GunDoc

+1 on that advice. burntcrispy: I have to agree with you on that one. 360 gr. @1150 f.p.s. = 1057 f.p.e. or 414 PF Doc.

Way back when the power factor dropped I did some testing with different powders and 180 and 200 gr bullets. IN MY GUN, I found no difference in the felt recoil impulse, so I switched to the 180’s solely on a cost bases. YMMV Doc.

Subject: 45 cal 230 gr. fp bullet. Shot the bullets with two different loads (Win. Super Target and Win 231) out of two different guns (Springfield 1911 & Ruger Bisley). I was only able to accuracy test out to 50 ft. as I was at the local indoor range. these are all 10 shot groups 45 acp. (I had to shoot off hand as I forgot to pack my sand bags). Springfield: 4.3 gr. WST oal. 1.200 Group size 2” 4.6 gr. 231 oal. 1.200 Group size 9- 2 1/4” 10-3” (called flyer) Ruger Bisley: 4.3 gr. WST oal. 1.200 Group size. 2 1/4” 4.6 gr. 231 oal. 1.200 Group size 2” These are defiantly the most accurate bullets I’ve tried so far and for some reason seemed to show less smoke at the muzzle than the plated bullets I was using. I haven't had the chance to chrono them yet, (I don’t have the indoor light set up for my chrono) as the temps outside have been it the high teens to single digits. After 100 rounds through each gun, clean up was much easier than the plated or lead bullets I’ve tried in the past. Next test will be seeing how many bullets it takes for accuracy or reliability to fall off. At this point I’m highly impressed with Bear creek and would recommend them. hope this helps. Doc. PS. To all on this forum who recommended Bear creek bullets (You know who you are) Thank You! PPS. Future test’s will be with the 147 gr. in my 9XD service and 180’s in my 40 limited gun.

I've also been searching for a SS holster and found this one on the Safariland web sight. Does anyone have any experance or info on it?

don't know if this has been posted before. Gun shop ad I thought it was great

I just got back from the range. COOL! stages. Only bad part about this match is I can only shoot it once. Shooting thursday. Working stage 6 with lew & Mukie

This reminds me of a project I did almost 20 years ago. I was shooting falling plates at a local club and I was trying to find a load that would work better with my Hi Power. (Trying to make a 9mm into a 357 mag.) My problem with most heavy bullets was with case bulging, where the base of the bullet would be inside the case. I quickly found out the 9mm’s case was also tapered on the inside as well, getting thicker as it went down to the case head. I fear you may have this same problem in some cases. I finally stumbled appon a turncated cone boat tail 160 grain that offered the best compromise between bullet mass and potental velocity. The local caster was kind enough to size me a few thousand to .356 to try in my HP and the results were great. Unfortunately I can’t find my notes on the load data. All I remember was that it was blue dot powder. I did not own a chronograph back then so the only test results I had was how well they knocked down the plates. I’m looking forward to hearing your results. Doc.

It really all depends on the size of your hand. Small hand, remove the grips and grip tape the frame. Large hands, grip tape over the grips or replace them with something larger. For me, I had my grips stippled like TXAG suggested. Matt Trout took his soldering iron too mine about five years ago and they still work great. Doc.

When I was shooting a lot of magnum revolvers, I used to separate the ones that were splitting at the mouth, and trim them down to special length, and keep on loading them at the lighter pressures till they finally gave up all together. Doc.

Years ago, when I switched to a 40 I was getting free Federal Nickel brass from the local PD. For a while, it was great. I was the only one at the matches shooting nickel brass. Those silver casings were so easy to pick out from the other brass on the ground. However, they started splitting after only four reloads. I switched back to normal brass and I was getting at least ten loadings before I down graded them to “Practice” brass. I used to be very anal about my brass, marking all of it, keeping records of how many times it was reloaded, etc. When the power factor was lowered, I quit keeping track and now I just segregate by head stamp and visual inspection. The gun doesn't really seem to care, it eats praticaly anything I feed it. However, the nickel casings still get a second look, and if it looks like they’ve been around the block a few times, I just pitch them with the rest of the junk. Doc.

Paul, What your dealing with is brass that came from a box of Winchester “Win-Clean” ammo. When Winchester decided to make a reduced lead round they used a lead free primer. However, the new primer was not as hot as a traditional lead styfanate one and it wouldn’t ignite the powder in certain circumstances. (Like cold weather). To compensate for this they went with a larger diameter flash hole. This solution created a new problem, the larger flash hole would allow more gas pressure back to the primer, sometimes causing it to back out of the casing, locking up the firearm. (like when it’s fired out of a revolver). To solve this problem, Winchester engineers crimped the primer in place, like in their military ammo. Unfortunately, Winchester did not change the head stamp on this ammo so it’s impossible to tell without really looking at the flash hole. Most of the brass that I buy comes from indoor ranges, and of that, I’ve been getting around 2% of this brass. It has forced me into some new culling procedures. First I look at all the head stamps and throw out the junk. (S&B, A-merc, etc). Then I set a decapping die in the press so it hits the shell plate as low in the travel as possible. This causes me to use more force on the arm of the press to deprime and I can feel if any of the casings need more force than usual to deprime. These I can cull as needed. I’ve also developed a rather soft hand at seating the new primers, to hopefully catch any that I’ve missed. Hope this helps. Doc.