Mihec 452-200 and 45acp - OAL

[cowpuncher]

I've recently (finally) set up a Dillon 550B press and started using it with my uncle, who is setting up a nice reloading room in his air conditioned garage. (aaahhhhh, luxury!) I've got a bunch of 452-200 hollow points cast with my mold from Miha, which I love, and casts beautifully.

We're having some problems with failures to feed. I have one of the Lyman pistol cartridge gages, and the rounds all sit in it properly flush, so they should chamber fine.

He's shooting a Ruger New American .45acp. I'm shooting a Wyoming arms .45 and a couple Kimbers. His Ruger has a lot more trouble with failures to feed this ammo than my pistols do, but I've had failure to feed in mine as well.

The brass we've used so far is once fired, and we ran it through a Lee Bulge Buster just to eliminate that variable. We're tried 5.2gr of AA#2, and 5.4gr of AA#2 so far.

I've tried OAL 1.180", 1.190", and 1.200".

So those of you guys using the Mihec 452-200 mold.... where are you setting your OAL? Since the stuff is passing the plunk test in the Lyman pistol cartridge gage when it comes off of my Dillon 550b, I'm thinking our issue has to be OAL, and his Ruger New American must be more sensitive to it than my Kimbers.

Make sense? Am I overlooking something obvious? I've loaded a lot for revolvers and some for bolt action rifles... but I don't have much experience loading for semi auto pistols yet.

Thanks for any helpful advice in advance.

[Bzcraig]

This may be a bit long, but here goes. Bought an American compact in 9mm and love it so bought one in .45, hated it. I had failures to extract as well as failures to feed. I was loading using Lee 452-230TC and NOE 452-200SWC. I tried Acc #2, 231 and Bullseye loading both heavy and light. Bought some WWB, which functioned fine. Send the gun off to Ruger. I was asked what was happening and I told the gal including the issues were occuring with reloads to which she replied, "we don't recommend reloads." Got it back with comments that the work done was ""replace magazine springs and repair barrel" still having same issues. Sent the barrel to DougGuy and had throat work done (wanted to be able to load longer OAL), still having same issues but not as often. Called Ruger again to send it back knowing if it doesn't work with cast when it comes back it is going down the road. This time I was going to send it via my FFL rather than driving to Boise to drop at FedEx. The big difference was that I was emailed a document to fill out to put with the gun this time which allowed me to explain in detail what was happening. Few days later I actually got a call from the technician working on my gun. He thanked me for my detailed explanation and said he believed he got it all sorted out. Got the gun back and darned if it wasn't running reliably with everything I fed it (factory fmj, cast RN & TC) except the 200 SWC. That is my favorite mold but honestly isn't 100% reliable in any of my 45's including my 1911's. I will continue to play with OAL but won't be sending the Ruger down the road yet. If you'd like to discuss further PM me and we can talk over the phone if you want.

[Forrest r]

I've been running that same bullet with a oal of 1.180" in 2 different 1911's.

[osteodoc08]

I seat it to where there is just a hint, fingernails thickness, of the shoulder above the case when I crimp.

[Gtrubicon]

I load that same bullet at 1.225, 4.6g of 700x.
It feeds flawlessly in 2 Springfield’s and two colts.

[Gtrubicon]

I forgot to add I lube size with a 452 die, on a Lyman 4500

[cowpuncher]

Hey gents, thank you for the responses!

We did some more testing this weekend. Some of the testing we did was loading some 230gr FMJ ball ammo, checking it in the Lyman ammo gage to confirm it as good, and shooting that with his Ruger. The Ruger New American didn't want to feed and shoot that either. I'm thinking my uncle is having the same experience BZCraig had (BZCraig I'll PM you later to get your # and have my uncle call you if you don't mind).

Uncle got a Rock Island 1911 because he likes my Kimbers... and lo and behold it ate our 45acp reloads flawlessly and shot great. Likewise, my kimber shot great. I even ripping through a couple magazines fast to encourage a failure.... the Kimber ran like a sewing machine, and never missed a beat.

Load was 5.4gr AA#2, 200gr powder coated Mihec 452-200 bullet, WLP primer, and meticulously checked with the ammo gage to be sure the issue wasn't us. The ruger just hates reloads apparently. It did run with a single mag of WWB ball ammo... but my uncle is going to try shooting a box of 50 sometime this week to see if it gives him grief during that test as well. If so it's headed back to Ruger.

