Downside of reloading to light?

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lyrikz

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I have a DE .50ae. I love it. Love shooting it. I learned to reload with this gun also. At first i was always loading them very hot. Right at the max. 34 grains. 34.5 is max. I have no learned that isnt necessary.

Well, i have a wife and a kid who both want to shoot the gun. Right now, with the 34 grain rounds im not about to let them look at it. I dont find it funny when some dude hands his wife the cannon and hits herself in the face with it..

So, what i did was i loaded up 4 cartridges. 300 grain bullet, and 29 grains of h110 powder. Thats a full 3 grains lower then what the lowest number is in the book.

I figured worst case scenario is the gun doesnt cycle or feed. I took them out and shot them. They cycled fine and the gun felt like shooting a small .45 acp. IT FELT GREAT!!!. I would like to continue to run this load because its going to save me money on powder in the long run and now i know my kid and wife will have zero issues firing it.

Besides the non feeding issue, is there any other issues with running light like that??
 
H110 is one of those powders that is usually a no-no to reduce the charge on.I don't know at what point it becomes dangerous,I believe it has to do with the actual pressure, below a certain pressure it becomes more "explosive"(for lack of a better term right now).I'm not all that familiar with the powder, but someone that is will chime in a clear this up. I think you are ok with that particular caliber and charge.
 
What he said. If you'll look a little closer, you'll probably notice that warning about reducing Olin 296 and H-110 below starting levels. There are doubtless some very good reasons for that. If you want to use reduced loads with slow ball powder, I'd suggest 2400. It's a lot more tolerant than the other two.
 
Well, crap. So LOWERING the level could actually be worse. Damn.

I was figuring the lower the level, it would just not function. Oh well. Glad i asked. I have only made 4 cartridges so luckily i dont have to pull anything.
 
Not what ether of them said. They have no idea what they are talking. This is how internet disinformation gets started & runs wild. The warning states not drop below min listing. It is because it needs the pressure to burn(opposite of spike) & you could stick a bullet.

Use a faster powder.
 
Well, little research for myself. Well, so much for that. Seemed like it would be fun to shoot now for everyone. Guess not.

"Reduce H110 and Winchester 296 loads 3% and work up from there. H110 and Winchester 296 if reduced too much will cause inconsistent ignition. In some cases it will lodge a bullet in the barrel, causing a hazardous situation (Barrel Obstruction). This may cause severe personal injury or death to users or bystanders. DO NOT REDUCE H110 LOADS BY MORE THAN 3%.

"""
 
You should know. If the bullet stuck it would make a wired sound & the slide would not function. Somehow people still manage to chamber another & blow up there gun. I believe it is the TRS(Tap Rack Squeeze) teaching.

Like I said go to a faster powder & you will have less recoil.
 
Lighter bullets usually increase recoil because you need more powder to increase the pressure to burn right & function the slide.
 
King,

I was thinking of just doing a set of 50 of these. I have NO problem loading one bullet at a time. Its rare my wife and kid come out to shoot. But when they do, it would be nice to have something for them.

say i did 1 round at a time, checked the bore everytime. Think there would be an issue??
 
No. Not if your sure headed. I stick bullets all the time just to see where that point is. If I want a load that just barley cycles the action I will go way below it to make sure it is nowhere near sticking a bullet.

You will get much better results from a faster powder tho. Is there a reason you don't want to try another powder?
 
Not really any main reason for sticking with this powder. Just what im used to using. I have another powder i use for my other pistol rounds.

It will take me a week or two to get to the store to get another powder. Thats why i kinda wanted to run with what i have.
 
I don't know anything about your gun but H110 is slower then I run in my rifle & Titegroup is very fast. It would get the bullet out but 2 problems to look for is it would be function your slide & way blow out your case if you get it to function. Not knowing the gun I would probably try Universal or the fastest powder you have data for.

Sorry I can't be more help.
 
I don't mean to rock the boat, but if you want to share our sport with shooters who prefer powder puff rounds, why are you looking to do that with the .50ae? Can your family enjoy shooting only if they "shoot the cannon"? Is shooting intentionally softened loads from the cannon really "shooting the cannon"?

For the price of a couple hundred of those rounds, you could buy a nice used .38spl or 9mmx18 that everyone can shoot comfortably and cheaply.

And you'd solve your additional powder issue. Assuming you would reload this hypothetical .38 or 9mm, Titegroup can do that.
 
I just assumed it was because it was because it was his gun & he could. Part of it being the novelty of it. I catch all kinds of flack around here because of sharing what I know or why I load a certain way. Thing is at the end of it all I prefer the truth & reward of enjoyment of it so it really doesn't matter what someone I don't even know complains about.
 
No rocking the boat. Legit question. yes, the family loves shooting. i just bought my kid his first 22 this christmas. And yes, shooting softer loads is soft for me, but still a pretty decent bang for them. Its likened to shooting a very light .45. They want to shoot it, but i wont allow it with the standard loads.

I have a .40 they shoot. Plus we get free rentals at the range so they shoot everything. EXCEPT the .50. ahaha.

I just love the gun and would like them to shoot it. Thats all.
 
kingmt said:
Lighter bullets usually increase recoil because you need more powder to increase the pressure to burn right & function the slide.
Click to expand...

That's simply false. The exact opposite is true. Recoil is not exempt from physical law.

If it were my family, I'd buy some lighter for caliber bullets and run them at moderate levels with a different powder.

If you can't find any load data, I'll post some for you when I get home, where my load books are.
 
I’ve read here about loading lower recoil loads to meet a power factor. Since then I’ve tried some of the suggestions and have realized a 9mm 115gr minor is pretty snappy compared to a 147gr at the same power factor. While not the same thing, it seems like you could look at slide operation as the required power factor. Makes sense to me that the lighter bullet with just enough power to operate the slide would be snappier than the heavier bullet with just enough power to operate the slide. Is there something wrong with my thinking on this?
 
ArtP
You simply don't know what your talking about.

It isn't exempt you just don't understand the physics.
 
I load 99% exclusively with H110/296 for it's magnum applications and have for many years. And the reason I do is because it is a full house magnum powder, and only a full house powder and not intended for anything less than that. Unlike 2400 and other simular powder's, it doesn't function predictably when reduced, with the exception being, you can count on it doing anything but performing predictably when reduced.

One other tid bit I would like to mention. If the published data indicates the use of a magnum powder for H110/296 don't try substituting the application. I did once when magnum primer's were hard to locate, and the results were anything but predictable. Other's will probably jump on me for that statement, but it didn't work well for me.

Pick a different powder to play around with, and positively don't reduce it!
 
All that is needed is to look at some recoil tables to understand the heavier the projectile the more recoil is generated.

Example:

.350 Rem. Mag. (200 at 2700) 8.5 22.3 13.0
.350 Rem. Mag. (225 at 2550) 8.5 24.2 13.5
.350 Rem. Mag. (250 at 2500) 8.5 29.0 14.8

(projectile weight at velocity) rifle weight / recoil energy / recoil velocity
 
That has nothing to do with what I said. We are not talking about bullets moveing at the same speed. If you move to a faster powder the bullet will be slower. If you try to push a heavier bullet to the same speed then you need more powder. Like I said you don't understand.

Heavier bullet needs less powder to burn correctly. It won't move as fast.
 
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