning, and oiling. Hopefully that takes care of it and the ticket with the manufacturer isn't necessary. Good luck.

Here's the metal clip I'm talking about: https://imgur.com/a/BJ4Exno

Indeed. If the price is right and if it can eat regular ammo then I'd be interested. My kids complain about the snappiness of my G17 so having this G44 would be a good way to get lots of trigger time in.

I have the same gun and I have a .22lr conversion slide. I have found that I have to keep it VERY clean for things to operate smoothly. My daughter uses it for steel challenge and other practice matches, and if I don't clean and oil it the night before a match there will be jams. Now that we have several hundred rounds through it, I can see the wear points on the slide so I'm going to polish them. I just ordered a new gun lube so I'll try that as well. The biggest improvement we saw was in the magazines we used. The magazines MUST have a metal spacing/retention clip on them or they will not cycle rounds reliably. The magazine will seat into the mag well if the clip isn't there, but it will cycle like garbage. Almost all of the hollow point ammo I have gets stuck at some point so I don't even try it anymore. I tried the mini-mags but they didn't seem to cycle that much better than others. The most consistent ammo we've used has been the regular box CCI Blazer:

I use a Hornady Lock n Load as well (but use Hornady dies). Never had issues with 9mm, but I had some scraping with .38 Special one time. In that case it was a small piece of lead/metal in the seating die. I took all my dies apart and cleaned them really thoroughly and the problem went away.

Definitely strange. I don't lube pistol brass, so I have no idea if that could be the culprit. Are you using the same bullets that you always have? It almost sounds like you got an oversized bullet stuck in the barrel. Did you measure the squibs against the rest of the stock you have? Could your seating/crimp die be damaged and deforming your bullets?

Agree. Start with pushups and pullups (they make bands to assist) and go from there.

Thanks Mike! Looks promising. Seems to be on sale right now and they have a great return policy.

Maybe I'll try that one and see if I can "make it work"...

Does anyone know of a simple/basic kydex holster that I can get for my large frame steel witness? I use a basic Uncle Mike's (don't laugh) for my Glock 17 when I do practice matches at a local indoor range, so I was hoping to get something similar for my Witness. I looked in previous threads and people recommend trying out holster made for Barettas or Sigs, but nobody with a large frame steel seems to have actually responded. Anyone out there have an idea? I saw this cheap Tactical Scorpion listed on Amazon, but it says it says for P frame, so I'm not sure if it would fit - https://www.amazon.com/Tactical-Scorpion-Witness-Polymer-Holster/dp/B079SWH6SJ

Where do you get decent ammo that cheap? I mainly shoot 124gr 9mm (occasionally 147gr) and I can't find anything good that's $8/box

Cripes. I'd have a hard enough time just seeing a 10 inch target at 1000 yards, nevermind hitting it. What's the magnification on the scopes you use?

FWIW I use Hornady dies with my Lock n Load progressive for 9, 45, and 38/357 and I've never had a problem (except the time a .380 case got mixed in with the 9mm). I have a Lee Factory Crimp die that I use with .45 because I had a pistol that was finicky about the crimp on SWC loads, so I use it out of habit.

I pretty much exclusively load coated bullets (ACME, ibijeheads, Blue, whatever..) and I've never had a problem using a Hornady Series II Taper Crimp Die Set. Station 1 - deprime and resize Station 2 - expand Station 3 - powder Station 4 - empty Station 5 - Seat and taper crimp The Hornady seat and taper crimp is great with coated bullets. Even when I have to pull bullets because of bad primer strike, etc, there's very little damage to the coating.