What am I doing wrong? (9mm leading)

[dmclark523]

Alright everyone, I'm having some leading problems in my 9mm Sccy CPX-2nd gen pistol.

I'm loading with a single-stage press and all of my dies are Lee. I'm using the Lee 124gn .356 RN-TL mold and the 45-45-10 lube for tumbling, using the instructions found from here.

The current recipe i'm using is for Accurate No2 powder and is as follows: 3.0-3.8gn powder (I run them 3.4gn) with an overall length of 1.050.

Anyway, with all that in mind, let me bring you up to speed on what I've done to try and combat the leading:

1) Stopped sizing my cast boolits down to .356, and instead shooting them as cast (about .358-.359).
2) Slugged my barrel 3 times, using micrometer to measure. Came out .356-.3565
3) Tumbled with a little more lube than looked necessary.
4) Pulled one of my newly made rounds at random, and measured the base out at .3575


What advice would you guys give? Should I try a new lube, switch to a different mold? Or maybe something else?
I might add, my accuracy with these rounds isn't very pretty.

Any other questions i'd be happy to answer them if you think it would help!

[saint_iverson]

Could you describe or show us the extent of the leading problems?

[MBTcustom]

all of my dies are Lee

4) Pulled one of my newly made rounds at random, and measured the base out at .3575

There's your problem.
Get a different seating die or get a machinist friend to hone out the carbide ring on your Lee seating die a couple of thousandths bigger so it quits sizing the brass and the boolit.
I actually like the Lee seating die concept, but I always have to hone mine out a couple of thou in order to get them to quit sizing the boolits inside the brass.
If that doesn't do the trick, then get an M die and use it to expand your case mouths bigger so that your boolits are not being sized by the brass itself.

[williamwaco]

There's your problem.
Get a different seating die or get a machinist friend to hone out the carbide ring on your Lee seating die a couple of thousandths bigger so it quits sizing the brass and the boolit.
I actually like the Lee seating die concept, but I always have to hone mine out a couple of thou in order to get them to quit sizing the boolits inside the brass.
If that doesn't do the trick, then get an M die and use it to expand your case mouths bigger so that your boolits are not being sized by the brass itself.



Ditto

[rollmyown]

This has already been covered in lots of detail. Try doing a search specifically for leading in the 9mm.
I think you'll find answers to most of your questions if you turn up the thread I'm thinking of.

[rollmyown]

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?121607-Setting-up-for-boolits-in-a-new-9mm&highlight=9mm+leading

You should find this thread helpful.

[dmclark523]

Before I tried to fix it, I was getting spots of lead all through the barrel excluding the chamber mouth. After I did steps 1-4, it mostly leads near the end of the barrel. Should I just come to accept leading? It's not a ton, but enough to concern me and takes a good 20 min to clean and scrub out.

p.s. Thanks for the link. Much appreciated.

[dmclark523]

There's your problem.
Get a different seating die or get a machinist friend to hone out the carbide ring on your Lee seating die a couple of thousandths bigger so it quits sizing the brass and the boolit.
I actually like the Lee seating die concept, but I always have to hone mine out a couple of thou in order to get them to quit sizing the boolits inside the brass.
If that doesn't do the trick, then get an M die and use it to expand your case mouths bigger so that your boolits are not being sized by the brass itself.

What do you mean by an 'M' die?

Also, I have a machinist friend. What do you mean when you say hone it out a little bit? Do you mean grind away at the inside part of the seating die itself?

[canyon-ghost]

If you only get leading at the muzzle now, I'd wager that you may be running out of lube. I like the 50/50s and Alox solid lubes. I use Carnuba Red because it's inexpensive and hasn't ever let me down. Also have some alox lube on hand. Love my solid lubes and 4500.

Good Luck,
Ron

[waksupi]

Lead may be too hard.

[dragonrider]

Tim is assuming you are using a Lee Factory Crimp Die. Are you???

[crashguy]

Clean the lead out of the barrel with some strands off a copper choreboy scrubber wrapped around an old bore brush to make a tight fit .... then work it back and forth.... should take less than 20 minutes and works well. Also check to see if you are getting the "lube star" on the end of your muzzle..... if there is lube there... there should have been lube all along the barrel.

[dmclark523]

Tim is assuming you are using a Lee Factory Crimp Die. Are you???

Yes I am using the Lee Factory Crimp Die that came with my 4 die set from Lee for 9mm Luger.

Should I use a different crimp die? What kind of difference might that make?

[runfiverun]

so what were the higher loadings doing??

[dmclark523]

so what were the higher loadings doing??

I'm not sure what you mean. I started out using 3.4gns of powder because my boolits were dropping at about 126-127gns instead of 124gns, which is what the mold advertised. I figured I would use a tad more than the minimum because of this.
Like I said, accuracy isn't that great, but it may be very well because the barrel is so short (3.1 inches), or because the gun itself isn't high-quality brand (Sccy).

[HeavyMetal]

Lead at muzzle means your lube has failed!

