Round Ball loads for .357 revolver?

[PerpetualStudent]

Thanks for all the replies and info.

I sent a PM to shaggybull and I ordered Nonte's "reloading for handgunners" since I was told that he has published some round ball loads for revolvers in that book. I'm probably overly worried about the possibility of getting an overpressure event with too little powder (especially given such a light bullet) but I tend to be conservative about things containing explosions in my hand

[35remington]

"Overpressure events with too little powder" haven't been substantiated to be factual by anyone despite many trying to do such a thing under controlled conditions.

Worry more about getting multiple powder charges in the case and take steps to prevent it and you will be fine.

Consider that using light charges of pistol powder in rifles has been popular for about 100 years and that very low charges don't blow up anything in rifles, nor are higher than normal power levels ever seen when light charges are used. There's a lot more airspace in rifle cartridges when Bullseye or Red Dot is used than in pistol cases.

Last summer I shot off more than a thousand rounds of ammo in load development in a .308 rifle with an 88 grain wadcutter bullet using Universal, Trail Boss, Bullseye, Red Dot, Winchester Super light, Winchester Super Target, W231, Titegroup and Clays. Speed approximated 1000 fps.

Vastly more airspace is present when the charges of powder are 3.5 to 4 grains in a .308 case than anything you can put in a .357. Not the slightest hint of problems were occasioned, nor was velocity anything other than normal as pretty much every round was chronographed.

Ask yourself....what situation is present to cause the gun to "blow up" with a light charge of powder that isn't duplicated when a little more powder is used? There isn't one. The situation that is truly dissimilar is when too much powder is used (multiple charges) and humans are all too fallible.

Humans also tend to blame everything but themselves when mistakes occur.

[PerpetualStudent]

I learned about this concern from one of the reloading manuals- pretty sure it was the ABC's of reloading. My understanding of the situation is that smokeless burns faster the more pressure there is, the more it burns the more pressure exists which makes what's left burn faster. Normally, the bullet moving down the barrel releases this pressure which slows the burn rate. If you had too little powder, and a bullet that didn't move so didn't ease the pressure, you could get a pressure curve that was a spike more than a cliff.

Lord knows I'm not wed to the theory. If it's unsubstantiated, I can understand why it would survive word of mouth and on the internet. But why print in the manuals if the companies can't replicate it? My theory was always "Yeah, it's possible but it's probably a really small sweet spot, and the companies want to cover their rears" and from there to "since I am self teaching about this world- I better be damn careful".

I'm very happy to hear I'm wasting worry though.

[MtGun44]

I absolutely do NOT believe in the "high pressure due to undercharge" theory.

The laws of physics control and with LESS energy available, you will get LESS
pressure, in spite of all the fanciful, illogical theories to the contrary.

Double charge or double bullets account for these "surprise" loads.

[PerpetualStudent]

As a partial update. ShaggyBull sent me some roundballs in .358 and .360, and the other book I ordered (Nonte's "Basic Handloading") arrived. In this book Nonte notes that you want a slightly oversized round ball, ideally the chamfer should just slightly shave the ball. The only concern is bulging it out so it doesn't chamber- which shouldn't be an issue with soft lead. He also has a couple of pictures to demonstrate what it should look like.

When I placed the .358 ball in the mouth of the .38 special case, the ball rolled down the inside of the cartridge. The .360 on the other hand sits on the case, and l am confident will properly seat. I have yet to to actually properly load the gallery load in the revolver or try it. I want to do that soon but it might be a bit. I'll post a proper update then but I thought I'd go ahead and post a mini-update.

[Blackwater]

The thing about light charges of powder producing SEE's is ONLY, to my understanding, when using light charges of very slow powders, and I think (?) only with jacketed bullets. Light charges of pistol powders have indeed been being used with cast bullets, and to a more limited extent with jacketed, for about since smokeless was invented, I think.

The peculiarity of it with the light charges of slow powders HAS been observed, but few have actually seen or experienced it, which is of course a GOOD thing. The thought is that the slow powder burns just enough to get the j-bullet into the rifling, but not enough to engrave it fully, and this makes the bullet act like a barrel obstruction, and pressures rise dramatically and in a nanosecond, thus causing the blowups. It's not a phenomena that has been observed very often, but apparently IS a real phenomena, though very rare.

