9mm cases made into rifle jackets

[Forrest r]

I made a draw die awhile back to turn 9mm cases into .357’s, I didn’t like the small quick tapered lee sizing die. It got me thinking why not make jackets for rifle bullets out of the 9mm cases also. Curiosity got the better of me so I made up a couple of different draw dies to see what would happen.

I don’t swage my own bullets but I don’t see why these jackets made from 9mm cases wouldn’t work for plinking rounds in:
8mm or .323”
303 British or .313”
7.62x39 or .310”
Any 30cal or .308”

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A close up of the .308’s.

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I really haven’t put a whole lot of time effort or energy into making these. An arbor press would be the way to go with these.

They use 22lr cases for .223’s I don’t see why a 9mm wouldn’t work for 8mm, 308’s ect. What do you guys think?

[danielk]

Those would make perfectly good target jackets.

[Bullshop]

Very interesting!!!!! I am listening.

[danielk]

After look at the pictures closer specifically the measurement on the dial caliper for the 308 case. You'll need to draw the jacket down a bit more. During the bullet swaging process you start with a smaller jacket and swage up during the core seating and point forming process. I don't swage 308 but on my 224 bullets the jacket starts out a .2195. Corbins offers a cartridge to jack conversion kit to do what you are doing. I put the link below if you wanted to see how they do it. It looks like a two stage draw operation.

http://www.swagedies.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=CBST&Product_Code=C2J-2-H&Category_Code=HSPECIALDIE

[beex215]

please tell more on how these were made

[MIBULLETS]

Did you have to anneal between draws?

[BT Sniper]

Here is what I was able to come up with back in the day.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?109386-308-bullet-from-9mm-brass

Think I could have got better groups then what I got from these bullets. By the time I shot these for groups I had a good amount of brass fouling in the barrel (from a full day of shooting at the range, not from teh brass jacket, it was a cheaper Stevens barrel too).

Certainly looks like it could have potential but sizing a 9mm down that much takes a bit of effort and a strong press. An anneal between each draw is deffinatly a must. I used four dies to draw teh 9mm down.

BT

[Forrest r]

Thank you for the info, like I posted earlier, I don't swage bullets. I just couldn't understand why I didn't see anyone using 9mm cases for rifles. Their so easy to come by,I kick them out of the way at a local gc I belong to.

It took 3 draws to get them down to .308, basically I tried to cut the amount I swaged the 9mm caes in 1/2 every time I swaged them smaller. The 1st swage was down to .357, the 2nd down to .323 & after that down to .313/.310/.308.

I only annealed the cases 1 time, rhey swaged easily for the .357 & .323. Annealing the cases for the final sizing (.308) would of made it easier but it wasn't too hard to do it with just the 1 annealing.

The draw dies I made are crude by most standards but they are long & have multiple angles/tapers to each one of them & have been polished/treated so they are extremly smooth/slick. Hence the need for only 3 draws & only annealing the brass once.

I didn't use a press to draw the jackets, like I stated earlier, I didn't put a lot of effort into making them. I just wanted to see how easily it could be done. I used nothing more than a simple hammer & a bolt to tap/hit the 9mm cases thru the draw dies. A arbor press would be the cat's meow to make these jackets, it would of been a lot faster & easier. I don't believe it took a lot of force to drive these 9mm cases thru the dies, for I .313, .310 & .308 jackets I only used a 5"x 1/4" bolt with the end ground down where the bolt fit into the case. The 1/4" bolt survived thru all the sizing/testing/recutting/polishing to make/finish the draw dies & then made 100+ jackets after the dies were done.

[Mountain Prepper]

Here is my findings with the 9mm to .308 jackets.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?127123-9mm-cases-to-308-jackets

I have not had the time to spin off the rims on our lathe and then size down the brass and shoot...

I do know that the base is causing some sort of problem - I think it will be fixed if the rim at the base is cut off and the base can become more "square" on the edge - I think the thick rounded base is causing the problems.

[nhrifle]

Those look good Mountain! Is the brass at the base thick enough to turn a BT or RBT if you angle the cross slide a little or would that interfere with the core?

That goes to you as well Forrest. Nice job making your own tooling.

[BT Sniper]

Yes, there is a lot of material that you could machine a boat tail into the base if one so wished.

BT

[algunjunkie]

Not to divert the topic but could the same thin be done with .40 cal brass? I don't have any 9 brass but I do have nearly 100 pounds of 40 brass.

[BT Sniper]

anything is possible depending on how much effort you wish to put into it. I don't think it would be much fun though and I would sooner trade off that 40S&W for 223 or look for 5.7x28 if it where up to me.

[Mountain Prepper]

Those look good Mountain! Is the brass at the base thick enough to turn a BT or RBT if you angle the cross slide a little or would that interfere with the core?

I wish I had more time, I have been scrambling for work after this economy hit and just have a much more limited amount of time to devote to things I would love to do.

As far as this project, I am sure that cutting off the rim and then making the jacket will be the answer.

Cutting a BT does sound like a good side project, and yes there is a huge excess of material.

[Jailer]

You know drawing that 9mm down to 30 cal and leaving a very thin jacket would make it perfect for 300 blk. The 300 blk needs a bullet that expands reliably at velocities under 1800 FPS. There are only a couple commercial offerings that meet this goal that are specifically made for this round and they are expensive.

[Forrest r]

I must be doing something different than you guys? The bases on the .323/.313/.310/.308 jackets that I made have a sharp square edge, not rounded.

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My thought was to make a jacket for a plinking bullet that would be in the 125g/150g range with a plain base for 300yds & in.

The side walls of the 308 jackets I did are 9/1000th’s thick & I have no idea if that’s a good or a bad thing or if it even matters.

Stretching/shrinking a 40s&w down that much would be a real chore, I’d trade/sell them off also for something more readily available that would suit your needs. On the other hand the 40s&w can easily be bumped up to make bullets for the 44 & 45. I have too many irons in the fire right now but I’m working on making 200g/210g segmented hp’s for the 44spl/mag & the 45acp. Here’s some 147g 9mm & 38spl/357 segmented hp’s that I made out of 9mm cases.

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I haven’t had time to do any serous testing yet. After I get the 44’s & 45’s made/done/perfected I was going to work up loads (550fps to 950fps) depending on the firearm and caliber & see how they perform.

Just making simple hbwc’s out of the 9mm cases & 40s&w cases has turned out to be not only extremely easy to do. The bullets are very accurate when their used as a hbwc & deadly when their turned around to make a huge hp. Some 40s&w cases turned into 220g hbwc’s for a 44spl & 9mm cases turned into a 158g hbwc’s for a 38spl that were shot with powder puff loads in 2” snub nosed revolvers @550fps.

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[Cane_man]

hey Forrest, when you come up for air i've got a few questions for ya... i shoulda know that you have already nutted this out :goodpost: