New to 10mm

[arguy57]

I am looking to start reloading 10mm. So far I've only reloaded 223 on a Dillon 550. Any start up information on it would be great. Mainly choosing the best powder, brass, and bullets. It would mainly be target rounds. Also, what are the best dies? I've found a set of 10mm/40 dies on craigslist with a caliber conversion. What do I offer the guy for it?

Edited February 11, 2012 by arguy57

[mdmrlm]

I've been reloading 10mm on a 550 for almost 20yrs. I have Dillon dies and haven't had a problem with them ever. As to powder, I've been using AA #7 for quite a while. It meters great with the Dillon powder measure and can really push the speed if needed. For my plinking loads I'm currently using 180gr Zero brand JHP, they work great in my Glock 29 and Delta Elite.

Mark

[preventec47]

For mostly plinking, I like to use the lightest bullets ( reasonably ) like

135 or 150gr or even 155gr so that I can have the laser beam like trajectories

and a lower recoil than with heavier bullets.

[DRAB81]

For an all-around target/fun/hot/accurate 10mm load, my favorite is a 180gr bullet over 9.2gr Longshot @ 1.25-1.26 OAL (CCI300 or CCI350). I love the versatility of the 10mm, but I figure why shoot 10mm if it's only loaded to 40S&W velocities? This is a med/hot 10mm load, under max published data, very accurate, and meters very well. It should get about 1250-1300fps out of a stock G20. I'd actually like to shoot this load at a match, it should make about 230pf...

I did some research on 155gr vs 180gr full power 10mm handloads, and most of the guys that loaded 155gr bullets were unhappy with accuracy @ true 10mm velocities (~1400fps+).

I'd recommend working up 180gr loads, using book data, with Longshot, Blue Dot, AA7, AA9 or Power Pistol. If you already have any of these powders, just start there.

I got most of my 10mm loading education here:

http://glocktalk.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=67

There are sticky's with load data for most powder companies, and the whole spectrum of bullet weights.

.

Edited February 14, 2012 by MEAT

[Amerflyer48]

I used to run 155gr LSWC at a 180 PF and had great accuracy results,..1170 fps or so..WSL (sadly discontinued) powder

then again it was a Delta Elite with a Bar-Sto setup by Dan Sierpina many years and rounds ago..

Use the 10 like it was meant to be used, and you will really come to love this round.

then you can give the .40 guys who load long the question....

"Why load long just use a 10mm.. brass costs about the same (Starline) and then you can make Major without stressing"..... last said at an Area 7 match when I chron'd something like a 195 PF

Go ahead put a "bonus" popper out at 85 yds. did I tell you this gun shoots flat ?

John

[jmbaccolyte]

Amerflyer48,

RE: "Use the 10 like it was meant to be used, and you will really come to love this round.then you can give the .40 guys who load long the question....

"Why load long just use a 10mm.. brass costs about the same (Starline) and then you can make Major without stressing"..... last said at an Area 7 match when I chron'd something like a 195 PF"

Question: I may buy a 10mm, but I don't understand why a long loaded .40 (1.26" OAL) won't get you about the same thing. With the same bullet and cartridge overall length, isn't the internal case volume the same? So shouldn't the pressure and performance be the same? I understand if you section the cases they are the same thickness in the critical web area, so they should be the same strength. So I would think you could use the same loading data. Assuming of course that you're not too close to the rifling (which I'm not in my Tanfo) and it feeds okay through the magazine.

I'm not being snide, I do want to know. One drawback is that I have to use different magazines depending on the OAL for reliable feeding, so I only have one mag that will shoot factory ammo.

Oh, and once fired .40 S&W cases are much cheaper and commonly available.

[freakshow10mm]

.40 cases are stronger than 10mm cases due to the primer size. Smaller primer pocket means more material around that area. The web and head of the .40 is stronger than the 10mm in the same area.

For me, I've got two 10mm loads for my gun. The often quoted 9.2gr Longshot behind anything 180gr and 6.0gr WSF behind anything 180gr.

[Amerflyer48]

the whole reason to load .40 long is to get it to run in a 1911

I bought my 10mm with about 4000 pieces of brass,.. and I am actually downloading it to make major especially now with it being lowered to 165

Once fired brass does tip the scales to the .40 I will give you that...