It's good to see someone learning by reading the stuff available. Most won't even read the front parts of the manuals before asking folks they don't even know what they do. REAL knowledge is usually obtained by reading and then thinking about what we read, and asking good questions about WHY such reports might be. This gives us a good clue of whether to believe it or not. And SEE's due to small charges of slow powders are rare, but apparently DO happen, though not always, and this is the part that makes them so mysterious and controversial. For my part, if I use slow powders with cast, it'll be with full to nearly full cases of it behind cast. It's said that this sometimes enables many shooters to gain velocity and still get good accuracy with minimal to no leading, but lots of that depends on what lube you use, alloy, fit, etc.

Reloading is one of those pursuits where if you just want to NOT learn stuff, you're probably better off not getting into it. The only thing that keeps us from blowing ourselves up is knowledge, judgment and good common sense and thought.

[jhaston]

I have loaded 38 spl "buck ball" loads, consisting of (2) 36 cal lead balls (70 gr each) over 2.9 gr of Green Dot, at 25 yards you get 2 holes about an inch apart.

[PerpetualStudent]

Hello again.

Dang I can't believe it's been more than a year. Normally I would start a new thread but I said I'd update this and hopefully somebody searching the archives will get a more complete answer this way. I did finally try out the cat sneeze loads.

The roundballs that Shaggy was kind enough to send me all rolled down the 38 sp cases so I wound up not using them. However the roundballs that I cast from the Lee .360 double roundball mold sat on top of the case nicely.

I used a lee loader to deprime and then reprime the cases. Charged them with 3 gr of Unique each. Placed the roundballs on top and gently tapped the ball down flush with the case using some wood, this shaved a tiny amount of lead off some of the roundballs the rest just squeezed down. I smeared vaseline on top of the rounds (the book suggested vaseline with beeswax but I was pressed for time yesterday) and took them to the range.

I shot the 6 rounds at 10 paces which I estimate to be about 21 feet. All the rounds exited the barrel with no problems. The cat sneeze loads gave me 2 in groups. They impacted low but some of that may be me. I had been using some factory ammo and I'd been shooting low with that as well. Either way, it's good enough for me to practice shooting at torso sized targets and practice quick firing and transitions.

There was unburned powder but it wasn't a big deal. Although around shot 4 I got a decent amount of flash, I think that some of unburned powder ignited just outside the cylinder gap. So with 2 cent primers and about a cent of powder (the lead I got for free) it comes to 3 cents a shot. About half the price of 22. Also interesting that the amount of sound varied with the shots. Which leads me to believe that some of them ignited the powder and some didn't.

Really looking forward to more range time with these and especially running ball and dummy drills with cat sneeze for the dummy. Thanks so much for all the input, help and encouragement guys.

[Mytmousemalibu]

I've yet to do it but a .38/.357 duplex round ball load is supposed to work pretty good and fun to shoot! I have however came up with a mouse fart round ball load for .380 which is fun to shoot! I tried both a sized .360 RB and unsized, alox'ed and powder coated being pushed by a lite charge of Titewad. The unsized & PC'ed ball did the best seatedjust deep enough to crimp the case over the "ogive" of the ball. They would even cycle the slide and feed through my little M&P bodyguard. No need to size them since the driving band formed under firing is narrow and a snug fit to the bore is best. This load can easily be adapted to any of the common .355 to .358 diameter cartridges and is splendid in a .38/.357 as a duplex load.

[MNruss]

Hello all,



I'm only going to buy 1 mold

Please keep us updated on your results, but spending time here quickly made it IMPOSSIBLE for me to even think of "only 1 mold"

[PerpetualStudent]

Update: 2 ball cat sneeze

I took the revolver out to try out how the double ball rounds would do. I loaded up 6 cartridges, just as before. Once fired .38 special brass (unsized). 1 small pistol primer. And 3 grains of Unique. This time I put 2 (.360) roundballs on top. Tapped down so the second ball was almost flush with the top of the cartridge. Then I hand smeared some vaseline on the top of the cartridge.

This was much better than the single ball loads. I had consistent ignition of the powder and the balls hit to point of aim at 21 ft. The pairs of balls impacted very close together, the most spread out pair was an inch apart. Recoil was minimal and the grouping was better than the single ball loads I tried.

I will post pictures tonight probably.

The only oddity was the cylinder seemed to "lock up" for lack of a better term. After a round it would not cock smoothly. Each time it happened I opened the cylinder to make sure there was no squib, debris in the gap or backed out primers. I didn't see anything off with the primers though I'll post pics of them too. Last time I put 50 rounds of 38 through it I had a couple of light primer strikes on double action, so perhaps an issue with my spring? After opening and closing the cylinder it cocked normally and the next shot fired normally.

