38 wadcutter frustration

pull a bullet and measure the diameter to see if your fcd is post-sizing the bullets. a two thou reduction will make a big difference here.

luck,

murf

brewer12345 said:

try adding a bit of alox

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I like this idea.

Do you know the bullet diameter. .357 or .358.

brewer12345 said:

Sized to 358. I acquired an M die to do a better job of expansion, but I think the FCD swaged it down.

I am determined to figure this out. I have a sizable pile of wadcutters sitting around I would love to shoot. Now that I have moved to powder coating, once I run through the current stash I would switch to coated.

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If you can feel the FCD carbide ring catching the case mouth then yes it is going to swag the bullet. I have taken the ring out of the FCD that I use for lead Bullets and don’t have this issue anymore.
But make sure it’s not the case bell that you are feeling. A black marker will show if the FCD ring is in fact going to swag the bullet.

brewer12345 said:

Yeah, that is what I am thinking. Loaded up a cylindereach of 2.8 and 3.0 grains of bullseye and crimped them with the FCD with the carbide ring taken out of the die.

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there is more than enough bullet/case contact area to keep that bullet from moving regardless of crimp. suggest you crimp just enough to take the bell out of the case.

luck,

murf

murf said:

there is more than enough bullet/case contact area to keep that bullet from moving regardless of crimp. suggest you crimp just enough to take the bell out of the case.

luck,

murf

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100%, The only crimp I do is just to take the flare out. Those bullets are seated DEEP and 38 doesn't kick much so there's next to zero chance of them pulling out during shooting.

My grandkids have been transitioning from .22s to .38 wadcutters. They love the S&W Model 10 and Model 19, both 4 inch barrels. I put a Crimson Trace laser grip on the Model 10 and that really adds to the fun. I finished the loads I had with 2.8 grains of Bullseye and started using some that I had made up during the Obama shortage using 2.0 grains of Trail Boss. They agree, or at least claim, the Trail Boss loads are more accurate. I had used Summers Wadcutters in both their Hi-Tek and plain lead bullets. This equals a lot of shooting for very little money. The haze from these loads allows you to see the laser beam in the indoor range we use. Just thought I'd share our experience with this load.

Typetwelve said:

All I can add is a bit more noise...but I has MASSIVE leading with some silly "laser cast" stuff I bought from Oregon Trail. That's $$ right down the drain, I have no clue what to do with the rest of those.

Either way, moved to hi-tek Missouri PPC #2 and that was that. I've had zero issues shooting them, they're very accurate and have zero leading (shooting from a S&W 627 Pro).

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Surprised at that I’ve used thousands of Oregon trail bullets with excellent results and little to no leading