mortre
03-31-2021, 12:14 AM
I picked up a conversion kit for my son's 22lr P229 for his birthday. It's a 357 Sig, not my first choice, but what was available. I guess they stopped producing the kits a couple years back. Anyway, I was able to source brass and dies and tried my first few loads in it today. I was using commercial .358 125gr TC bullets from lasercast that I have floating around. I'm pretty sure 10 rounds left me with some minor leading. It's not bad enough to be very obvious, but there is some streaking in the grooves that I think might be the start of something. So I'm pretty sure I should make a change somewhere.
The kicker is I only have a couple hundred, and they are the last of my 9mm sized commercial bullets of any kind. I'm tempted to just toss them in the casting pot with my normal lead, and just try and start from scratch. That's probably easier than trying to chip off the dry lube and powder coat them. I could probably try reducing the load too. It's a starting load of AA7, but the chrono clocked it at 1250fps. That is almost 100fps over what the book said to expect, so I should be safe to reduce it by a bit. I could also try swapping to Universal to try and slow it down. I'd be happy with 9mm velocities to be honest, it doesn't really need to be a barn burner. I guess I could just load and shoot these as is as well. The buildup doesn't seem to be a big deal so far, so I guess I could just plow forward and start over after this first couple hundred are shot up.
That said, I already have a nice mold from Mihec that's never been cast. It was packed up and moved right after I got it and just found it the other day, 7 years or so later.... So I could easily just recast and powder coat them. That is what I am leaning towards now. I was really happy with the results I had swapping from commercial or tumble lube to dry tumble PC in 45 ACP. But I also recognize that this caliber is a bit of a different beast.
The kicker is I only have a couple hundred, and they are the last of my 9mm sized commercial bullets of any kind. I'm tempted to just toss them in the casting pot with my normal lead, and just try and start from scratch. That's probably easier than trying to chip off the dry lube and powder coat them. I could probably try reducing the load too. It's a starting load of AA7, but the chrono clocked it at 1250fps. That is almost 100fps over what the book said to expect, so I should be safe to reduce it by a bit. I could also try swapping to Universal to try and slow it down. I'd be happy with 9mm velocities to be honest, it doesn't really need to be a barn burner. I guess I could just load and shoot these as is as well. The buildup doesn't seem to be a big deal so far, so I guess I could just plow forward and start over after this first couple hundred are shot up.
That said, I already have a nice mold from Mihec that's never been cast. It was packed up and moved right after I got it and just found it the other day, 7 years or so later.... So I could easily just recast and powder coat them. That is what I am leaning towards now. I was really happy with the results I had swapping from commercial or tumble lube to dry tumble PC in 45 ACP. But I also recognize that this caliber is a bit of a different beast.