Wasp Rice Shot Loads: .38/.45LC

[steve urquell]

Read through this whole thread. I have a flock of carpenter bees buzzing around my log cabin so I am going to try some 38 Spec. rice medicine to thin the flock. Don’t have any Bullseye but have some shotgun powder(700x, 7625) as well as a good selection of others. Looking for some recommendations as a good choice. Will 1 gr be sufficient for a 38 case of rice ?

2 grains of any shotgun powder is good in the .38 for rice. 3gr for lead shot. I'm actually using powder harvested from Federal 12ga shells I had which had rusty brass.

[Shawlerbrook]

Steve, thanks for the advice .

[steve urquell]

Steve, thanks for the advice .

No problem. Are you going to do the wax capped rice loads or gelatin capsules?

[Shawlerbrook]

Wax capped

[steve urquell]

Wax capped

They'll do fine in .38. It's more critical to get more volume in the 9mm using capsules than the .38. Be careful of any wood behind the shot. The wax plug will dent it.

[Shawlerbrook]

Thanks ! I plan on wing shooting.

[Shawlerbrook]

Steve, wax plug directly over the rice and about 1/8” thick ?

[steve urquell]

Steve, wax plug directly over the rice and about 1/8” thick ?

Yep. Wax is fairly weak though and won't take much abuse to knock it out. I had the lead shot ones with wax fall apart in my pocket. Rice is more tolerant because it is lighter in weight.

[sureYnot]

So I solved the dilemma of the non-scrunching .38 loads when trying to use a roll crimp. I could not get my .38 dies to seat the capsule before trying to crimp it so the capsule was hanging out of the case too far.

I first ran the cases thru a .38 resizing die and re-primed them.
Then I took the decapping/depriming pin out of my .300BLK sizing die and set the depth to where a .38 case would be crimped by the resizing area where the shoulder of a .300BLK case is.

I found that a 5/16" bolt fits the bore of it perfectly.
I figured out how much bolt length I needed to push the gel capsule to the depth I wanted it using flat washers to set the depth.

Then I just held the bolt down with a 4lb chunk of iron while I seated the capsules. This was for testing only. All I need to do moving forward is to either buy another decapping pin and cut it down as the capsule seater or cut down a bolt to go inside the .300BLK die. The only problem is retention of the bolt so it doesn't fall out the bottom of the die.

These have a full top 1/2 of a capsule full of rice or shot (directly on the powder charge with no wad) under a fully filled capsule on top of it. I overfilled these to where they would barely fit together so I could make sure they would crunch down.

Attachment 326970

I turned the decapping pin around so it's pointy end up. Also removed the pointy part so it still fits in the box. Could maybe put a small nut on it if you need more bearing surface.



Edit: Nevermind about putting a nut on. There isn't really room for anything.

[steve urquell]

I got a new weapon to assist in my silliness with this. I have a Lee PRO1000 set up for 9mm that runs great and I do not want to change its' settings so I was using my old hand-me-down RCBS single stage press and die changing was getting old.

I'd been looking at turret presses then checked here and found one in S&S. Thanks to Bjornb I now have an old Lee 3-hole turret press. It is super-simple with manual die rotation. I really like it. I put in my .380 resizer die, neck expander and .38spl seater die and loaded a few 9mm #12 shot loads(Thanks again to TXbyGod for the shot)

Capsules held 115gr of #12 over 3.1gr of TiteWad

[Texas by God]

I’ve ordered some of those capsules.


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[steve urquell]

I’ve ordered some of those capsules.


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They are a bargain compared to capsules designed for shot. The bullet seater makes a big difference in how these squish down into the case. My 9mm seater plug seems to do the best.

[sureYnot]

Steve's going to have us hunting geese with .380 pistols by the time he's done playing with this. Lol
I'm actually looking forward to the next carpenter bee season.

[steve urquell]

Steve's going to have us hunting geese with .380 pistols by the time he's done playing with this. Lol
I'm actually looking forward to the next carpenter bee season.

Hmm... .380 huh? Challenging.
It looks like I really put the hurt on my wasp population here. I don't see any wasps on my porch anymore. Weird how 10-20 can make it seem like your house is infested.

[sureYnot]

Hmm... .380 huh? Challenging.
It looks like I really put the hurt on my wasp population here. I don't see any wasps on my porch anymore. Weird how 10-20 can make it seem like your house is infested.

Agreed. I'd have sworn I had hundreds around.

.380... well, I may have exaggerated slightly. But the time and resources (probably some blood and tears, if your wife saw any of that damage from early on) that you've spent on this is pretty cool... and appreciated.
That's a thanks and a compliment.
What next, fearless leader?

[steve urquell]

Agreed. I'd have sworn I had hundreds around.

.380... well, I may have exaggerated slightly. But the time and resources (probably some blood and tears, if your wife saw any of that damage from early on) that you've spent on this is pretty cool... and appreciated.
That's a thanks and a compliment.
What next, fearless leader?

Ha, ha. Thanks. Maybe miniature nets for live capture a'la Planet of the Apes?

[steve urquell]

About 30ft from my front door I have a suet cake to feed the birds. The squirrels have been raiding it non-stop lately and it's not making me happy. I was coating it in cayenne which helped some but once the birds ate a spot away from it the squirrels decimated it.

Squirrels are doing what they do and I don't want to kill them so I loaded some cayenne loads today. Looks like I'm reaching the suet cake with the powder. I stacked 2 full capsules and let the seater crunch them down. The one below was one half of a capsule(the long end) filled and in the case with another full capsule on top of it and seated by hand.

Can't wait to see if this works lol. Video below

ETA: I did get a whiff of the pepper after that shot. Nose is feeling like I sniffed Vicks vapor rub.



https://youtu.be/RIG0tPfVhWA?feature=shared

[HWooldridge]

About 30ft from my front door I have a suet cake to feed the birds. The squirrels have been raiding it non-stop lately and it's not making me happy. I was coating it in cayenne which helped some but once the birds ate a spot away from it the squirrels decimated it.

Squirrels are doing what they do and I don't want to kill them so I loaded some cayenne loads today. Looks like I'm reaching the suet cake with the powder. I stacked 2 full capsules and let the seater crunch them down. The one below was one half of a capsule(the long end) filled and in the case with another full capsule on top of it and seated by hand.

Can't wait to see if this works lol. Video below



https://youtu.be/RIG0tPfVhWA?feature=shared

That load would work as a dog repellent if you decide to carry a .38 while walking. Better than shooting them in the face with bird shot.

[steve urquell]

That load would work as a dog repellent if you decide to carry a .38 while walking. Better than shooting them in the face with bird shot.

Or someone acting sassy. What I could not get on vid is the cloud that comes out. It's pretty good. Up close and personal would put you on your knees. The capsule flies about 45ft and would hurt like a son-of-a-gun. I have another side view vid where you can see the capsule hit the driveway.

[steve urquell]

Here's where I was testing with corn starch. You can see a puff of powder hit the tree. Not sure if that's the bottom capsule opening up on impact or not.
https://youtu.be/igDLk4Q8VPA?feature=shared