This is the number one failing of tumble lubing and the TL boolit designs.

Add in the FCD die and you have a combo for disaster!

Heres how you fix this:
1 remove the FCD die from the loading cycle! You have a seater die use it only.
2 change to a std lube groove boolit and pour thr liquid alox in the sewer
Leading should go away and accuracy will improve like magic!

[dmclark523]

Lead at muzzle means your lube has failed!

This is the number one failing of tumble lubing and the TL boolit designs.

Add in the FCD die and you have a combo for disaster!

Heres how you fix this:
1 remove the FCD die from the loading cycle! You have a seater die use it only.
2 change to a std lube groove boolit and pour thr liquid alox in the sewer
Leading should go away and accuracy will improve like magic!

Okay, now I'm getting somewhere. So i'll buy a different mold with standard lube grooves.
So you are saying I shouldn't use the crimp die? What about bullet seating as the rounds chamber?
Without crimping, I'll start getting pressure issues, as I did with my .45 when I didn't crimp.
Maybe explain a little bit?

[autopilotmp]

The setup I use with lee dies is this:
Station1: Sizing (decapping) die (9mm)
Station2: expander powder thru die (modified with a lee 38 S&W powder thru exp. plug)
Station3: Bullet seating Die (adj so it will not crimp)
Station4: Lee Taper crimp die (9mm; 38 super; 38 auto)

Do not use the "Carbide Factory Crimp Die".
I used the 3 carbide die set that Lee sells then purchased the Lee taper crimp die speratly when i got the 38S&W plug.
The 38 S&W plug can be purchased directly from Lee here: http://leeprecision.com/pm-expan-plg-38-s-w.html
Kind of a rule of thumb to seat and crimp in seperate steps with cast boolits

[blikseme300]

The setup I use with lee dies is this:
Station1: Sizing (decapping) die (9mm)
Station2: expander powder thru die (modified with a lee 38 S&W powder thru exp. plug)
Station3: Bullet seating Die (adj so it will not crimp)
Station4: Lee Taper crimp die (9mm; 38 super; 38 auto)

Do not use the "Carbide Factory Crimp Die".
I used the 3 carbide die set that Lee sells then purchased the Lee taper crimp die speratly when i got the 38S&W plug.
The 38 S&W plug can be purchased directly from Lee here: http://leeprecision.com/pm-expan-plg-38-s-w.html
Kind of a rule of thumb to seat and crimp in seperate steps with cast boolits

This is it in a nut shell. All I can add to this is to switch to non-tumble lube boolits and wax-based lube. My personal preference is a Star lube sizer and member RandyRat's TAC#1 lube sizing the boolits to .357 This works in all my 9's.

[MBTcustom]

There is nothing wrong with 45/45/10 lube. I have driven it to 2000fps in a 24" long barrel. Your boolits are undersized, period.
The Lee seating die has a carbide ring, or at least has a diameter at the nose of the die who's sole purpose in life is to make sure that there are no bulges in your brass that will cause feeding issues. Great concept in theory, but the problem comes in when you are trying to use a boolit that is bigger than it is supposed to be. Then the die just insures that the boolit will be undersized.
Fix that first, and tryit.
If that doesn't work, then you can try a different mold, lube, powder etc.
You must adhere to this advice like glue unless you want to spend the whole next year trying to figure out how to cast for this gun: Change only one thing at a time. Make a change, test, observe, conclude. Make another change, test, observe, conclude.
If you ignore this advice, then you are in for a long, expensive journey to fruition.

[waksupi]

People keep going back to lube. I will keep going back to, softer alloy. Everyone else from the OP on has ignored that factor.
Guys, he's is shooting a THREE INCH BARREL. It isn't lube failure.

[HeavyMetal]

The advice to only change one thing at a time is good.

The FCD die is first! This die is for jacketed bullets and, according to Lees book, is designex to deal with out of zpec loaded rounds to prevent feed failure due to oversized diameter rounds.

Use it for cast and the die sqeezes the boolit in the case and makes it undersized which creates the leading issue. This is caused by the carbide sizing rng in the die not the crimping part of the die.
Now ya get leading!

The next issue will be to not over due the taper crimp! If you can see cfimp on. 9mm or 45 acp your putging on way to much crimp.
Boolits that slip into the case during feeding cycle are caused by improper case to boolit fit and cannot be "cured" with a crimp.of any kind!

[MBTcustom]

People keep going back to lube. I will keep going back to, softer alloy. Everyone else from the OP on has ignored that factor.
Guys, he's is shooting a THREE INCH BARREL. It isn't lube failure.

I went over the thread again from the beginning.
I never thought that the lube was the problem, but I believe you are right. Even though the boolits are being sized down, they are still over groove diameter by an acceptable margin.
If the boolits are too hard, that could be the problem, but the OP has not stated what alloy he is using. I confess, I assumed he was using WW, but I guess he didn't say.
So what alloy are you running there dmclark523?