38 S&W vs 38 Special cases

[fiatmom]

Can 38 SW be made from 38 Special cases?
If so can the same die be used as in 38 and 357?
I did notice there were some dimentional differences.
Nick


Forgive me for stealing this but I liked the quote

Democracy is two wolves and a lamb discussing what’s for dinner. Liberty is a well armed lamb willing to contest the majority decision”.

Benjamin Franklin, 1755

Utopia Is The Opiate of Liberals.

[S.R.Custom]

Can 38 SW be made from 38 Special cases?


Not really. Sizing dies are made such that you'd still have a ring of full diameter brass at the head, and this would prevent chambering.

[Harry O]

Not really. Sizing dies are made such that you'd still have a ring of full diameter brass at the head, and this would prevent chambering.

I think you have it backwards. .38 S&W is larger in diameter than .38 Special brass. You should be able to shorten the .38 Spl brass and use them in .38 S&W chambers. The difference is very small (I don't have my books with me, but from memory, it is about 0.003"), so you should not have to worry about case bulging or splitting.

BTW, I had a bunch of .38 S&W cartridges many years ago, but did not have a gun to shoot them. All I had was .38 Spl's. I could not fit the .38 S&W cartridge into the .38 Spl chambers. The were too large in diameter. I ran a few of them through a .38 Spl sizing die (while loaded). They chambered even though it was not sized all the way to the rim. I did it to all of them and shot them up. I have had people tell me that .38 S&W brass is NOT larger than .38 Spl and I have had people tell me that not sizing them all the way to the base will NOT work, but it did for me.

[cajun shooter]

The 38 S&W neck size on the case is .386 compared to the neck of the 38 spl at .379 I don't think that I would want to shoot 38 spl cases in a 38 S&W under normal times. In an emergency I would shoot anything that I could beat into or drop into the chambers.

[AJ Peacock]

The 38spcl is smaller in diameter by .001" than the 38S&W. It is not advisable to shoot cut down 38spcl brass in a 38s&W because many of them will split and will/can damage the cylinder.

Find some loaded 38S&W ammo and save the brass.

AJ

[kyle623]

midway has 38 S&W brass in stock. i've been told by many and from waht my manuals say I wouldnt shoot 38 spcl brass in a 38 S&W

[SierraWhiskeyMC]

MidwayUSA doesn't have .38 S&W in stock right now; they've been out for awhile. They expect some in at the end of the month.

[S.R.Custom]

I think you have it backwards.

Yup, sure do. Somehow I managed to read the question backwards.


I have had people tell me that .38 S&W brass is NOT larger than .38 Spl and I have had people tell me that not sizing them all the way to the base will NOT work, but it did for me.

I currently have some antique .38 S&W black powder ammo on consignment sale for a guy, and a few days ago I was curious and ran one of the empties through a .38 Spl RCBS die. It would chamber up to where the die's opening radius left the case full diameter. The empty would almost, but not quite chamber. So if one were inclined to try to size down .38 S&W cases, it may or may not work depending on the size of the opening radius of the die, and the generosity in the chamber dimension. In my particular S&W M&P, it did not work. The rim was held off the cylinder about .015".

As for the original poster's question --which I think I'm reading correctly now that I've had my daily allotment of coffee-- yes, sizing up the .38 spl cases will work just fine. They'll look a little funny at the bottom, but nothing to be alarmed about. (The differece between head diameters of the samples I have here is .008".) But I would recommend either Remington or Federal brass for that exercise, as they seem to have less taper in the case walls than other brands, which is a consideration since you're trimming down brass.

Case volume, however, will be a less than a regular .38 S&W case. You'll have to work up to your load.

[Treeman]

I have done it. It did work fine with mild 38 S&W loads, however the .38 spl case is too small at the web and the cases are being worked hard if you size them in 38 spl dies. If you have 38 S&W or 9mm Makarov dies you won't work the case mouth as much but the cases may be a bit off center in relation to the base/casehead. The bottom line is that it is a POSSIBLE workaround to make usable cartridges but it is NOT the ideal approach.

