Lee 45 acp, 230 TC, 1911 favorite loads, oal etc...

[Bula]

Hello all, recently cast a pile of the Lee 230 gr Truncated cone traditional lube boolits. Drops nice at about 238gr lubed with 50/50 from WW with 2% tin.

What loads have y'all tried successfully from your 1911's. They look right and load from a mag right at 1.20" OAL, but I have yet to shoot any.

I'm looking for a load equal to the vel of traditional ball. All from Gov model lengths.

Thanks.

[Trey45]

I have the Lee 2r acp mold. My pet load in my 1911 is 5gr Redot, or 5gr Bullseye. Both are full power loadings.

[j20owner]

I'm like Trey and only have experience with Lee's 2R a 230gr boolit. I've had good luck with 4.8gr Titegroup. Basically a 'factory duplication', running about 850fps out of a 5" gun.

[35remington]

I've shot the Lee 230 Truncated Cone quite a bit.....I've got the tumble lube version, but I lubricate it in my lubrisizer, using only the bottom two bands with the soft lube I usually have in the sizer. This seems to give better accuracy than filling all the grooves with soft lube and leading is minimal.

Of course the LLA works too.

Red Dot has more suds to it than Bullseye in equal charge weights, so less of it is needed according to my chronograph. I find Red Dot gets more velocity with less powder than nearly any other powder in 45 ACP save Clays (where it is approximately equivalent), and Clays does not have Red Dot's "top end" so it cannot duplicate standard velocities. Red Dot can and will.

In a five inch barrel, 5.0 Bullseye or 4.7 grains Red Dot duplicates factory ball velocity, as does about 5.8 grains Unique or 6.0-6.2 grains of Herco. It takes about 5.5 grains W231 to equal factory. The reason I say "about" is that seating the bullet in the case slightly deeper to your OAL of 1.200 will increase velocities since powder space is reduced. I used 5.2 grains American Select to get a 855 fps average. The granule size of American Select is a little large but it sure does burn clean. I'm not sure how much that matters with a lead bullet.

Power Pistol, in its maximum listed +P loadings of the older Alliant manuals, stopped at around 7.5 grains with 230 grain bullets; this got a rather high velocity of right around 1000 fps for an average at 1.220" OAL . While this may be allowable, it's hard on the gun for any frequent use and I'd drop it down to 6.5 grains or so with this powder. It meters well and gives good ballistics but it's rather blasty, so I usually prefer Unique or Herco to Power Pistol when using a little bit slower powder than Bullseye or W231.

You might want to experiment with seating to 1.220" if your chamber will allow it, as the velocities I quote are for this length and this obtains best reliability for me; at least, in a lot of shooting, this OAL has held up well.

[pdawg_shooter]

I load 8.3gr of AA#5 for both of my Colts and my Sig P220.

[BD]

I shot a couple of years of action pistol using a pair of Lee six cavity 230 grain TC molds and an eight lb jug of Titegroup. Load was 5 grains of Titegroup, so I guess that's a little over 11,000 rounds.
BD

[Bula]

Thanks guys, so does "1.22 sound good to you guys?

[35remington]

Question is, does it sound good to your gun?

Take the barrel out and see if it fits, and hand chamber a few as well with the barrel in the slide......some guns have a little slack between the barrel hood and the breechface, and in some cases rounds that are a little above flush with the hood when the barrel is removed will still chamber fine.

What you're looking for is that the rifling origin does not hit the full diameter portion of the bullet below the tapered cone portion, allowing the cartridge to fit properly into the chamber and allow the slide/barrel to go fully into battery.

If the cartridges pass at the 1.220" length, give that a whirl.....but you gotta check first.

[Bula]

Had a chance to shoot this load, 5.2g W231 at 1.20, 1.21 and 1.22--20 rounds of each. All of them fed fine. Looks like I'll keep my OAL at 1.220". I really like the looks of this truncated cone. Good weight and that nice meplat, I think this one is a winner for sure.

[Bula]

Well, I guess 20 rounds doesn't prove much. Loaded up a box of 50 rounds to 1.22" over a 5.2 g load of W231, had about 4 fails to chamber. I think I need to go shorter. 1.20" here I come.

[cptinjeff]

I use this boolit thru my Glock for USPSA. I had a heck of a time getting it to feed 100% and not lead in the lone wolf replacement bbl. Final answer .452, 50/50 pb/ww quenched, Recluse method modified LLA (I have the traditional grove mold), 1.18-1.20 OAL. 4.2g bullseye.

Accurate and authoritative on steel.