Hey where'd the guy who started this thread, disappeared faster than the Enterprise in warp
So curiosity, all weapons not being created equal, anyone have an opinion on what weight 9mm bullet has shown to work better than others? Have 115 FMJ and some 124 FP but was wondering if I should order a small pack of 147's to load also. Still working on getting parts together. Thanks.
Sorry, got activated for Federation Reserves duty and been busy fighting off the Borg ... dang near got assimilated too.
I have tested 100, 115, and 124 gr FMJ, JHP and thick plated bullets (rated to 1500 fps) with Red Dot/Promo, IMR Red, Vectan Ba 9.5, IMR Target, Sport Pistol, W231/HP-38, BE-86 with different OAL/COL from low SAAMI minimum (1.110") to almost maximum (1.160") using 17" Just Right Carbine, 16" PSA M-Lok/KeyMod/MOE uppers with M&P15/Spike's Tactical/Anderson lowers/PSA metal block/Joe Bob Outfitter/Frontier Armory dedicated lowers on these threads:
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.p...n-9mm-40s-w-45acp.799231/page-4#post-10338994
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/700x-one-pound-later.825599/#post-10629316
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.p...-and-vectan-ba-9-5-ba-9.817796/#post-10508215
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.p...ectan-ba-9-5-ba-9.817796/page-2#post-10519646
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.p...ectan-ba-9-5-ba-9.817796/page-2#post-10520702
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.p...ectan-ba-9-5-ba-9.817796/page-2#post-10523519
Based on my limited testing, here's what I found:
- Lighter weight 100 gr bullet pushed to 1500 fps produce less vertical stringing from velocity drop at 50-100 yards
- Blowback carbines seem to produce accuracy trends at different powder charge levels (mid range load data vs near max) often with small powder charge difference of .2 - .3 gr
- Jacketed bullets did not always produce greater accuracy compared to RMR thick plated bullets (This was a surprise to me)
- Sizing of bullet diameter seems to affect accuracy (.355"-.3555" sized jacketed bullets compared to .3565" sized plated bullets)
My current low cost plinking round is RMR 115 gr FMJ with 4.1-4.2 of Promo loaded short to 1.110"-1.115" (OAL variance I get from my progressive press) for greater neck tension/more consistent chamber pressures - light target load pleasant to shoot in M&P Shield 9mm (4.4-4.5 gr Promo is closer to Winchester White Box). These loads produced around 1" 10 shot gropus at 25 yards good for minute of soda cans which these are intended for.
Below are examples of accuracy trend I found common during powder work up (yes, I am using mixed range brass) with different powders where small changes of .2-.3 gr would produce significant change in group size but made identifying accuracy nodes easier (near max loads didn't always produce the smallest groups) -
Load with lowest ES/SD numbers was with RMR 100 gr thick plated RN with 4.5-4.7 gr Promo loaded to 1.050" (essentially 100% case fill load) produced 13 to 16 fps spread depending on temperature. Here are chrono data:
100 gr RMR HM RN 4.5-4.7 gr Promo @ 1.050": 1478-1475-1480-1471-1467 fps (58 F - JR carbine)
100 gr RMR HM RN 4.5-4.7 gr Promo @ 1.050": 1458-1450-1445-1442-1448 fps (71 F - JR carbine)
This load produced mostly sub 2" 10 shot cluster group at 50 yards, producing slightly smaller group than reference 5.5 gr W231/HP-38 load -
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.p...n-9mm-40s-w-45acp.799231/page-3#post-10245856
And 3" 100 yard 10 shot group, I mean pattern.