Jayman Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 Well I have probably shot upwards of 40k Berry's Plated bullets in 9mm/147gr RN. Today I had a few keyhole on me. Not a lot, but enough to be noticeable and annoying. Have I just not cleaned my barrel well enough? I changed nothing in my loading process, and the same thing that always worked before is now not working so hot: 3.3gr Titegroup 1.135" OAL just enough crimp to straighten out bell (pulled bullets have no marks) CCI primers I'm going to scrub my barrel silly tomorrow, I haven't been fastidious about it. Is there anything else I should check, or did I just get a goofy run of bullets? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
el pres Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 Measure the diameter of the bullets ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chills1994 Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 Check for "A-MERC" head stamped brass. No, I haven't loaded up any Berry's 147 grainers in 9mm, yet, but I have loaded up plenty of 200 gr Plated SWC's and 230 grain plated "FMJ" pro-jo's . The A-MERC brass cuts through the plating every time. In fact it shaves a little sliver of copper off and the rounds usually don't drop into the case gage either. Not to "run down" Berry's bullets, but a guy here locally told me he was getting "double struck" bullets from them. Granted, I don't know what that means exactly, but it does kinda leave me wondering about the quality of their "first struck" products. I mean, couldn't they get it right the first time? So yeah, like he ^^^ said. Check the pro-jos' diameters. Their prices have gone so high, I'm switching to lead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joecichlid Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 I agree, check the DIA of the bullets. Chills, Double Struck means that they bullets are resized after the plating to make sure they are to the correct DIA. I used to run the 124 gr RN out of my .38 Super without any troubles unless I over crimped them and then I would start to see oblong holes at 10 yards, not a drastic key hole though. Joe W. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kmitchl Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 Welcome to the club. Like you I shot a bunch of them before getting burned. I now have 3000 under my bench that I don't know anyone who has p#$$ed me off badly enough to sell them to. They tumble out of every 9mm I own. When I miked them they are all within a few tenths of the advertised dia. When I contacted Berrys they were no help. I'm shooting Precision Deltas now. Keith Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mick Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 I've had trouble with "plated" bullets before, especially in older barrels or AET barrels. They just don't seem to engrave well and slip in the rifling... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scirocco38s Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 Welcome to the club. Like you I shot a bunch of them before getting burned. I now have 3000 under my bench that I don't know anyone who has p#$$ed me off badly enough to sell them to. They tumble out of every 9mm I own. When I miked them they are all within a few tenths of the advertised dia. When I contacted Berrys they were no help.I'm shooting Precision Deltas now. Keith Berry's and rainiers both keyhole for some reason. I thought it was my gun only until I talked to several other shooters who had bought in on a big bulk purchase from Black Hills Shooting supplies. That was when I found out that we all were getting keyholes with 180 and 200 grain 40's and the guys shooting the 147's were expierenceing the same. We all went back to Montanas as Zeros were unavailable and I wont change out again. Those same guns run fine with lead or Jacketed but not plated. The cross section of guns were pretty large as it was a SV sighttrakker, a Brazos limitted, a Sti edge, and a couple of custom guns so the barrels were all diffierent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisStock Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 ummmm... I use the Berry's 147's without issue out of my CZ SP01. No tumbling noticed at all, perfect clean holes every time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jmorris Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 Berry’s doesn’t sell double struck 147’s. The only tumbling problems I’ve seen are with the AET barrels. If you’ve got a few thousand under the bench and need to send them to someone that’s po’ed you, I’ll say something about your mom and even send you some money to cover shipping. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jayman Posted April 22, 2008 Author Share Posted April 22, 2008 I opened up the next box in the group and all of the bullets I measured were between 0.3555 and 0.3565. (Berry's advertises them as 0.356, so they were in the same neighborhood.) That said, the box in question is all sitting in loaded cases right now. No AMERC brass, I know better than that! 99% of it was Federal brass. (FC). It isn't consistent. If it was every shot, I'd figure a bad batch of bullets or something, but it isn't. If I hadn't shot so much of it before with no problem, I would just assume that Berry's 147s and this gun wouldn't go together, but seriously, I've shot boxes and boxes of that ammo through this gun. I'll re-check my crimp, maybe the die got loose or something.