Look for accurate 38 spl. loads for 358242 95g, 358246, 358212, 358432 160, 35887

[happy7]

Does anyone have any pet loads for the following boolits in the 38 special cartridge? I am wanting to get some accurate loads worked up. I will probably be using W231, Unique, Bullseye, Trail Boss or similar powders.

358242 round nose 95 gr.
358246 round nose 150 gr.
358212 round nose 146 gr.
358432 wadcutter 160 gr.
35887 wadcutter 140 gr.
358477 SWC 150 gr.

[Heavy lead]

I don't know if I can help with any of those in particular, but I've loaded and shot probably 10,000 over the last 5 year with 3 grains of Red Dot under a 148 grain Remington swaged HBWC. It shoots and is cheap and the boolits are so cheap to buy it doesn't warrant casting for.
I have shot that same load with the RCBS version of the 358-477 though, it is plenty accurate enough. Can't remember any chrono results.

[happy7]

I've got red dot as well, so I will throw that into the mix of test loads with the 150 grain bullets. Thanks.

[Glen]

The Lyman Handbook covers this pretty well, I suggest you buy a copy. Of your list of powders, I have gotten very good accuracy with Unique, Bullseye, and W231 with a wide variety of cast bullets in the .38 Special.

One of my favorite all-round loads is 5.4 grains of Unique underneath the 150 grain 358477 for about 950 fps. Weigh yours to make sure its 150 grains and not the more recent 158 grain version of this bullet (if it is, reduce that charge to 5.0 grains of Unique).

For the wadcutters, I like 3.0 grains of Bullseye.

[GSM]

3 gr BE & 148 gr solid wadcutters is about as close to the Holy Grail as anyone will ever get - a beautiful mid-range target load.

Good luck on the 95 gr RN. I tried some 95 gr SWC's and just couldn't get happy with the bullet until the loads came up to 2.8+ gr of BE (sort of defeated the purpose of a light bullet - I was looking for an accurate pipsqueak load for 25 yard bullseye).