[SP101GUY]

There are actually people out there that shoot 38 S&W? I have had a box of them for 30 years now and could never find a gun to put them in. I think they are 160g round nose copper plaited in nickel cases. I think they are Winchester Super X rounds.

Once I get moved and upacked here in a few weeks, I will have to dig them out. It is a box of 50, but I think there is 1 round missing. Want to buy them?

AJ

[kywoodwrkr]

'Winchester 38 S & W Brass' is currently available if you look.
Runs about $50 per 500. Starline is available also.
Dies were being sold as 38 ACP/38 Super/38 S&W a year or so ago.
Ken Waters Book has level 1 and level 2 loads in for the 38 S&W also I think. One of the above categories is for old top breaks(not Enfields/Webleys but H&R and such).
FWIW

[anachronism]

You can't use the same dies. 38 S&W cases are too short to be crimped in 38 Spl dies. As already mentioned, there is a diameter difference. I once had a S&W chambered in 38 S&W. It had been "converted" to 38 SPL. This means that some moron ran a 38 spl reamer in the 38 S&W cylinder which gave me the worst of both worlds. Jacketed bullet shot okay but lead (the only factory load available) shot poorly. Why wouldn't it with almost 1/2 inch of freebore? 38 spl cases swelled badly at the web & threatened to tie the gun up. Nowadays, I would just load 200+ grain bullets in S&W cases & be happy. Back then, I couldn't wait to get rid of it and get a real gun.

[9.3X62AL]

There are actually people out there that shoot 38 S&W? I have had a box of them for 30 years now and could never find a gun to put them in. I think they are 160g round nose copper plaited in nickel cases. I think they are Winchester Super X rounds.

Ahem.......I have 4 such revolvers, and enjoy shooting them very much. One must be careful with the caliber, it could raise quite a welt.

[Bret4207]

Rather than relying on my famously poor rememberer I went to the SAAMI drawings-

38 Special- Cartridge diameter .379/chamber- .3809
38S+W- Cartridge diameter .3863/chamber- .3896

I leave it to the user to make his own decision, but my 38S+W Perfected Model get's ONLY Starline 38 S+W brass or other commercial 38S+W marked brass. It's not that hard to get guys and Lee makes dies for cheap.

[SP101GUY]

Never ment to offend any one, I have just looked at every gun show for years and never found a pistol chambered for the round. Every one just stared at me when I asked about it, so I held on to the box of them.

"You mean 38 special, I have that" they would all say. "No, I mean 38 S&W" I would pull one out of my pocket for visual reinforcement, and they just looked at it dumbfounded. "Why would you cut down a 38 spl. case like that for, you lose power that way." I take the round back and walk away. [smilie=b:

aj

[BLTsandwedge]

I like odd old handgun calibers. I've got two revolvers chambered in .38S&W- a Colt Police Positive c. 1905 and a breaktop S&W c. 1890. Prior to buying the first, I had a 100g button-nose wadcutter mould made by Mountain Moulds for an unrelated project. The boolit drops out at .360- and delivers surprising accuracy out of both revolvers. The 100g wadcutter sits over 3g of Unique- moves out just about as fast as curing concrete. I can push faster in the solid frame Colt- but why? Kinda like hot-loading a .25 auto. Interestingly, the same boolit- button-nose wadcutter design- will cycle beautifully through my .380 Makarov, provided the boolit is sized to .357. I've never tried .38spl brass in the .38S&W revolvers- I'd echo the idea that it ain't worth the hassle. I haven't had difficulty finding .38S&W brass on the net.

[Charlie Sometimes]

38 S&W is a great "gut buster" round- fun to shoot, too.
Buy the 38 S&W cases, don't waste your 38 Spl's, or find someone who will trade you some.
They are not interchangable at any level, despite their obvious relationship.

