RGA

Compressed powder charge?

I had good luck after polishing the inside of the Dillon powder funnel. No more powder bridging with Varget or N140/N540. Another issue is that you should give the charge enough time to drop through the powder funnel by adding a little dwell time.

Hi tkss_burgundy, Do you have a link supporting the claim below? I'm not able to find any small pistol primers under 75 Euro per 1000 at the moment. Thanks!

Hi, https://geco-ammunition.com/en/ammunition/products-overview/pistol-revolver-cartridges/geco-full-metal-jacket-flat-nose-pr This is what Geco lists: Velocity V0 [m/s] 283 V10 [m/s] 278 V25 [m/s] 270 V50 [m/s] 259

Just trying to help. Have a nice weekend!

For comparisons sake I added 2 pics of factory S&B cases fired in my Q5. The 3rd pic is from the OP BlackApache's case failure. It looks like I see 2 ring markings from the stepped chamber. Considering that it concerns a reloaded case this could indicate the case was not fully chambered the 2nd firing.

I think Miranda is correct as well. When I have the time I will check and compare with fired cases from my Q5.

Hi, I guess Dave Corbin and the rest of the bullet swaging community is wrong too than. This comes from his website: Swaging is the opposite of drawing. When you DRAW a bullet or jacket, you push it through an open ring die that reduces the size. When you SWAGE a bullet, you expand it to a slightly larger size in a pressure-sealed die. You can draw down, but you always swage up. http://www.corbins.com/intro.htm But after checking I noticed the term has different definitions in different contexts. That I never realized but we are using it in the context of bullets here. On topic: Personally I'd shoot the projectiles in the picture without reservations.

Slightly off topic but swaging is increasing the diameter and drawing is decreasing the diameter. I have been drawing copper jackets and using these to swage jacketed bullets (.224, 308 and .355) for 13 years and this is the terminology used.

Hi, The largest benefit from these type of toolheads when loading handgun calibers comes from clamping it. Floating the dies does not add a lot more for these calibers. Bottleneck rifle calibers are another story where floating the dies (in addition to clamping the toolhead) does have a positive measurable effect in my experience.

Here also no issues with Win SR in my X5.

Both the Mighty Armory and FW are excellent and tough but I like the FW the most due to the already mentioned case centering function. This function proved to be very helpful when decapping cases with a narrow neck like .223R.

I'm happy with the MA decapper dies I have but sadly cannot say the same about the 9mm and 223 FL dies I purchased a couple of years ago. Issue was not insufficicient neck tension but they scratched my brass severly due to insufficient hardening. I assume that issue has been addressed in the mean time.

Below a pic of my X5 slide manufactured end of 2017.

I see your point. Just make sure to try a seating die without crimping function (like the Redding Pro variant for instance).

Hi, On my MK7 Evo I use Dillon powder dies in some of the unused stations for this purpose. Kind rgds, RGA

Hi, Fiocchi makes a quite good 200 grain jacketed SWC but I don't know if that is available on your side of the pond. I'm also happy with Speer 200 TC en 200 SWC (plated). The 200 grain XTP is excellent as well as the Speer 200 Gold Dot but both are pricey.

Oh thanks, you just reminded me I'm getting old.... What can I say, I'm an eighties kids and Magnum PI was one of the shows I loved to watch as a young teen. As well as Knight Rider and of course The A-Team! Man, I wanted a Mini-14 so bad back then.... as well as 2 Dobermann dogs. Anyway, thanks everybody for your replies so far. And I agree there are many, many other powder brands/types that will do the job more than well but I wanted to limit my enquiry here to these 3 Hodgdon types. Over here European brands like Vectan, Vihtavuori en Lovex are also getting scarser (and more expensive if you do find them!). My favorite powder monger is out of BA9, several Lovex types and also a number of Vihta types for instance. And we won't even mention primers.... Supply chain woes and the war in Ukraine do not help. I was quite lucky to find this small Hodgdon cache for ancient prices. Also found this rescource which is a walhalla for tinkerers like myself. Some of you will surely appreciate it as well. http://www.natoreloading.com/9mm/

You are absolutely right Guy! If I was smarter I'd limit myself to N320 for everything (in 9 and .45) and be done with it. I just like experimenting too much... Hodgdon and other US made powders are almost impossible to find in the EU these days but I discovered a small cache. Quantities are limited so my experiments are just for fun.

Hi, Which powder do you prefer for 115,124 and 145/147 grain plated and jacketed bullets? Hodgdon HP38, CFE pistol or HS6? I'm aware of the different burning rates and that's why I'm asking. And for fun of course. I'dont shoot major or open so that is not a consideration. I obtained some CFE and am playing with it in 9 and .45. I quite like this stuff! Accurate, meters like water, is reasonably clean and soft shooting. (My usual go-to powder is N320 (for 115/124 bullets) and I also been using some N310 (100/115 target loads), N340 (124/145) 3N38 (145), D032 (115/124) and RS12 (115/124.) Which of the named Hodgdon powders do you like for which bullet weights and why? Looking forward to your responses!

Hi, Like Farmer mentioned, generally SR will work in SP but I tried Murom SRM in a SIG P320X5 and they would not ignite, not a single one and I made sure they were seated well. In a Walther Q5 about 10% failed to ignite (even by the 2nd or 3rd strike). Just FYI in case you come across Murom small rifle magnum primers.

Excellent review Stef! Bedankt!

Hi, I've been using Ginex primers for a while now and they are quite hard/thick as noted. Some shooters using lighter hammer/striker spring don't like them for that reason. I have not had a failure to fire in my stock Sig P320 X5 or Walther Q5 however. They are made in the former Yugoslav state of Bosnia and Herzegovina and there is no relation to S&B. The picture below shows the relatively shallow firing pin strikes (mixed P320 X5 and Walther Q5) . The load was on the low side of the spectrum.

Hi all, Has anybody tried Redding NxGEN (sizer) dies already? How do they compare with the TiC sizers? Are they worth replacing my TiC dies in your opinion? I really don't need more dies but just love to experiment with (new) stuff.

Maybe the undersize decapping pin from Redding (0.057") is an option? I use tem for decapping 6mmBR brass with tight flash holes. Or just grind down a standard pin untill it works. (I don't have experience with Norma 9mm brass so I don't know how tight the flash holes exactly.)