Bullet weight

[Nordeste]

Hi all:

Finally got my Lee Classic Turret press home. It'll soon be installed and I have a week or so for my reloading permit to get done (yes, we have to get a permit in order to reload here, then I read you guys complaining about your gun laws ) and hopefully, start reloading my abundant 9 mm brass.

Powder will be Vectan BA9 (French stuff) which is the one most readily available here in my town. Primers will be CCI for the same reason, and when it comes to bullets, here comes my question.

Am I correct if I assume that the heavier the bullet, the lighter the recoil?. I know I'll have to use less powder if I use a heavier bullet, but I'm interested in the recoil thing. I'll reload trying to get as close as possible to the minimum power factor in IPSC Production (125), and the softer the recoil, the quicker the follow-ups, the better my scores.

At first, I thought the 124 grns bullets would be the most balanced option, but I'd like to hear your opinions.

Thanks in advance.

 

[BullfrogKen]

That's pretty much true. I find the heavier bullets don't have the sharp edge in recoil like the lighter bullets.

Back in IPSC's heyday it was common for guys to push the heaviest bullets they could fit in a 38 Super case to make Major. One reason was you could push those envelopes much farther, and much more safely, with the heavier bullets. The other was the splits were easier to manage.

Spain huh? Very cool. Very cool indeed.

 

[Nordeste]

Thanks Bullfrog . My first bag of bullets will be of 124 gr since I already have a working 9mm recipe for my pistol (STAR 30M) and as the inexperienced reloader that I am, I prefer to get started safely. But having this confirmed is good. After m first 500 rounds are consumed I'll order the heavier ones and see what happens. It won't take much to shoot those first 500 .

Have you been over here?. We have bad gun laws and terrible politicians, but a nice country, good food (and wines) and friendly people.

 

[45lcshooter]

Yes, heavy bullet= less powder= less recoil

Never been in an another country to experience their gun laws/reloading laws.

Stay safe, and this board has a lot of good people to ask questions to.

 

[gamestalker]

Yep, that's pretty much true. I get beat up by my 115 gr loads much worse than with my 147's. I don't notice as much of this with big bore magnum wheel guns, though there is some difference, it's not as significant.

GS

 

[BullfrogKen]

Have you been over here?. We have bad gun laws and terrible politicians, but a nice country, good food (and wines) and friendly people.

No, but I did spend a year in Cuba, and the country speaks Spanish so that's like kinda sorta close to like visiting Spain, right?




Okay . . . well we hired many Phillipine Nationals who worked on the labor force for the base who spoke Tagalog. I became good fishing friends with a few of them . . . which is kinda sorta . . .



Oh nevermind.


No. Never been to Spain.

But the Spaniard influence across the globe predates the English influence, so consider me impressed. Almost everywhere I went the Spanish were first. Also, your English is impeccable, so consider me double-impressed.


If you are looking for a heavy 9mm bullet, I'd suggest the 147 grain bullet. I prefer it. In fact, when I would shoot any IDPA matches with a 9mm where I knew I'd have steel that needed to be knocked down, I'd bring my 147 grain loads. They always had a more pleasant recoil, knocked steel down much more reliably, and I just flat out liked a fast-moving 147 grain bullet. The only reason I'd shoot lighter was because the bullets cost less.

Forgive me, but I can't comment on your powder choice. We just don't have it here, so it's not in any of my loading manuals.

If you have VihtaVuori powder available in Spain - we do here in America but I always have to special order it locally - 3N37 is just awesome in the 9mm. You can push bullets in a 9mm to an amazing velocity - safely - if you want to. It's my go-to powder for heavy 9mm loads. And 38 Super. And 9x23. I just love the stuff.

 

[BullfrogKen]

By the way . . . so I see you can buy your press before you have your reloader's license in Spain.

So . . . what's the controlled item/items? What components do you need your license to be able to buy? The bullet components? The powder? The primers?

 

[1SOW]

Nordeste,
If you have Vihtavuori powder available, it is often used in IPSC minor loads (125-130PF), and is as a very clean burning soft shooting load with 9mm. About 4.0 grains of n320 under a 124 bullet is a great load.

Just for reference, the Brian Enos forum has a wealth of IPSC and other competition loading and shooting information. http://www.brianenos.com/forums/index.php

What pistol do you shoot in competition?

Are you from the North in Spain?

 

[Jim Watson]

I have long thought that heavy bullets had less FELT recoil for a given power factor.
But circumstances led me to buy 125 grain bullets recently instead of my usual 145 or 147.
And I found that they were not uncomfortable at all, milder than the usual cheap 115 grain bullets or economy factory loads.
Is that because you can still make Minor at subsonic velocity with the 125 but not the 115?
Perhaps. Muzzle blast and supersonic Crack! are part of the firing sensation.

Trivia: 9mm ammunition tested by the US Army in 1903 had a 123 gr bullet at 1040 and 1090 fps, depending on the powder charge provided.

 

[ArchAngelCD]

If you can push that 124gr bullet 1050 fps you will generate a PF of 130. That round shouldn't be that hard to control since much of the 9mm+P SD ammo is well over 1200 fps.

With a 147gr bullet you only needs to push it to ~875 fps to make 128 PF.

If you use a slower powder you can achieve higher velocities with less pressure than with faster powders. With the slower powders I feel the recoil impulse doesn't feel as sharp and instead of a snap you get a push. Using a slower powder is another way to control the felt recoil.

