acceptable swage down (??)

[soldierbilly1]

I am using my new Lyman mold 356637, that is, single cav, 9 mm HP's. The HP's are great, and the boolit dropped is a work of art.

However, there are some problems. When I cast they drop out at 0.3579." I use a Lyman M die in my loading operation and when I seat the boolits and pull them the diameter is reduced to about 0.3557," that is, I am losing about 2.5 thou. on seating. My bore slugged at 0.3550. The BHN of these boolits is 13 based on my Lee tester; they are 50/50 WW and scrap.

Are they worth loading up? is my lead too soft? If I do not get leading in my barrel, and I make the lead harder, will the HP open up like it is supposed to? How do you all test your HP's for expansion?

thanks for any help!
billy boy

[Wayne Smith]

Get the stem for the M die that is made for cast boolits. The one you have is for condom boolits.

[fredj338]

I would say the alloy is a bit soft but if you want expansion, it kinda has to be. I use 25-1 lead/tin for 9mm. Depending on the HP design, they will expand @ 900fps. I use wetpack (phone books) for testing; cheap, repeatable & you get more than 4shots per stack, then just toss in the recycle bin. Expansion is almost identical to bal gel but penetration is about 25% less.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v703/fredj338/136hp-1050.jpg (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/fredj338/media/136hp-1050.jpg.html)

[soldierbilly1]

Get the stem for the M die that is made for cast boolits. The one you have is for condom boolits.

Wayne: where do I get this item? I cant find it on the net. custom item? thanks
billy boy