[PerpetualStudent]

As promised pictures

Here's the target, with ruler for scale. The sun was just at the wrong angle, my front sight looked like a mirror. Enough accuracy that I'm not sure if it was me or the load. That's good enough to start for me.



Primer Appearance?

This is from the first batch of single ball cat sneeze, with a steel cased 38. These look fine to me.

However I can tell there's a difference in primer appearance with these, which were the double ball cat sneeze.


I think that's within the realm of acceptable variation. The primers aren't backed out. But again, this is my first reloading and I'm perhaps overly cautious. Should I be concerned?

[rancher1913]

it seems that seating the ball fairly tight to the powder helped your ignition, could a person seat a single roundball deep in the case and still have it work ok.

[PerpetualStudent]

I might have to try that experiment rancher. Seating 1 ball deeper might get combustion. Nonte mentions that for gallery loads in rifles a teflon puff to keep the powder next to the primer is often indicated. That might also be a worthwhile experiment.

The other possibility that occurs to me is that the extra mass (together they're 140 gr) might resist the acceleration long enough that you get combustion. My reloading manual shows that the bullets of around 140 gr have starting charges of Unique that are just above 3 gr. Two balls on top of each other are obviously importantly different than a flat based bullet of the same mass, but the charge is in the neighborhood.

Some of the other suggestions in the thread suggest crimping (which I haven't done so far). Which would likewise resist acceleration. Maybe just enough to get better combustion.

[Tom W.]

I never tried it with my .357, although I did take some .440 round balls with LLA and sized them to .430 and lubed them again before loading them in my .44 mag. That was a looong time ago. I remember accuracy was good for the range I was shooting. I just loaded up twelve and really haven't had the desire to do any more as my curiosity was satisfied.

[rintinglen]

For a 38/357nget the 75 grain WC's instead. I have done considerable work with multi-boolit loads, both in 44 and 38/357. I have a 359-101 Lyman 2c and a 110 grain 44 Noe mold. In dual or triple caliber loads, they will shoot to about a 2 inch group . The target was , IIRc 10 shots of a triplex loading in 44 magnum cases deliberately spread around

[PerpetualStudent]

it seems that seating the ball fairly tight to the powder helped your ignition, could a person seat a single roundball deep in the case and still have it work ok.

Just tested that theory today Rancher. 3 grains of unique and the .360 roundball seated as deep as it would have been with a second one on top.

It did help ignition and consistency compared to the other single roundball. There was no real difference between shots report. However the shots still impacted several inches low at 10 paces. Group was a lot looser too, though that might have been me. Also, there were flakes of unburned powder that came out the cylinder gap seemed to be some in the bottom of the cases too.

So far the double roundball over 3 grains of unique is my favorite.

Next time I'll try crimping a single ball with the lee loader see if that gives me better results.

[LAGS]

When I got my first .357 back in 1976, I did not have any surplus cash for to much ammo and i was saving up to buy my first reloading press.
I made up squib loads with 000 buckshot that I salvaged from old shotgun shells that I got a Smokin deal at a garage sale.
I also used the salvaged powder from the shotgun shells for my powder
Since I didnt have a press, or even a Lee Loader at the time, I loaded them in my bench vise and a Nail to push out the primers.
Then I found a small scale and a loading manual and started Upping the load a bit.
Even with an unsized case , either in .38 or .357 Mag I got good enough accuracy for extended practice an even nailed a bunch of Jack Rabbits in the cow fields near where I grew up.
I smeared the ball with Bees Wax to help with the leading, and I did my fair share of barrel cleaning when I shot the hotter loads.
But the experience was well worth it, and still load up some for informal Blasting Ammo even now that I have two Rock Chuckers and all the dies.
It makes me appreciate where I started out .
And it gives me the confidance that I can keep on shooting if things go south.
My friends think I am crazy because I have all the right tools and molds,and materials, plus the knowledge to make top grade reloads, so why would I play with things that are not Optimal.
My answer is, Because I can.
You have to know where you came from, before you can know where you are going.

[funnyjim014]

Good post LAGS.most of us started with minimal equipment and we were lucky if had a mentor to help us threw the beginning. Threw trial and error and more error we all will get better and learn from mistakes. Even a master can learn something new

[Tom W.]

Just an aside, but isn't a .357 / .38 special a 36 caliber? .003 ain't that much....