OAL

[bradthegunmaniac]

Why is there so many sizes off OAL. What does the OAL do?

[elantra2004]

over all length differnt calibers differnt lenghts dont make mistake like i did BUY a MICROMETER

[bradthegunmaniac]

I'm loading 147s in a 9mm I see so many OAL why do you set one at 1.125 and one at 1.145?

[Pat Miles]

over all length differnt calibers differnt lenghts dont make mistake like i did BUY a MICROMETER

I think he was referring to a caliper. They can be had in all price ranges from a simple dial caliper to a digital unit. They are an absolute MUST for reloading. Do yourself a big favor and don't try ANY reloading without a set of calipers and a good current reloading manual. Serious accidents could occur by not using BOTH. Be smart

CYa,

Pat

[Corey]

good book for beginners to reloading is "The ABC's of Reloading". pretty easy reading and VERY informative.

basically, people adjust their load OALs to accomodate feeding. some guns feed ammo better at different lengths. changing OAL on a load will change the pressure so you have to be careful when making changes. 2 or 3 good manuals with load data are a must for reloading.

[bradthegunmaniac]

I have looked and can't find anything on solo 1000.

Edited May 20, 2010 by bradthegunmaniac

[blind bat]

Solo 1000 is primarily an obscure shotgun powder. You aren't going to find much data on it outside of competition circles. It has a cult following among competition shooters who were looking for a powder that performed like N320 but was cheaper and easier to find. If you do this you will find a ton of data: Advanced Search -> Solo 1000, Search in Title, 9mm/38 Reloading forum

If you haven't read at least a good portion of 'The ABC's of Reloading' you shouldn't be loading. There is a lot more data about the process of reloading in that book than you will find in reloading manuals. It has almost no load data but a lot of good info on how to do load development without blowing yourself and your gun to pieces. Remember there is a very fine line between safe, reloaded ammunition and a pipe bomb.

My reasoning behind picking an OAL:

- Most factory round nose 9mm is loaded to about 1.150". Don't quote me on this but I believe most factory 9mm hollow points around 1.125". I figure they probably have good reason for that. So when I started reloading I duplicated WWB's OAL of 1.150"

- Certain barrels have deeper chambers than others and depending on your bullet profile a long OAL can come in contact with the rifling. If this happens you can have problems ejecting a round by racking the slide or you can sometime turn your gun in to a manual bullet puller. Having the bullet touching the rifling can cause pressure spikes and can also cause the gun not to go into battery. Some of my 1.150" rounds would catch on the rifling of my XD-9 so I decreased the OAL to 1.145". My rounds usually come out to within OAK +/- .003" with mixed brass, this means I don't have to worry about loading special batches of ammo for the XD.

- Some guns (eg. glocks) have magazines that don't allow loading to the maximum length allowed by the ammo specification. Loading much over 1.150" in a glock can cause ammo to get stuck in the mag. 1.145" works great in all my mags (Glock, XD, CZ, etc).

- Loading to short can cause feeding problems and ammo to rattle around in the mag. Loading too long can cause feeding problems as well but I've experienced more problems feeding short rounds.

- There is a general consensus that long rounds are more accurate. A rule of thumb in the rifle world is to keep the bullet just off the rifling. I haven't seen much of a difference in 9mm pistols.

- Most reloading manuals will quote very short OAL measurements. This is so that they can calculate pressure figures at the short end of the OAL range. If they you load longer there is no problem because generally loading a longer round decreases pressure. However, if they quote a max load at a long OAL and you load shorter than the published OAL you could cause a pressure spike that blows up your gun.

Edited May 20, 2010 by blind bat

[superdude]

see:

http://www.38super.net/Pages/Overall%20Length.html

[calishootr]

different OAL lengths are forthe different bullet profiles(ogives) and the seating depths as formerly stated can be critical!!!!! in a 9mm .003 of an inch mistake in seating depth can actually double chamber pressures(re-read above about that whole pipe bomb thing) DO NOT eyeball your loaded rounds vs. a factory round on a kitchen table for OAL....go out an buy a nice set of calipers