Type of powder for shield 40 and ppks

[Mleon]

Hi I am new to reloading and a bit overwhelmed by all the different types of powders. I have a M&P shield 40 and looking to find a reliable clean burning powder that I can also use in a ppks 380. Can anyone recommend which powder and how much grains works best for both the ppks and shield 40? For the ppks I bought lee 95gr-fn mold for the ppks and lee 175-401 mold for the shield 40. Did you lube or powder paint for best results? Any help would be appreciated, thank you.

[GooseGestapo]

For one powder, for both; I'd look at Alliant PowerPistol.
Its one of the few powders that give good results in both.
Personally, I use Winchester Superfield for accuracy loads in the .40. Hodgdon LongShot for highest velocities. CFE Pistol is too new. I haven't tried it yet. Not sure I need to.
In the .380, I use TiteGroup with either the Hornady 90gr XTP, or Lee 95gr FNTC-TL, powder coated and sized to .357". My S&W BodyGuard is astonishing accurate with the Lee bullet.

I do powder coat "some" bullets. It has its place, but it's not a universal panacea.

[vernm]

I use W231 in both my Walther PPKS and M&P Shield 40S&W. Some say it is dirty. I never saw a problem.

I would suggest you get reloading data from http://hodgdonreloading.com/data rather than from an internet forum until you have more experience.
I use 3.1gr W231 with a 95gr bullet in 380 Auto. I can shoot the Shield more accurately with a load about midway between the starting load and the max load listed in laboratory tested load data. A midrange load is a lot easier to control and easier on the fine little pistol too.

[54bore]

Hodgdon Longshot gave good performance in .40 Cal, I have no experience with .380

[FergusonTO35]

How hot do you want to load your .40? For a dual purpose powder that works well in both I would look no further than Bullseye. 3.0 grains and either of the Lee boolits will be dandy in your PPKS, it certainly is in my Glock 42 and Kimber Micro. The new IMR Target (Bullseye clone, allegedly) would also be worth trying. I haven't yet loaded any .40's with Bullseye but I think it would be ideal for this cartridge in a gun that small.

[contender1]

Welcome to the Forum!
First,,, may I suggest you get about 2-3 (or more,) different reloading manuals. Study them,,, and see the things they recommend. In the manuals,, they will often give details on which powders were overall the most accurate, cleanest etc.
I load over 65 calibers,,, and I do not try & get only one or two powders to "do it all" for my guns. Yes,,, there are well over 100 different powders available to us. And while it is nice to have a powder that works in many calibers,,, sometimes it may not be the best avenue. As noted above,,,, PowerPistol is a good candidate to do what you wish,,, and may fill your wants. But,, I always like to experiment to see what provides me the best accuracy in my guns. I currently have over 40 different powders on my bench. But,,, I use about 10-12 of them the most.
Get some manuals,,, study & then experiment. That's part of the fun!
Now, as to powder coating. I'm a long time caster,,, and I currently own 3 lube sizers. But,,, once I found powder coating,,, I haven't lubed a single handgun bullet. I'm NOT saying it's the end all,,, be all,,,, but it sure is an excellent thing for me and many others. Now my lube sizers,,, are just sizers.

[FergusonTO35]

Another thing to consider is, what powders are usually available in your area at prices you can live with? I tend to stick with Hodgdon and IMR because they are usually in stock at reasonable prices. Alliant powders can be very sporadic, Accurate and Ramshot have a habit of disappearing for months or even years. I'm quite pleased that IMR has decided to make their own versions of Bullseye, Unique, and the Dot series powders because the Alliant originals are not always available; particularly Unique and Blue Dot.

[gwpercle]

Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook will be your friend . Study it well and heed the advice within it.
Lee Modern Reloading Manual also covers cast boolits . Both of your moulds are Lee design and it will be a big help. Get both.
As for powder , check your manuals and make a list of the powders that can be used in both , go to dealer and see what's on the shelf...buy it . Good old Unique can be used in both and would be my choice , but there are others.
Gary

[Mleon]

Thank you all for the info, very helpful. With either lee lube or powder paint do you think I can get away with melting soft lead fishing sinkers with adding solder or have to get hard lead or antimony?

[shooting on a shoestring]

You should be aware there is a lot of difference in design pressure between 380 and 40. You won't get best results with one powder. The fast powders will work best in 380 but only get you slow to medium velocity in 40. The slower powders that will make 40 scream will not burn well in 380 and will not give best velocity there.

I agree Bullseye is great in 380 and can work in 40 if you don't push the 40s too hard. AA5 works pretty good in both, a little slow for 380 and a little fast for 40, but not bad in either.

Your 380 might work ok with tumble lube. 40 won't.
Felix lube will work great for both and is my recommendation. Apply it with a lubisizer if you have one. If you don't, try smearing it on as cast boolits and load without sizing. It often works just fine that way.
I've never used powder coating. I got my gear together using lubrisizers and will stay with it because it works well for me. Not condemning it, just don't have any impetus to try it.

i agree a couple of paper manuals like Lyman's 49th or similar will do more good for you than a years worth of Internet.

[Mleon]

Good to know thanks. I bought the Lyman and Lee books and they dont exactly have load data for my size lead bullets, only for full metal jacket. Can I use the same load data for FMJ? Also why is it that the lighter bullets within the same caliber need more powder? Kind of defies logic to me, you would think the heavier bullet needs more powder, but thats not what the book shows?

[marlin39a]

HP-38 or Win 231. Go to Hodgdon site and get a good reloading manual.

[shooting on a shoestring]

You asked can you use data for jacketed bullets when loading cast? Yes.
Jacketed bullets are harder to push into rifling sand out the barrel. Therefore they have higher pressures for the same weight projectile with the same charge of powder.

Look in your manuals and find either a jacketed bullet same weight or slightly heavier. Use the starting (minimum) powder charge and load a handful (5 or 10). Shoot them and expect to see signs of low pressure like sooty cases, powder trash in the barrel, round corners on the primers. If you do see those, load another handful and increase the charge weight 5%. Shoot and see how they work. Repeat until you hit the upper end of the data, or until you get clean cases and the powder trash goes away, or until you get to a load you like that has a good balance of power, recoil and accuracy.

Just remember, if you load too hot, stop and pull down the remaining rounds. There's no brownie points for overloading. You won't blowup a gun (unless you're absolutely ridiculous) but you can over stress them and cause premature wear/damage/break parts.

[shooting on a shoestring]

As to why light boolits can have heavier powder charges than heavy boolits, it's all about building pressure. We're limited by pressure. Example 40 S&W the pressure limit is about 36k psi (from memory).

Think about the heavy boolits in 40 and the powder charge that hits that limit. The pressure is contained by the heavy boolit plugging the barrel. It's hard to move and it takes lots of pressure to push it out of the barrel from rest.

Now keep the powder charge the same and switch to a lighter boolit. The lighter boolits moves easier and unplugs the barrel with less pressure than the heavier one. Therefore you can increase the powder charge and get the pressure to go back as high as when the heavier, harder to move boolit was plugging the barrel.

Yep counter intuitive, at first.