[Walks]

I'd dump the RUGER & send your 1911's to a COMPETENT GUNSMITH that can do a GOOD ramp/throat job, get some new QUALITY mags. Then a few springs from 11lb up to 17lb. Prep & load your brass on a quality single stage press with good dies from one of the quality Reloading Manufacturers such as REDDING, LYMAN, RCBS or HORNADY. Adjust seating depth to fit the new mags and check cartridge fit by dropping the loaded rounds into the barrel of the disassembled pistol. When you start trying to find O.A.L. to find what feeds, use unprimed empty cases prepped as you would for loading. Fill the mag and cycle the slide back & forth. When you reach that place where:
The rounds feed WITHOUT jamming,
The rounds are short enough to fit the mag,
The loaded rounds eject without hanging up,
Try feeding dummies from a locked back slide.
If all this works, load up some live ammo. Shoot 300rds without a malfunction. If that doesn't work..............
WELL YOUR ****ED.

[Rodfac]

Try seating them out so that a minimum amount of the full dia. bullet is just barely showing at the case mouth. This seems to cushion the entry, and does not allow the hard brass case mouth to interfere with the round seating in the chamber. By a small amount, I mean less than 1/16"...my load is 5.2 gr's of Win 231 for ~800 fps from a 5" 1911. This load is accurate in every .45 I've ever tried it in: XD, 1911" (about a dozen of them), several Sigs P227, P220, and a Remington-Rand WWll 1911a1 with its original GI barrel. Best of luck, Rod BTW, I have the same mold but w/o the hollow point.

[reddog81]

I seat it to where there is just a hint, fingernails thickness, of the shoulder above the case when I crimp.

This works for me on about every 9mm, 10mm, 45 ACP bullet out there. I use the calipers to make sure the OAL is reasonable, but I don't try to predetermine what the OAL should be. My Lyman manual shows a 200 grn SWC #452460 with an OAL of 1.16.

I'd try going shorter until the round chambers like it should. Asking for OAL's is only marginally useful since no one else is shooting your gun. If I was a Ruger customer service rep and someone called saying that their reloads don’t work and that factory rounds work OK, I'd tell them there's something wrong with their reloads. I have a 9mm Lyman case gauge and it only tells you if the brass is within spec. You can load the bullet as long as you want and it doesn't make any difference as long as the bullet is under .358 diameter. Using a Lyman case gauge to help determine OAL is not going to be helpful at all.

[Forrest r]

[IMG][/IMG]

1.180" oal has a good amount of "fingernail length" of the bullets body sticking above the mouth of the case.
[IMG][/IMG]

[cowpuncher]

This works for me on about every 9mm, 10mm, 45 ACP bullet out there. I use the calipers to make sure the OAL is reasonable, but I don't try to predetermine what the OAL should be. My Lyman manual shows a 200 grn SWC #452460 with an OAL of 1.16.

I'd try going shorter until the round chambers like it should. Asking for OAL's is only marginally useful since no one else is shooting your gun. If I was a Ruger customer service rep and someone called saying that their reloads don’t work and that factory rounds work OK, I'd tell them there's something wrong with their reloads. I have a 9mm Lyman case gauge and it only tells you if the brass is within spec. You can load the bullet as long as you want and it doesn't make any difference as long as the bullet is under .358 diameter. Using a Lyman case gauge to help determine OAL is not going to be helpful at all.

We were using the Lyman gage just to make sure that the rounds should chamber, and they should. We also took his barrel out of the Ruger New American and most passed the plunk test... but a few were proud of the chamber by about 1/2 of the cartridge rim.

We also used a set of calipers to check the diameter of the Lyman case gage vs the chamber of his Ruger New American. The Lyman gage is supposed to be at minimum, tightest spec. The Ruger New American's chamber is TIGHTER. That was interesting.

His RIA 1911 and my Kimbers functioned flawlessly with them last time we shot. As I stated above... I even tried to shoot fast to encourage a malfunction of any sort... the Kimbers just ran like a sewing machine... never hiccuped or missed a beat. The Ruger New American... was as frustrating as always.

He hasn't shot that Ruger much, and this past week while I was out of town working (I travel for work), he was going to try shooting 100 rounds of ball, factory ammo through it to see if it gave him any grief. I managed to catch a crappy summer cold while I was gone this week, so i haven't been back over to his place to find out the results. Might go over tomorrow if I'm feeling good. My uncle's had a heart attack a few years ago.... and a few heart surgeries, including one this year that was major.... so i'm not going over there until i'm sure I'm not going to give him a cold.

Probably an excess of caution on my part, but you only get old favorite uncles for so many years.

I'll report back in when I know more. Might be over there tomorrow shooting and reloading with him, I feel pretty good today and am not hacking or sneezing much anymore. In the meantime.... to pass time until then, I've started restoring an old Saeco pot that I bought rusty and in pieces. Taking pics, might post that in another thread.

[reddog81]

The Lyman gauge will not guarantee you have the correct OAL. You can probably seat the bullet out to 1.3" and it'll still pass. If the Ruger doesn't function at 1.18 I'd try 1.16 or give up on shooting in the Ruger.

Good luck with your shooting tomorrow.