[Firehand]

I like shooting it, interesting old cartridge. And I've found you can use a lot of .38/.357 bullets if you use them as they come out of the mold and lube with Lee Liquid Alox. Can even duplicate the Brit military load with a 200-grain bullet.

Side note, after WWII a lot of Victory Model S&W revolvers were 'converted' to .38 Special by lengthening the chambers; it'll work, but has a nasty habit of cases splitting when fired.

[Landric]

If I ever have money again I'm hoping to pick up both a S&W Victory Model and a Webley, both in .38 S&W. I just like guns that are a little different, and I like those 200 grain slugs.

[9.3X62AL]

If I ever have money again I'm hoping to pick up both a S&W Victory Model and a Webley, both in .38 S&W. I just like guns that are a little different, and I like those 200 grain slugs.

Those are two of the four examples I have in 38 S&W, and they shoot rather well with the NEI #169A castings at 700 FPS. Many thanks to OKSMLE for the intro samples that prompted me to order that mould.

Another *jewel* I have in 38 S&W is the most-recently acquired, a Colt Police Positive x 4". Talk about The Kit Gun From Hell--Lyman #358477s @ .359" go right to the sights at 700-725 FPS, and cluster pretty closely. Some of the local jackrabbits have found these loads not to their liking, and now that cottontail season is upon us, some hasenpfeffer might be enabled with the little Colt.

The S&W and Webley-Enfield both have .362"-.363" throats; the Colt has .359". This requires some tooling adaptations, but between the 9mm Mak dies and the RCBS Cowboy set in 38 S&W things get assembled without much fuss or bother. There is about .007"-.008" of difference between case diameters on 38 Special (.379") and 38 S&W (.386"-.387"). Starline brass is EXCELLENT, W-W and R-P is almost as good. Just keep the load intensities where they belong--I won't let ANY of the 200 grain loads near the Colt or the Iver Johnson top-break.

[AzShooter]

I shoot 38 short cases in my regular .38 specials. I buy new cases from Star, reload them and run them through my 627 and 686 with no problems.

[NickSS]

I have two old top break Iver Johnson revolvers as well as a 1913 vintage Ploice positive and an Enfield revolver in 38 S&W. It is a fun round to shoot though most of them go through my WWII enfield. When I first started I had no dies or brass for that caliber and also a lock of money, I did have 38 special dies as well as lots of brass in that caliber. So with the use of a tubing cutter and my 38 special dies I cobbled up about 100 rounds of 38 S&W ammo. They worked just fine and I have had no split cases or other problems with it. Since then I have aquired 36 S&W dies (does make reloading easier) and I have picked up a few hundred starline cases in that caliber. Howeverm I still load and shoot my cases I made from 38 Spl Brass but do use the proper dies. I also made 38 long colt and 360 Rook cases from 38 spl so it can be done with a little pacience.

[Buckshot]

...............I have a blued Victory model my dad gave me. He'd bought it from a Calif Highway Patrolman in 1964. I don't think dad shot it more then a few times as he also gave me an almost full box of 38 S&W ammo with it and they're headstamped Rem-UMC. Come to find out later it had had a 38 Special reamer run into the chambers. I also have an 'unfooled with' Victory model, and the chamber differences tell the tale.

http://www.fototime.com/F07416FB0193628/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/6881A644F3C47E4/standard.jpg

LEFT This is the "Modified" cylinder. RIGHT This is the "As Issued" cylinder and as you can see there is no throat in a true 38 S&W Victory model chamber.

When I dirst got the revolver from my did I didn't know the difference between 38 Special and 38 S&W, so I DID fire 38 Special in it. The cases came out bulged but none split and accuracy was let's say, disappointing? You cannot get a 38 Special case into a 38 S&W chamber. At least not in a Smith and Wesson revolver.

...............Buckshot