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bruce282 Posted April 22, 2008 Share Posted April 22, 2008 <off topic> Jay, Do you still reload 357 sig? <off topic off> Bruce Sure miss those SP IDPA matches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jayman Posted April 23, 2008 Author Share Posted April 23, 2008 <off topic>Jay, Do you still reload 357 sig? <off topic off> Bruce Sure miss those SP IDPA matches. I do indeed still load 357sig. In fact, I'm queueing up a big ol' batch to load sometime this weekend or next. (3000 or bust!)I miss 'em too, even when it was freezing on the range and a pain, it was still fun. I'm now reduced to shooting at Blue Ridge and hoping my lead count doesn't skyrocket. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
racemaker Posted May 7, 2008 Share Posted May 7, 2008 Just my 2 cents! Had a problem with my 9's tumbling - found it was due to low velocity! Added a little more powder and everthing is peachy!! Don't know if this is your problem, but it worked for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlos Posted May 7, 2008 Share Posted May 7, 2008 Hey Jayman! Good to hear from you on this site. Speer also makes electroplated bullets - but they are deathly afraid of anyone finding out about it just because of these types of problems. Speer hides the fact by calling their bullets "TMJ" (total metal jacket) instead of "plated." Even the Glod Dot is electroplated. So, why does Speer ammo not tumble? No one is certain why (could be that Speer's electroplating is thicker). BUT, tumbling generally appears to be related to the use of fast burning powder. Example: Phil was once sponsored by West Coast (electroplated) Bullet Company and another powder company but he was then picked up by Vihta Vouri. He tried N320 with the 200 grain plated bullets that worked in all his STI guns. Tumbling occurred. Switching to the slightly slower N330 curred the problem. For some reason, Titegroup is often associated with tumbling bullets. Problem with slower powder is: it kicks a lot harder (slowing you down), you have to use more of it, plus you have to buy it, test it, and work up load for it. Getting back to Speer, I believe they simply use a slow burning powder in their ammo. Regards, Douglas Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joe4d Posted May 7, 2008 Share Posted May 7, 2008 Just my 2 cents! Had a problem with my 9's tumbling - found it was due to low velocity! Added a little more powder and everthing is peachy!! Don't know if this is your problem, but it worked for me. I found the same thing with 9mm 147's. If I tried to get below 130 pf they tumbled. If I loaded them higher they dint tumble but I didnt want 9mm 145 pf ammo. So I loaded them at full power for my wife. She wants all her ammo to feel the same as her carry +p hollowpoints and in her guns at full power they run fine out of a Beretta M-9, Sig 226 and Taurus 111 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jayman Posted May 8, 2008 Author Share Posted May 8, 2008 Hey Jayman! Good to hear from you on this site. Speer also makes electroplated bullets - but they are deathly afraid of anyone finding out about it just because of these types of problems. Speer hides the fact by calling their bullets "TMJ" (total metal jacket) instead of "plated." Even the Glod Dot is electroplated. So, why does Speer ammo not tumble? No one is certain why (could be that Speer's electroplating is thicker). BUT, tumbling generally appears to be related to the use of fast burning powder. Example: Phil was once sponsored by West Coast (electroplated) Bullet Company and another powder company but he was then picked up by Vihta Vouri. He tried N320 with the 200 grain plated bullets that worked in all his STI guns. Tumbling occurred. Switching to the slightly slower N330 curred the problem. For some reason, Titegroup is often associated with tumbling bullets. Problem with slower powder is: it kicks a lot harder (slowing you down), you have to use more of it, plus you have to buy it, test it, and work up load for it. Getting back to Speer, I believe they simply use a slow burning powder in their ammo. Regards, Douglas Hey Dude! I wonder if I just up the PF slightly will the problem go away? I've been using this combo for like forever (TG+Berrys 147s) with no issue, I'm just kind of freaked out that it is happening now! The last run of ammo I did was with a pretty light throw, if memory serves, and that may very well be why... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kevin Kline Posted May 8, 2008 Share Posted May 8, 2008 Keith, sent you a PM reference your bullets. Kevin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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