]This is copied from a posting I put up over on “thehighroad.com.
I thought more people with greater interest would get more from it.
WARNING, THIS POSTING CONTAINS LOAD DATA THAT HAS NOT BEEN LABRATORY TESTED AND VERIFIED BY AN INDEPENDENT SOURCE. THE RESULTS ARE MY OBSERVATIONS AND NOT RECOMMENDATIONS.
Well I finally got around to collating the data from two reloading sessions and my first trip to the range.
First, the range trip.
This target is the first 10rds I fired though the.30SC.
not 10ft, not 10yds, but 25yds! Yikes! I’ve got $X,XXX target pistols that won’t do this!
Last two shots in the black square were last two shots of 40rds I fired. Used a center hold instead of 6o’clock hold. The sights are regulated to hit at 12oclock on the white dots.
The fit of the barrel in the slide is such you have to lightly push it out of battery to remove the barrel. I’ve never seen such a good fit on a production line pistol.
Velocities were close to advertised.
After producing fired brass, I embarked on production of some reloads to start to get an idea of what will produce good practice/plinking/field loads.
For starters, I used data for the .32acp as a departure point. Some immediate observations were noted.
HP38 was the first powder I tried. I started at 2.5 and stopped at 3.5gr with a 93gr Lee RN @.314” powder coated. NONE of the combinations proved acceptable! 3.5 gave lightly cratered primers and still failed to cycle the slide. Velocity was 1.050fps. Substitution of a 100gr RN Lee 2R with charges reduced to 3.3gr yields 1,000fps, slightly cratered primers, and only 1of 3 cases locked the slide back.
NEXT I tried what I expected to be a good powder. I was not disappointed.
LongShot was started at 2.8 and stopped at 4.5gr. 3.9gr with a 93gr bullet began to give weak but consistent ejection. Velocity is 1,070fps. Pressures not remarkable. 4.2 is a good working load, and I deem 4.5gr as a maximum as primers were showing light cratering and swipe marks equal to factory loaded ammo. Velocity is 1,170fps (3-shots).
4.2gr of LS with a 100gr Lee, gave 1,100fps. Three 113gr Lee RFN-GC over 3..7 gave 933fps and tight grouping at 7yds. I’ll be revisiting this bullet after I cast some more and powder coat without a GC.
Acc #5 is close to LS. Top load came in at 4.9 with the 93gr RN @ 1,070fps. 4.7gr w100gr RN @1,020fps.
Acc#7 was the best tested yet. Maximum with the 100gr RN was 6.6gr and yielded 1,140fps with just slightly cratered primer (1of 3). This is approaching factory level performance.
A fifth powde was tried for jee-wiz purpose.
#2400 won’t work!
I started at 3.5gr that clocked at 413fps! I was surprised it didn’t stick in the barrel. I eventually worked up to a near compressed load of 6.2gr that ejected but didn’t lock the slide back.
Of particular interest is that start loads (ones that give complete ejection and slide lock back) are typically only 0.5 to 0.9gr below maximum (primer cratering with pin swipe). This was based on what I observed from Federal factory ammo.
I probably need to mention that I used a target set at 7yds and a chronograph set at 15ft to ensure that beginning loads cleared the barrel.
At present, no industry (powder or bullet manufacturers) data is available.
Proceed with caution at your own risk..
I’ll have to post the pics later as my internet is crawling at present and won’t load the photos.
|
   
   
|
|
Reply With Quote