I know nothing about powders made by Nobel Sport and hardly anything about VihtaVuori powders but there are many on this forum who do use VihtaVuori powders. I would give them a try if they were available where I live but they are not.

Please don't forget the range report.

 

[Spade5]

Went to Spain once

I was in Bayonne France and a local who was a Spanaird suggested we drive over to San Sebastian Spain for some local quizine and some fine wine.

I said sure, let's go. Well it turns out that was Basque country and it seems there was some sort of disagreement with the local authority. We drove through the center of town and and there was a line of protesters on the left and a line of riot police on the right and we were in the middle.

The food and vino turned out to be great and the people friendly after we got out of downtown that is. Never did figure out what the fuss was all about.

 

[mdi]

I guess I'm wrong about recoil vs. bullet weight. I always thought heavier bullets equaled more recoil. Physics. Every action, equal reaction?? I guess my guns are different; a load with a 200 gr. bullet and 9 grains of Unique recoils much less than a 265 gr. bullet with the same load in my .44 Magnums....

 

[Nordeste]

Bullfrog, you have a sense of humour. Nice to see that . Thanks for your compliments, but even though I have a decent command of English, sometimes I re-read my own posts and detect mistakes, particularly with prepositions. In fact, I met very, very few people who spoke a second (or third) language flawlessly, unless one of their parents was a native speaker. Then you can consider yourself a true bilingual person. And yes, we had our influence and that left some evidence. Now we got good at sports and bad at economy and politics. I wouldn't mind to have that the other way around.

Answering your questions, VihtaVuori is not available in Spain. That stuff is quite highly praised over here too, and handgun shooters in a local firearms forum I frequent are quite frustrated at the fact that nobody is importing it. Vectan (French) and Optima (local) are the available choices. Vectan has a very good reputation. Optima A (the one used for handguns) is a faster propellant but still a good product. The local Santa Bárbara company (now owned by General Dynamics) produced and sold a very good handgun powder they called Fil-141, but no longer. According to some of my range buddies, it was a very good powder. No longer sold. We used to have Santa Bárbara ammo in my law enforcement agency (the military used them too), but now we use Fiocchi.

The components that are under control are cases, bullets, primers and powders. Presses or dies are not. You can buy them freely but no gun shop owner will sell you any controlled item unless you have a reloading permit. Explanation for this is that, in order to obtain a permit, you need to purchase a press that has been tested and authorized by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce. Some presses aren't, but it is still legal to import and sell them. To me, it's all a great nonsense.

1SOW, affirmative. I come from and live in Asturias, which is one of the regions located in the very north of the country. Nice place to live in. It just looks like sometimes, we get our weather directly from the British isles. Guess you know what I mean . The pistol I shoot is my STAR 30M. Very pleasant pistol to shoot. Very nice trigger, built like a tank and tames the 9 mm very nicely. Problem is, since STAR went belly up, the availability of spares. I plan on keeping and shooting her until she wears out. So far she's keeping up with the CZ Shadow crowd, which is the most popular choice of IPSC shooters over here. You get to see some Tanfos, Sig-Sauer and Glocks but the CZ is the most popular (talking Production division, obviously).

Spade, the Basque region has been quite politically convulse in the past with local nationalisms and terrorist separatists. The terrorist ETA organization has declared a permanent cease-fire (our law enforcement agencies had them actually against the ropes) and it looks like things have settled down lately. What you witnessed was, quite likely, one of their usual demonstrations. You were lucky enough to get through without being in the middle of some intense "action", and I'm happy to read that you enjoyed the good part of it.

Back to topic, talked to my LGS owner and it looks like I'll have to choose between RG Pugnator 124 or 115 grains bullets, either copper plated or lead. He'll be able to order 147 grain bullets for me in the future, though. You have convinced me that is the way to go. A couple of my range buddies have chronies so I'll get my reloads through them and I won't forget to post a range report over here.

You guys have been quite helpful. Thank you very much .

 

[noylj]

At the same velocity, heavier bullets equals more recoil.
In general, heavy bullets have more recoil; however, you have been hearing about perceived or felt recoil. This issue comes up for action pistol shooting where the shooter does not want to loose track of the front sight (speed is everything in action pistol). Thus, they shoot for low power factor, light loads. A heavy bullet and fast powder will produce a recoil impulse that "feels" lighter as the lighter bullet, traveling faster to make the same power factor, feels snappier while the slower heavy bullet is more of a push into the hand.
Unless you are into action pistol shooting or a very recoil sensitive (which the 9x19 is not a heavy recoiling round), sticking with 121-125gn bullets (right around 8 grams) will be all you will ever need. JHP is more accurate than FMJ-RN. Lead SWCs are very accurate -- if you can shoot lead.

 

[Walkalong]

About 4.0 grains of n320 under a 124 bullet is a great load.

If you can push that 124gr bullet 1050 fps you will generate a PF of 130.

Agreed. I came up with 3.9 Grs N320 in my 9MM with my 124 Gr bullet at my seating depth to get 1050+ FPS and it is very soft shooting. I always ran the 115 Gr bullets before because they were always cheaper, but after trying the 124/5 Gr bullets in 9MM I am a fan of them. I have not tried the 147s in 9MM, at least not yet. I agree with Ken on 3N37, it is superb in .38 Super.

sometimes I re-read my own posts and detect mistakes

Heck, so do I. Too bad more people don't do the same.