.38 Nyclad bullets for reloading? Are they still available?

[MillCreek]

I searched in this forum and others, and did a Google search without much success. I understand that Federal is no longer making complete rounds in the Nyclad .38 ammunition line. Perhaps they have discontinued all the Nyclad ammunition lines.

Does anyone know if the Nyclad JHP 110 or 125 grain bullets only are available anywhere for reloading purposes? Did Federal manufacture the Nyclad bullets or was the production outsourced, and Federal only assembled the completed rounds? Any pointers would be welcome. From the results of my searches, I fear the Nyclad bullets are no longer available from any source, but thought I would solicit the opinions of the experts here.

PS: Edited to specify JHP and bullet weight, in case that makes a difference as to availability. The reason I ask is that I think the Nyclad .38 JHP made a very nice standard pressure round for carry in lightweight revolvers.

 

[Jim Watson]

I don't think loose Nyclad component bullets were ever available.
The whole line has been discontinued.

 

[Gewehr98]

They're out there. You just have to keep your eyes open.

Earlier this year I bought (via e-Bay) a box of 600 Nyclad .358" bullets, produced for Smith & Wesson's line of factory Nyclad ammo. The blue-gray nylon cladding is very thick, the bullets mike out at .360" or larger.

For Jim's sake, I'll take pictures of the batch and upload them here.

If I ever get through my reloading backlog, I'm going to load some of the 158gr batch in my Desert Eagle, and see if the NyClad handles jacketed bullet velocities. That was the intent of the coating to begin with, to reduce or eliminate leading of cast or swaged bullets.

A recent auction there sold about 500 of them for $11.45, see here:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Nyclad-38-357-R...ryZ71113QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

[BluesBear]

Don't forget that the S&W Nyclad bullets were never meant to expand.
They were designed for range use.

Since Federal stopped production of Nyclad ammo I have seen several lots of bullets being sold off. Some of it is the NOS S&W stuff from when they bought the rights. Some of it is later Federal production.

 

[MillCreek]

Don't forget that the S&W Nyclad bullets were never meant to expand.
They were designed for range use.

It is entirely possible, that as I am getting older, my memory is turning into Cream of Wheat. But I thought that I remembered that Federal and/or S&W put out a line of .38 Nyclad, in standard pressure JHP, that expanded very well in short-barrel revolvers. In fact, I thought I recalled reading in the gun rags at the time (back in the 80's?) that the round was very commonly used in LEO back up and off duty guns for that very reason, since the very soft lead JHP expanded very well, and the round did not batter the Model 36's, Model 60's and Colt Detective Specials of the era. I had several boxes of this ammo (I think it was 110 or 125 grain JHP), all of which I used up many years ago, and I do recall firing it out of the Model 36 and Colt Agent that I had at the time. I would occasionally dig a fired bullet out of the sand berm backstop and remarked at the nice expansion and retained bullet weight. The color of the nylon coating was black, and it seemed fairly thin. It was also a very soft-shooting round, as I recall, yet seemed to reliably expand.

So if indeed my recollection is faulty, please point this out, and it will save me some work! I believe I also remember, as does Bear above, that the round was designed for indoor range work, and the nylon coating was to reduce airborne lead exposure. So was it just coincidence that at least one line of the .38 Nyclad was also good for carry, or was it designed that way?

 

[bpisler]

I think the S&W nyclads were
designed to reduce the amount
of airborn lead in indoor
ranges.Federal loaded nyclad
hp's for defensive use in 9mmP,
38spl and 357mag.

 

[Jim Watson]

Well, thanks for the poop. I beg leave to doubt the bona fides of somebody selling some sort of coated bullet in candy boxes off of ebay, though.

I have a few Federal Nyclad Chief's Special .38s left for my S&W Airweight. When they are gone, I will try the Gold Dot 135 grain "snubnose" load vs the well proven 158 grain lead hollowpoint. I agree that the original purpose of Nyclads was to reduce airborne lead in indoor ranges, but the later hollowpoints do perform well.

 

[Gewehr98]

It's the real thing.

I beg leave to doubt the bona fides of somebody selling some sort of coated bullet in candy boxes off of ebay, though.

My 600 bullets came from the same seller, and look exactly the same as the bullets loaded in the live Federal and S&W NyClad rounds I've kept on speedloaders in my nightstand. It appears she ran out of the bulk bullet boxes, maybe I'll send her my empty box and have her refill it with more of the same...

My guess is that once word got out about the toxic combustion/decomposition products of Teflon, then the days of NyClad bullets were pretty much over.

 

[MillCreek]

I have a few Federal Nyclad Chief's Special .38s left for my S&W Airweight.

Mr. Watson, would you please be so kind as to look at the ammo box and tell me the bullet weight? Thank you for your help.

 

[Jim Watson]

125 grains.

My ammo is labeled:
Federal Premium
.38 Special
125 gr Nyclad Hollowpoint
P38M

No +P designation on what was the old S&W Chief's Special load.

The bullets are of rounded ogive with a very large hollowpoint. Some of the secret ninja warrior magazine writers have said that the earlier version with a semiwadcutter profile is not a good expander.

Gewehr, what have the combustion products of Teflon got to do with a Nylon coating? (If indeed it is one of the Nylon polymers. If it were Teflon I would think they would surely have advertised it.)

 

[mikec]

Saw somewhere that Federal made a run of the 158gr +P Nyclads. Not sure if a distributor offered $$ to Federal or what.

 

[MillCreek]

I am almost positive that what Mr. Watson has is what I remember from all those years ago. I think my .38 Nyclad ammo may have been from S&W, since I am recalling they were in a dark blue and white box and was labeled as 'Chief's Special'. I also recall that the .38 Nyclad came in a SWC, which was not considered all that good for carry, and the 125 grain JHP, which was.

 

[BluesBear]

Back when S&W first came out with Nyclad ammo, it was originally a bluish purple colour. That way range officers could tell at a distance what ammo was being used. Federal changed it to black.
Anyway, in the early 1980s S&W sent out posters to us stocking dealers featuring all of their ammo.
(It seems that the more S&W ammo you sold the bigger your handgun allotment became.)

As I recall it had a photo of the loaded round in a horizontal position, with a picture of the bullet by itself just to the right and then a picture of the bullet (if it was a hollow point) after it had expanded.
The poster clearly showed that every Nyclad loading was a duplicate of a swaged lead bullet load they already had in production.
If my feeble memory serves me correctly the only Nyclad loading that showed the third image, the one of an expanded bullet, was the .357 loadings.

Perhaps one of our members may have one of those old posters stashed away somewhere and could photograph it for us. I know I'd sure love to find one.

 

[Patnav]

This is probably a dead issue, but I bought plenty of S&W Nyclad ammo in the 80's (close to 1,000 rnds for all calibers). Yes, it was supposed to reduce airborne lead at the range. But they were also supposed to expand better due to the soft blue nylon jackets.

I had 9mm 124 Gr JHP's that were truncated but still fed into my HK943 carbine, Sig P226 and Tanfoglio TZ75 Series 90 with no problems. I also had .38 +p 125 JHP's, .357 magnum 125 JHP's and .357 158 Semi-wadcutter hollow-points that I used in my Smith M66 & M586.

I used the .357 125 jhp's and 9mm 124 jhp's for home defense rounds after Glasers (which were for the first shot). I must admit that loading and unloading 9mm mags of the Nyclad's would sometimes strip of a little of the nylon coating off, but that's about the only problem I had with that ammo. I have a few articles of this ammo in some of my old gun magazines from the 80's