Reloading .380 acp Question

SSN Vet
I took an old casing and made a dipper out of it after establishing what load I wanted to use. I just filed off the top of it until I was able to scoop that load and it never changes so no worry of over/under charge now. A piece of looped electrical wire soldered to the rim recess = instant handle. A few years ago I bought a set of dies and some brass/bullets from a guy named Bart that was an IDPA shooter down near you for a screaming deal. Hope you find what you need for a good price. FYI there was a guy on here in the for sale section that was selling reasonably priced 380 brass recently.
FWIW you guys that think 380 is small, try loading 25 ACP.

OP, loading 380 for that LCP, you can make some moderate loads which will be mostly pleasant to shoot at the range. I've been loading Xtreme and Berry's 100gr with 2.8-3.0 grains of W231. I've also used Promo for the loads.
It's another caliber, and yeah, you may have to pick up some once fired brass for it as it's not often found.

I load for the wife's G42 and also use Berry's and xtreme bullets.

Around here range brass is pretty easy to come by however. I've got more than I'll need for a while.

I spent some time this evening reloading .380 on my LCT.

Not sure where I picked up all my once-fired brass but be on the look-out, I found a few that WERE brass cased but BERDAN primed. Thankfully the Lee decapper pin is designed to release from the die rather than break and sets quickly with a pair of wrenches.

I opted to halt reloading and went through and hand inspected every .380 case I had, ended up finding a couple dozen Berdans, which promptly went into the junk brass bin. I'll do a more thorough sort for sure next time I collect range brass.

Not unlike blazing through .45ACP reloading and finding the random small pistol primer case. A PIA for sure.

Hope this helps someone else.

Wolf Gold case on the left. Must be copper/brass 'washed' steel. A magnet attracts it.

ArchAngelCD said:

My guess would be, since those three are not made here they have slightly different dimensions. American made brass conforms time SAAMI specifications while the European brass conforms to CIP specifications. The differences are slight and don't usually effect shooting but as you found the shell holder can be a problem.

Sometimes another company's holder will fit. If you know other freeloaders you can try different holders and buy the one that fits which will probably be easier than sending a holder out.

Click to expand...

Thanks! NOW I know why the difference.
Lee will modify a shell holder, I just need to see if its justified in cost or just toss the '380 misfits'. The Lee Loadmaster is a progressive so I doubt I'd find another shellholder that would be compatable.

I have one of those gadgets that picks up all range brass. I've been getting lucky and getting brass from other's bump-fire's on their AR15s so have TONS of 223 brass to trade. I've been trying to get a surplus of 380 brass built up in trade.
The brass from a 380 almost flies as far as the bullet does.

For whatever reason, .380 remains fairly expensive compared to 9mm. For me, that alone justifies reloading to keep a few hundred 100 grain Berry's bullets loaded up with 2.9 grains of 700X.

I went shooting yesterday, .45 and .380.
This particular range caters to the casual shooter and has few reloaders. So I came home with more brass than I started with. Even some more .380s. I now have enough brass to load up that 500 bullets I have on order.

I resisted adding 9x17 to my hand-/re-loading repertoire for a long time ... until someone in this forum last February, IIRC, posted about a MidwayUSA special on 95gr Federal SP for 6.5¢ea (7.6¢, delivered) ... <sigh> that tipped me over and I order 1250.

Since I do my pistol shooting from a controlled location, I ordered brass from Starline.

I currently have ~500 of them loaded with Bullseye.

380 is getting a lot more popular, I keep getting more and more of them at the range when I pick up my fired 9 mm Luger brass ! just about impossible to spot the difference when picking the stuff up. I've resorted to just sweeping everything up , going home and looking at each head stamp.
Gary

I've got three .380s, and I shoot them a lot. Brass is so cheap, like here http://www.diamondkbrass.com/.380-AUTO-2500.html , that scrounging isn't even worth it. Bought a whole lot of Hornady 100gr FMJ's from Widener's when they were on sale for 7 cents per, so I load them for maybe $8.50 a box of 50. Cheap shooting, and fun.

Hmmm I bought a Kahr .380 and had over 500 rounds thru it in the first two months I owned it. Reloads at about $6 a box factory stuff about $15+
so $60 vs $150. Dies paid for themselves quick.

If it is expensive to shoot you will shoot it less and IMO the small .380 is the one you need the most practice with to shoot well.
Much harder to shoot my little Kahr than well than any of my other pistols.

Nit much fun at $15-18 a box three times as much fun at $6.

As I side note I like AA#2 for .380, nice small grains and meters great in .380 size charges.

With Lee dies in .380, you may find that their resizing die will not give you enough neck tension to safely retain the bullet, especially the short 90-95 grainers. Seems to be a fairly common problem, thus they sell a "undersized" .380 sizing die that costs almost as much as their 4 die set. BTDT. With the regular sizing die, I did not have to flare the cases at all in order to seat the bullets. No amount of crimp or even their FCD would correct the problem. When I contacted Lee, their response was "yeah, that happens with some brands of brass, you need to buy our undersized die, or sort your brass accordingly." Well, it happened with all my brands of brass, even that considered quality. Graf and Son sells the undersized die much cheaper than getting it from Lee direct.

I reload 380 because the factory ammo is way too hot.

N320, Lead Extrusions 6gram TC bullet, 270m/s velocity (very slow). Works very nicely (and accurately!) in a Beretta 84F.

(I'm in EU so self defence is not allowed and humans have no value).


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I load .380 on my 650. Only concern is arthritis in my fingers. I use AA # 2.

Just for the record I'm new to reloading but this is what works for me. 100g Powerbond (plated but able to use fmj charges because of thickness of plating) on top of 2.8g of hp-38. My adj. Charge bar has no issues with the small charge but each one is different I guess. Got decent accuracy out of these, any higher and the groups start spreading out tho. Haven't tried any fmj loads but I bet its similar

I use 2.5 gr of 700-X behind X-treme's 100 g plated RNFP. Goes boom, belches fire, and cycles my BT 380 reliabily. What more can one ask?

I tried 700X at 2.7 grains and it would not cycle my G42, so I stay with the max load of 2.9 grains with 100 grain Berrys bullets. 2.7 worked fine it's my 238, but the G42 seems to need a stout load to cycle.

Yeah I can see where that would happen, the slide on the Glock .380 looks bigger and heavier than my bersa's slide. I have a Taurus TCP that has a light slide but the spring is pretty stiff, haven't tried any 2.8 loads with it vut I can see it having issues too.

It's fairly well documented, the Glock 42 prefers hotter loads. I went through that as well when I first got mine. My mid-range loads of W231 and Promo that worked well in the LCP, Sig 238 and Beretta 84 would barely work the Glock. I had to bump it up a little to get them to work well.