My brother left me have a thousand or so 9mm that he assembled some years ago for an AR conversion that he had.
When I asked him about the recipe he used, he just shrugged his shoulders and said something along the line of " maybe Bluedot or something like that, I know that they were sorta' HOT though"
Well, being new to reloading, I followed all the dictums, and rather than go out and fire off any of "his" ammo, I did my due diligence and investigated the possibilities.
No.1: Don't trust ANYONE else's reloads
No.2: Don't fire anything that you have reason to suspect the recipe or lack there-of
I checked several different reloading manuals and found NO recipe that would have indicated the use of that powder. The OAL did not coincide with anything that I found possible.
So, I dismantled a handfull and measured the components & studied the powder as well as I could.
When all was said and done, I determined that he used GREENdot powder, and assembled the catridges with a shorter OAL than any current recipe using that powder called for.
Being the "new to reloading" fella that I was, I ended up getting a collet dismantling tool and took apart each round, measured the powder volume and adjusted as needed, and reassembled them with an appropriate OAL.
P.I.T.A. , but, neccessary if I want to follow the basic rules of using reloaded ammunition.
My brother, and maybe others in the wings, might think I was anal about the whole thing, but where safety is involved, What else was I to do?
It was sorta' hard on the fingers/hands/wrists, but good practice using the tools/scale/ect. , so in the big picture, worth the effort I'd think.
I did take them all down and considered the propellant fertilizer. The other stuff was reused with low-medium power loadings as that is what I use anyway. Everything worked as it was supposed to----both eyes and 10 fingers still.
Good for you for your windfall.
