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40 Long


tomjerry1

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Ok, I have heard of, but have never seen or personally know anyone shooting 40 Long. Is it a 40 loaded to a longer length? 10mm sized shorter? If there is an advantage for it's use, what is it? I'm up for anything that will help, but is it another mouse trap?

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It's just regular 40 brass with the bullet not seated as deep.  1911s are "large frame" guns meaning they're designed for 45/10/38, not 9/40 like "small frame" guns (CZ75, etc.) so in the early days long loaded 9 and 40 feed more reliably than factory length rounds.  Now there are a selection of magazines which feed factory length rounds just fine (SVI, MBX, STI with spacer)

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Most STI/SV shooters load their .40 loads longer (around 1.200" plus or minus) for reliability, even with current generation magazines. It also gives less chamber pressure and a tad more safety margin for fast powders.

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I wondered what this "40 long" business was all about when I got into limited with a 2011...now that I've been to the range with both my 40 long loads and factory length ammo I See the difference..Intermittent feeding issues with the shorter ammo. Loading longer...just under 1.2 for me a my lim guns run perfect. 

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16 hours ago, nelson1each said:

I wondered what this "40 long" business was all about when I got into limited with a 2011...now that I've been to the range with both my 40 long loads and factory length ammo I See the difference..Intermittent feeding issues with the shorter ammo. Loading longer...just under 1.2 for me a my lim guns run perfect. 

yep, you got it!

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Not to jack your thread. I recently bought a Trojan and bought 5 tripp Corey mags and they haaaaaate 1.135, which I always loaded for my glock and m&p. I'm going to give 1.180 a go, but how long is too long? 180gr blue bullets

Edited by txolds442
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seems like 1.180 oal is the sweet spot for long loaded .40.  The companies selling long load .40 use this oal too.  With factory ammo all of my custom .40s (except my first Edge ironically) would occasionally jam. 

My guns worked just fine at 1.180, I tried 1.20 and I'd occasionally get jams.  Don't see the point in going longer than 1.180 if that oal gives near 100% function. 

 

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I can load to a oal of 1.20 in my edge as well as my ria. Make sure the bullets you are using are .400. I got a batch of coated bullets a while ago that were sized to .401-.402 and had problems with them. I would get one stuck in the barrel not quite in battery. Had to pop them out. Now I make sure they  are sized to .400

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I run 1.185 in mine and never have any problems. Typically I use 180's or 200's with fast powders AA2. You pretty much have to make sure you chamber and lead are cut to work with the longer length then you are good to go.

 

 

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  • 2 months later...

I have both STIs and Paras that will feed empty brass, but I load 1.170" in practice ammo (works in glock or M&P) 1.2" with everything else, except 1.225" when using Clays. A gunsmith told me  years ago that when pushing pressure limits, or even if you're not, a longer OAL will be more forgiving.

 

Edited by jeff40
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On 10/18/2016 at 3:36 PM, txolds442 said:

Not to jack your thread. I recently bought a Trojan and bought 5 tripp Corey mags and they haaaaaate 1.135, which I always loaded for my glock and m&p. I'm going to give 1.180 a go, but how long is too long? 180gr blue bullets

I load 180 and 165 grain blue bullets at 1.185 with no issues.

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  • 2 weeks later...

My personally built 2011 .40 Limited gun with would not run factory ammo reliably, 1.175 and above OAL ran flawless.  After some mag and extractor tuning it now runs everything.  I was very surprised to find out how tuning the mag made such a difference.  However, the load recipe I like most uses a 1.18 OAL.

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