Tightening groups

[chris in va]

Let's brainstorm a bit here.

I'd like to tighten up my groups a bit with my CZ. I found a few unfired FMJ at the range today and was shocked how much more accurate they were than my boolits.

So far I have:

Lee 358-125-RF, sized to .358
40-40-10
OAL at 1.005 (longest I can get it to chamber properly)
Water dropped
Universal or Bullseye, seems to like mid-range best

Anything else I can do, or is lead inherently inaccurate compared to FMJ?

Oh and please don't recommend a piece of equipment that will make my wallet scream. I'm thinking more like different powders etc.

[lwknight]

I bet you find the fmj's measure .354

[geargnasher]

CZ what? 9mm?

Lead has the same potential for accuracy as any other projectile, it's just a bit less forgiving of "generic" loading practices. Lots more things to get wrong with lead. With jacketed, you adjust your COAL, powder charge, bellmouth and crimp, and crank away. With lead, you have to get the alloy right for the pressure, the lube right for the application, the boolit size right, the brass crimped just right (or not, as the situation dictates), the powder has to be right for the correct launch and pressure build, not just muzzle velocity, the critical dimensions of the gun and the bore finish are also much more of a factor with cast than jacketed, you name it.

After you've been reloading cast exclusively for a while, go back and load a box of FMJs. You'll be stopping every few rounds saying to yourself "What? That's it? What am I forgetting?"

Oh, and try Blue Dot for the 9mm.

Gear

[lwknight]

Chris , you have the same problen that I havewith my 5906 smith. The mouth of the barrel is just too tight. I plan to hone the barrel entry one of these days.
I have a ruger that eats anything I put in it and the barrel slugs .355 like its suposed to.
Its just a bummer to get a pita barrel.
Luckily the grip is the same as the smith, on my P-95 so I will be practicing with the P-95 and the 5906 is just an EDC gun that I shoot sparingly till I can shoot cast bullets in it too without giving up the preciuos little case capacity that it has anyway.

[Bret4207]

IME some guns like cast better than others, No rhyme or reason to it, they just do. Barrel condition and design is probably the key. Start with the basics- fit, Fit, FIT, lube, seating depth, crimp or not, powder juggling, etc. Record everything, change only one thing at a time, look for trends plus and minus. High pressure rounds like the 9mm are tougher to work with than lower pressure rounds.

What is the 40-40-10 you're referring to?

[Windy City Kid]

Try WSF powder it's an excellent 9mm cast bullet powder.

40-40-10? It think you mean the tumble lube 45-45-10.

I would also try a different lube like Carnauba red.

[casterofboolits]

+1 for Blue Dot in the 9mm. Also, make sure you are sizing your boolit to fit your barrel.

Make sure you are not over taper crimping, this is a major problem as you can resize your boolit.

[deltaenterprizes]

Try 147 gr boolts.

[lwknight]

Try 147 gr boolts.

Chris said that his OAL was already only 1.005 There would not be any powder room left with 147 grainers LOL

[chris in va]

Oops, yes...45-45-10. Never was a math whiz.;-)

I did try the 356 147 grain boolits and they went in sideways.

I'll try Blue Dot and see if it helps. Not saying my accuracy is bad, but I was reminded how much my CZ shoots like a laser when putting those FMJ through it.

As lead is getting phased out I'm wondering how more accurate a zinc boolit will be. Does it have the same BHN as copper?

[Bwana]

"I'd like to tighten up my groups a bit with my CZ. I found a few unfired FMJ at the range today and was shocked how much more accurate they were than my boolits."

My understanding, from your post, is that you picked up "unfired' rounds that were not yours and you had no knowledge of their history and fired them in your gun.
This is very unwise. While they may have looked like factory rounds they could just as easily been reloads or, even worse, rounds that were deliberately overloaded and "salted" onto the range.
While I pick up unfired rounds they all go into the "unfired round bucket" for later disassembly for use of the components.
DO NOT FIRE ROUNDS THAT YOU ARE NOT ABSOLUTELY SURE ARE SAFE!!!!!!!!!!!

[Old Caster]

You need to pay attention to neck tension. It is possible that your lead bullets are getting swaged down from too tight of a case after sizing. Pull one of your loaded .358's with an inertia puller and measure what size the bullet is. It may be too small. The smaller the caliber, the more this causes trouble. It has always been nigh impossible to load 38 HBWC's as accurate as factory and I think this is why. They use new brass which is consistant and sized exactly as they know it is necessary. Since HBWC's are very soft it was double as important.

[bobthenailer]

i have a tz 75 witness, in 9mm , i size bullets to 0.357 dia and use hs6 powder and a saeco #929 145 gr swc made for the 38 super, i use rem cases sorted to a length of 0.750 to 0.755 length measured after resizing. i also have 2 other 9mms and 2- 38 supers all prefer bullets sized to 0.357 dia ,and the saeco #929 bullet and med to med fast powders for the most accurate loads . i also have 3 other moulds and the #929 is hands down the most accurate cast bullet in every pistol

[noylj]

I can use 1.169" for L-RN in my CZ-75s. You should be able to use 1.140".
What was the COL of the range pick-up? It could be a question of your gun not liking lead or not liking that bullet style. Why don't you but 100 FMJs, clean your barrel, and try some different loads?
IME, the 9x19 is a fussy round when it comes to accuracy and the only 9mm's I have that can actually claim to be accurate are my two CZs. They like lead quite a bit.
One thing that I found was that a tumble lube in LLA would improve the accuracy of the commercial lead bullets I bought.
I decided to try this when I worked with a couple hundred of the Lee 358-105-SWC that I had cast several years ago. Playing around, I found that the best accuracy was simply tumble lubing them in LLA. Rooster Jacket was a failure. Pan lubing with old Lyman Alox stick lube was not very good, and tumble lubing the Lyman =-lubed bullets with Rooster Jacket was no good. I went from 3-5" groups with the other lube combinations to 1-2" groups with any that were tumble lubed in LLA.
Powders that have performed well in terms of accuracy in my 9mm's with lead bullets are Herco, Unique, Silhouette, Power Pistol, and 231/HP38.

[Bret4207]

Oops, yes...45-45-10. Never was a math whiz.;-)



Okay, 45-45-10 what? Lead-tin-antimony?

[AzShooter]

If your bullets are going in sideways they are not stabilizing. You need to shoot them faster. Go up a few tenths of a grain at a time until they shoot straight.

147s are THE go to bullet in the 9 mm. You should be able to get great groups with them. Play with crimp, OAL and powder charge. One thing at a time.

Seat them out as far as they can go and still feed.

Put a tight enough crimp on but not enough that the crimp is deforming the back of the bullet.

Powder ... go for what you need to make them stabilize or to make the power factor you are looking for.

[fredj338]

You could be getting deformation w/ the 0.358" boolets, What does your bbl slug? I never got good results w/ BE & Univ was just ok. If lead bullets won't shoot w/ Unique in the 9mm, they may not shoot. Try 4.7-4.8gr w/ that bullet. Alloy can play a part, as can the bullet lube. Many guys are complaining about accuracy w/ the Lee TL bullets in 9mm. Your bbl could just be rough as a cob too. Any leading to go w/ the poor accuracy?

[jsizemore]

Have you tried Air Cooled instead of Water Dropped? Not saying one is better then the other. In my gun, WD leads and groups big. AC doesn't lead and groups small.