Setting up for a steel challenge

[Mo Zee]

I have a 4.5" shorty that has been built by a local smith. I usually shoot a 170PF with a 121 copper or 123 lead bullet. The gun currently has a 9lb spring. Should I shoot the gun as is at the steel challenge or should I drop the charge? What PF should I look at and can I use the same recoil spring or should I replace with a lighter one?

[Pro2AInPA]

A lot of the steel matches around here want minor PF ammo only. As far as whether or not you'll need to change your spring setup, testing is the only way to know for sure.

[soaringf22]

I use a shorty 38 super. And for months I tried to find the best steel load. From 115pf where reliabilty in cycle was and issue to 135 where recoil was rediculous. I also tried 7625, 4756, autocomp then tried WST. But my gun just would not run at light loads. The biggest problem was it needed a 7lb spring and my gun wouldn't work with less than a 9. That's when I went to 5.3gr of wst behind a 115 berry bullet. However the 9lb spring at that 133pf was still sluggish. Not to mention I would have to go from a tungsten guide rod to a plastic one and alter the reverse plug to a lighter one.

A couple weekes ago I got sick of changing the internals and still not have a nice load. I decided to use my same setup for major but instead of 124s I dropped a 115 on it and voola it worked great and even shot flatter than all other loads I tried. I havnt chronyd it yet but I'm assuming its about 155pf. But nothing needs to be altered and it shoots flat so now I have a steel load that months ago I thought would have been silly. Just fyi my major load is 124gr hp with 7.6gr ac. Now steel load is same powder load with 115 bullet. And seating die doesn't get altered either so even better.

[G-ManBart]

It's really going to depend on your gun. Some will run lighter loads with the same spring, and some won't. Rather than drop the charge, I've considered loading a 95gr .380 bullet over one of my normal loads, and maybe drop the charge a bit...going to work on this one over the winter. I'd probably try to go with the lightest PF that would still run with my normal spring...whatever that number worked out to be. R,

[soaringf22]

I agree with Bart, the gun works already with those springs and its not worth the trouble of changing inernal pieces out. especially when you have back to back matches such as steel then uspsa. All I have to do is look at the bullet head and know what i need to load the mag for now.

[Mo Zee]

Thanks for the replies guys. I will see if I can find some lighter heads to experiment with.