Problems loading 9mm in a G34 - coke bottle

[GlocksareGood]

I am trying to load a few of Miha's 124gn HP boolits for 9mm. They are sized .357 and lubed with blue angel. I am trying to load them for my G34 but i am having coke bottle problems. I size the brass and they drop in the barrel just fine. I use a lyman M die to expand the mouth and they seat the boolit to 1.150" with no taper crimp. At this point I get the buldge below the seated boolit in the case. It measures ~ .388810 with my Mic. Once I taper crimp it to remove the M die bell it will drop part of the way into the barrrel but stops at the coke bottle. If I run it through a Lee FCD the problem is fixed but of course you know what that does to boolit size.

Any ideas? I have a Lone Wolf threaded barrel on the way for this G34 but i wanted to see if i could load a few for the factory barrel.

[john hayslip]

Probably you seating die has a crimping shoulder. Look on the inside. If you see one set the die up this way. Put a case on the ram and run it up. Screw the die down til it stops. That will be the case hitting the crimping shoulder. Back off 10 degrees of so. The sizing die will probably NOT hit the shellholder. Proceed with reloading. What is probably happening is that the shoulder is trying to compress the die lengthwise if you screwed it all the way down. How do I know. I had 223's doing the same thing and got some sage advice.

[GlocksareGood]

Good call but I already fixed that one already. I backed the seating die body out as far as I could and still seat to 1.150". I am getting no taper crimp from the seating die. I am using a LEE Taper crimp die for that in a the last stage.



Probably you seating die has a crimping shoulder. Look on the inside. If you see one set the die up this way. Put a case on the ram and run it up. Screw the die down til it stops. That will be the case hitting the crimping shoulder. Back off 10 degrees of so. The sizing die will probably NOT hit the shellholder. Proceed with reloading. What is probably happening is that the shoulder is trying to compress the die lengthwise if you screwed it all the way down. How do I know. I had 223's doing the same thing and got some sage advice.

[rintinglen]

I am perplexed in that you state the bulge is below the boolit base. Are you using an M die specific to the 9mm? Can you size and flare a case, then taper crimp it to see if it will fit the chamber? That may identify the M die as the root causeof the problem.

[Groo]

Groo here
A bulge below the boolet is either a boolet not square in case [ one side pushed out] or
a tight sizing die [ not usually a problem.]
When you use the lee, do the shells feed and function?
What groups do you get?
If the answer to both is "good" forget the other stuff and shoot the thing..........
We often get hung up on the small stuff and forget that the proof is in the group!!!!

[tomme boy]

The 9mm is a tapered case. You are not going to get rid of the bulge using over sized bullets in it. Your dies are spec. for 0.355" bullets. Not for loading cast oversized bullets. I don't like the lyman M-dies. Get a Lee 38 S&W powder thru die. It will size a little farther down into the case. It will also help to not swage the bullet at the base of the bullet which will cause leading.

[GlocksareGood]

I will take some measurements here in a bit for some more information. Been smelting range lead. Almost as much fun as messing with this 9mm. Think I will stick with getting clip on wheel weights in the future.

[garym1a2]

I gave up for Lyman "M" die in my 9mm lone wolf Glock35 conversion barrel.

[yotatrd4x4]

All the lone wolf barrels I have had 3 of them a 45 a 9mm and a 40 I had to have them all reamed to run boolits. My 40 was the worst it would hang up on a .401 boolit and needed hand pressure on the back of the slide to push it the rest of the way into the chamber. I had a smith ream them all enough to fit the handloads I carried to him to use as a guide. I paid $50 I think for all 3 and he did it while I waited but I think they use near a match chamber to help accuracy and that doesn't help feeding in my opinion. Ymmv.

[WILDEBILL308]

Hear is my thought on what is causing the bulge. Try measuring the length of the expander in the M die. I think it is expanding to deep into the 9mm case. Some makes of brass are worse than others in how much and how fast they taper on the inside. The seating and crimp dies don’t address the area under the bullet. Do you have a chamber/case gage? I keep one handy and do random checks as I load.
Do you have a regular expander like you use for jacketed bullets I would try just belling the mouth and see how that works.
Bill

[cylinderman]

Just something i have noted with the 9mm and cast is a crooked bullet will jam. Darken the outside of the case with a marker and see where the case touches the chamber. If crooked it will touch opposite sides at case mouth and bulge.

[GlocksareGood]

Results: It was the M-Die. It is bulging the cases about 1/3 up from the bottom. I used both the M-die and the RCBS expander and then crimped the bell back out without seating a boolit. RCBS went in the G34 barrel and the M-Die would not. I can see the expanded area with my cheaters and could measure the difference with my mic. I went ahead and ran several dummy rounds with the RCBS expander and then pulled them down. To get the round to function every time in my G34 I ended up with my .357 boolits at .355 at the base. By the time I got up to just under the case mouth it was back to .357. I will just have to see how they shoot. On the plus side I never touched the Lee FCD.

Thanks for the help and suggestions folks. I will definitely keep and eye on any future M-Die use.