Since I don't own a 1911 in .40 I can't say for sure if a long loaded .40 is the same but then again is a long loaded .38Spl. anything like a .357 Mag ? Logic would say no but without a side by side test who knows ? Does extra brass contact mean much ? is there really much strength gained by a SP vs. a LP primer pocket ?

anybody want to take a long loaded .40 to a 190 PF and see what happens ??? keep in mind most 10s don't have a ramped barrel

In the end if all you are doing is shooting USPSA or IDPA with it either does fine, but if I were to hunt with it I would prefer my 10 as I can load it hotter than a .40 even I believe a long loaded .40 just my opinion.

John

Edited March 4, 2012 by Amerflyer48

[jmbaccolyte]

Another reason to load long was to be able to use a faster powder for less recoil and still make major without too much peak chamber pressure (probably more important for the old higher power factor).

My Tanfoglio has a ramped barrel and appears to be fully supported, but some of the guys who have the same gun in 10mm, wrote on this forum that they can't find a stiff enough recoil spring to keep from launching the brass into the next county with hot 10mm loads. So, I'm worried about frame battering at hot 10mm levels.

I've never loaded mine hot at all, so I don't know, but looking at Hogdon's manual, the top .40 load @ 1.125" OAL length with a 180 gr bullet and Longshot powder is 8.0 grains @ 1159fps for 208pf if my math is correct.

The same website for the 10mm lists the OAL as 1.26" & from a low of 8.5 grains of Longshot @ 1221fps for 220pf to a high of 9.5 grains @ 1287fps for 232pf. I agree it would be an interesting experiment, but I think NEALIO said that even with the stiffest recoil spring and a Stage 2 Sprinco in his Tanfoglio 10mm, he was still kicking brass too far with hot 10mm loads.

Finally the pressure for the listed .40 load is 32,000 psi and the pressure for the lower 10mm load is 31,000 psi although the velocity has increased from 1159fps to 1221fps. With different powders the pressure drop is much more pronounced when going from a hot .40 load to a mild 10mm load. It might be worth experimenting with. Hopefully someone who has done it will chip in.

Edited March 6, 2012 by jmbaccolyte

[freakshow10mm]

I've got a 10mm 1911 commander with 22lb recoil spring. Load of choice for defense and hunting is a 180gr XTP with 9.2gr of Longshot set to 1.260. This 180/LS combination is weird in that 9.5gr generally gives less velocity than 9.2gr. A lot of us on different forums have experienced this. Very few actually get faster velocity with more powder. 9.2 to 9.3 is the sweet spot. It's also scary accurate. Brass does kick quite a ways away.

As to frame battering, my 1911 is an aluminum frame with 60,000 rounds on it. No frame battering to speak of and I load 10mm like a 10mm should be loaded; not stupid, but definitely not a .40 with more expensive brass. My light load is 207 PF.

[dsb1829]

I started my 10mm journey with a S&W 1006. I followed shortly with a glock20SF. The next item in short order was reloading equipment...

I have been shooting a weekly IDPA match at one of the local ranges since late November. During that time I have shot 45acp, 10mm, and .40. Out of 2 separate g22 .40 cal guns I have yet to have any feeding or ejection problems. My 1911 and g20 both have random gremlins that sneak up, especially with fast powder and light load combinations. I have come to realize that both will require tuning to an unknown extent if I want to run them competitively in matches.

That said, put the gun/ competition conversation to the side, the 10mm is fun to reload. The cartridge can be whatever you want. Glocktalk 10mm reloading board has a lot of guys with 10mm reload specific experience. One of them has been scouring the web and compiling every 10mm load he can find, he keeps it in a shared google doc for all to see. My go-to load is 180g XTP JHP(or Magnus J134 which is a cheap twin), 10.4g of BlueDot, loaded to 1.25 COAL, with a CCI LPP or WLP.

[Art Yeo]

You guys kept recommending the GlockTalk website but every time I (and many others) tried to register, the website kept returning with this message:

"Sorry. The administrator has banned your IP address. To contact the administrator".

No one seems to be reading any emails sent to the Admin over there. Does this website have too many users or something?

[jmbaccolyte]

Art,

This showed up at the top my my screen when I went there from my bookmark,

http://glocktalk.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=67

Good Luck

[DRAB81]

Check this one out too:

http://www.10mm-firearms.com/

.

[zaphar]

then you can give the .40 guys who load long the question....

"Why load long just use a 10mm.. brass costs about the same (Starline) and then you can make Major without stressing"..... last said at an Area 7 match when I chron'd something like a 195 PF

The 10mm seems like a better off-the-shelf option, but if you reload, it seems like long loading 40 S&W might make more sense if you only use the mid to heavier bullets. I personally don't use anything under 165gr in 40 caliber, which in the picture below you can see will probably perform similar to 10mm loaded to the same length. In addition to having similar (the same?) case capacity when loaded to equal length, the 40 S&W uses small primers which is beneficial to anyone that doesn't use anything with large primers (no need to buy more tooling to use them). Then there's the cost of brass on top of that.

If the 10mm had an OAL similar to the 7.62x25mm Tok, there would be very little overlap in bullet weights and you probably wouldn't see people trying to load 40 S&W that long.

[kneelingatlas]

I shoot .40 instead of 10mm for the same reason I shoot 9 major instead of .38 super: I don't has to search for MY brass, I can just grab ANY brass.

When I go to the range and shoot a handful of rounds, sweep the brass in my lane into a pile, grab a handful of brass and go home (all but a few pieces will be 9, 40 or 45, all of which I reload), it takes exactly 20 seconds, but if I'm shooting 10mm or .38 super, I have to sweep up all the brass I can get to without disrupting other shooters, pick through the pile for 10 minutes just to recover 30%-40% of the brass I brought to the range. Plus every time I've found a piece of 10mm brass at the range I didn't shoot, it came from a Glock and has a bulge which will keep it from cycling reliably in my Tanfoglio of my dad's Colt.

[Rockets]

You can find 40s&w all over the range. 10mm is very scarce and darn expensive. I shoot 10mm less and less as I hate hunting for my spent brass at the range.

[lee blackman]

10mm is by far my favorite handgun cartridge. Only because no one ever made a production double stack .460rowland.

Just about everything mainstream you find on the shelf is loaded down to the same as a .40sw or barely hotter. Buffalo Bore and Double Tap brand ammo is the only thing I've found that loads to the original norma specs. Even the Winchester 175gr STHP's are loaded down well below the original spec. PMC, Federal, all that other stuff might as well just buy 40sw because its exactly the same.

I really like AA#9 for 10mm behind a jacketed 180gr bullet.

I have a couple 10mm's, my first was an IAI Javelina 7" longslide all stainless 1911. I later bought a Glock 20c, which I traded for a 20sf because I like the grip size better. A solid guide rod with a 22lb ISMI recoil spring was my next purchase.

The most awesome thing about the 10mm, is being able to convert to a 9x25dillon by dropping in a barrel. Wanna talk about a beast! It makes the 357sig look like 380acp by comparison. I takes that long 10mm case and necks it down to a 9mm bullet... Its like a full powered 357mag thats semi-auto.

[zaphar]

I shoot .40 instead of 10mm for the same reason I shoot 9 major instead of .38 super: I don't has to search for MY brass, I can just grab ANY brass.

When I go to the range and shoot a handful of rounds, sweep the brass in my lane into a pile, grab a handful of brass and go home (all but a few pieces will be 9, 40 or 45, all of which I reload), it takes exactly 20 seconds, but if I'm shooting 10mm or .38 super, I have to sweep up all the brass I can get to without disrupting other shooters, pick through the pile for 10 minutes just to recover 30%-40% of the brass I brought to the range. Plus every time I've found a piece of 10mm brass at the range I didn't shoot, it came from a Glock and has a bulge which will keep it from cycling reliably in my Tanfoglio of my dad's Colt.

If you're shooting at a range you could probably use one of these to catch your brass:

Although one of those wouldn't be very useful during a competition.

[gandog56]

I use a Precision Bullets 185 grain RFN bullet and HP-38 powder.

Why I love this bullet. First a target from my Sig P229 40 cal S&W.

Second, a target from my Dan Wesson Razorback 10mm pistol.

I don't think I can possibly do any better on MY end.

Edited July 25, 2013 by gandog56