Leading with my SUB2000 9mm

[Wilkie]

Oh sage ones...I come to the mount of Boolits seeking knowledge......I have been using my keltec SUB2000 9mm carbine with lead loads lately.(What a kick in the pants that little gun is!) I have seen a fair amount of leading in the barrel. I did not water drop my 9mm. (124 Grain Lee RN) I am using Alox as the lube. I am loading moderate speeds with HP 38. I know with the carbine Im getting .357 like speeds. Would things improve with water dropping my boolits? I seek the wisdom from this wise group....

[Ed_Shot]

I load for a HP 995 and I do not get a trace of leading.
What is the diameter of the boolit you are loading? Are you sizing?
What alloy are you using?
What is your load with HP 38?

[Wilkie]

Lee .356. Sized. WW alloy. 4.3 grains of HP 38.

[fourarmed]

I'd be willing to bet if you stopped sizing the boolits entirely, the leading will improve...assuming they drop from the mold bigger than that.

[plainsman456]

Size does matter.

[Ed_Shot]

I size my 9MM to .358 for both pistol and carbine. COWW should do fine with out water droping.

[williamwaco]

Three things.

I have very bad luck with light loads in ANY 9mm They all seem to lead badly.

Size them to the largest diameter that will allow the loaded cartridges to chamber easily.
Chamber easily does not mean you can hammer them in with a mallet.
It means that they will drop into the chamber aided only by gravity.

I expect you will find the right diameter to be around .357 -.358.
If .359 chambers easily - use it.

Your carbine velocities are no more than 100 - 125 fps faster than your handgun velocities.
Don't worry about lube. The problem is fit.

[Pb2au]

+1 one to what William said. Getting the fit sorted out will bring you joy.
Have you slugged the bore on that? Just curious.

[quasi]

I use .358 dia. in mine, no leading with 147 Miha's or 137 NOE's

[MtGun44]

+1 to William.

Read the sticky on "setting up a new 9mm for boolits", may save some problems.

Bill

[Wilkie]

Thanks for all the feedback.

[finishman2000]

all these replies yet no one asked what "lead" he is using. with 9mm lead does matter. wheel weights work for me, anything softer and I got leading.
also you will get more than 100fps difference between a carbine and a handgun. same load of 147gr and aa#7 comes out of my semi's around 1070, out of my storm and uzi they are at 1275. I have a chrono and was surprised at the difference.

[bdecker9]

+1 to finishman, my 995 makes halfway hot loads zing and hot loads rip thru the air. hollow points whistle from mine. never heard a bullet "cut" thru the air like that till i started reloading and shot them outta that 16" barrel.

[Wilkie]

I'm going to drag my Chrony out next time and take a look just how fast.

[W.R.Buchanan]

The S2K has a 16.1" bbl. You will get 200-300fps more out of it. Boolits need to be .001-.002 above groove diameter.

I just read that +P 9mm's are pushing 1600fps from a Subbie, But I don't think that 4.3gr of HP-38/W231 will be that hot, sounds pretty midrange to me.

I run 5.4gr of W231 with 165gr Plated boolits in my S2K in .40 S&W, and my Glock 35, it is very midrange.

I have read that the main reason for using hard boolits in 9MM (strait Linotype) is to prevent boolit deformation when the boolit hits the feed ramp on pistols and not to prevent leading. I think this would be less of a problem with the carbine.

Boolit fit is the key to success here.

Sometimes S2K barrels are a little rough and require a longer than normal break in period. Shooting a bunch of factory ammo thru it to smooth the bore out may help a lot.

Really fun guns aren't they? Too bad they are so hard to find.

Randy

[Wilkie]

So I got the lead out finally. To your point this is a new gun and the barrel inside looked"rough" for lack of a better word. I've not fired many factory loads through it. I plan on putting two hundred factory loads down range this week. Plus, I'm going to slug the barrel to check things out.

[W.R.Buchanan]

When you slug the barrel if the slug comes out anything but perfectly polished then it needs more break in. 200 rounds may or may not do it.

You would be well advised to keep shooting factory ammo until the slug comes thru nice and shiny. Then you know you have a smooth barrel.

You may have to "Fire Lap" the barrel. Hopefully just shooting the factory ammo will smooth things out.

Another alternative is Plated bullets from Berry's Rainier, or X-Treme. Not quite as cheap as cast but close.

Randy