lehigh defense extreme defender for the pocket gun

i started a new project this christmas: shot underwood extreme defender 68 grain ammo out of my lcpII and my brother's bersa firestorm. nice round: penetrated three water jugs, averaged 1214 fps out of my lcp and 1239 fps out of the firestorm, functioned beautifully out of the firestorm and functioned miserably out of my lcp.

result: end of test, gave the rest of the underwood rounds to brother, enjoyed the rest of the holidays by finishing my slow/heavy bullet test.

i also bought a box of lehigh defense 90 grain defender (eftm-xd 355 cal./9mm) bullets to test in my lcpII. load: the 90 gn defender bullet, new starline cases, 2.9 gn w231, cci500, .982" col. i loaded only five to make sure i didn't blow up the gun.

so far so good with this bullet and load:

the good: the gun didn't blow up, the cases landed a foot away behind me (with one hitting me on top of the head), 4 out of 5 bullets hit the paper 26.5 yards away, i didn't shoot the chrony, and, most important, the rounds fed and functioned through the lcpII perfectly. i'm going to load up twenty and get better numbers, but it's lookin' good so far.

can't wait for a penetration test,

murf

Obturation said:

I use the 90 grain lehigh penetrator for my small gun, good results. I've only used them as loaded by underwood- can't comment on the charge.
Good luck, I think it's a worthy project.

Click to expand...

if you still have some, can you get a cartridge overall length for me?

murf

took the sluice box and water jugs out to the shootin' spot today. the lcpII is dead-on @ ten feet and the bullet went through three jugs* and was found in the fourth. no damage to the bullet. fired the other nine through the chrony (no paper target this time but i was hitting an empty water jug @ 35 yards with every shot) and the results are: na, 858, 820, 848, 850, 851, 850, 820, 817, 820 ... 837 avg fps, 41 es. the temp was 60 degrees fahrenheit, it was sunny and there was no wind.

and, most important, perfect feed and function in my gun. so,this is my new defense load for the lcpII. the test is over. i'm amazed the test took so little time and effort.

time to make more ammo,

murf

* three jugs is sixteen inches of water

i decided to continue the 380 acp test with another lehigh defense bullet, the 68 grain ftm-exd xtreme defender. i found out that the underwood load with this bullet would not feed and function through my lcpII, but i thought i'd try to load this bullet and find a c.o.l. that would work. found it on the first try @ .980". found load data on the lehigh defense website: 4.0 grains of w231, and their c.o.l. of .960" (which i disregarded). loaded up ten rounds this morning and shot them this afernoon.

the first round was sent through the water jugs. i shot high and a bit left, but the round went through four jugs and exited high/left. will have to try again next time. the real takeaway here is the much larger amount of water displaced than the 90 grain @ 837 fps load. probably due to the 1129 fps average velocity of the 68 grain load:

the next nine rounds went through the chrony: 1100, 1113, 1168, 1130, 1144, 1121, 1088, 1155, 1140 - 1129 fps average, 80 es, and into the target @ 25 yards. seven out of nine hit the box and the group center was about 4 inches low: . perfect feed and function, cases landed between three and nine feet out @ 5 o'clock, fired cases looked normal with primers as flat as the underwood cases.

i changed my mind again because of the water jug test. i'm going with the 68 grain load for carry.

murf

i chose a longer c.o.l. because the underwood rounds don't feed very well in my lcp. .984" is the max cartridge length and i did have one loaded round too long to load in my magazine (measured .985"). so i guess i will reduce the length a bit to guarantee every round will load in the magazine. i will try .970" c.o.l. next time.

i'm working on "fixing" the round nose seating stem in my seating die to get rid of load length variations, also. these lehigh bullets require a "flat nose" seating stem, i think.

thx,

murf

my new, new project is to make those 90 grain xtreme defender bullets work in my glock 19.

murf

i loaded up some more 68 grain xtreme defender bullets @ .975" c.o.l. for the lcpII and ran eight of them over the chrony: 1148 avg fps, 78 es. feed and function is 100 percent.

loaded and shot five 90 grain ftm-exd bullets, 5.2 gn w231, cci 500, 1.105" c.o.l., mixed cases:

i'm happy with 1300 fps out of the glock 19, feed and function is 100 percent and the accuracy is more than enough for a defense round. the jug test is next.

murf

sorry, no pics for the jug test, but the 90 grain xtreme defender bullet ended up in the fifth jug. the other nine rounds went through the chrony: 1350, 1305, 1310, 1308, 1307, 1302, 1306, 1294, 1294*, 1308 avg fps, 56 es. if i throw out the first "lead bullet cleaning" round, i get a 1303 fps avg and a 16 es number. also, the chrony showed a "dup 1" for the second 1294 reading meaning the second number is a real duplication.

cases are mixed. i had 5 of 10 bullets drop down inside the case when seating. so, i ran those five cases through a 380 acp sizing die, then belled them in a 9mm expander die. after i seated bullets in those five cases, i did this same process to all my prepped 9mm brass (a bit over 300 pieces). that took me all night last night and most of this morning. but now i don't have to worry about bullets dropping down inside the case, or poor case/bullet tension.

i'm assuming the nice tight chrony numbers means i did something right last night with the case prep.

now i have new defense ammo for my 380 acp and my 9mm pistols.

murf

i decided to do one more water jug penetration test before i put this to bed. another of my defense loads is a 230 gn xtp bullet in 45 super going a bit over a thousand feet per second out the muzzle. the load fired into the sluice box penetrated three jugs, dented the fourth and fell back into the third jug. water went everywhere and the bullet expanded to .72".

so, here is a summary of my defense loads and penetration results:

and here is a pic of the sluice box:

murf