Heavy 9mm with W231?

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I contacted Hodgdon about using 231 with 147gr FMJ, and was told it was unsuitable for 147 gr bullets, suggesting I use WSF.

I responded that I would take their suggestion, but have been using 231 very successfully with both Berry's and Rainier plated 147 gr bullets.

Rainier 147gr TRN:
3.7gr 231.
1.115 OAL
PF: 129

Berry's 147gr RN:
3.6gr 231.
1.115 OAL
PF: 126.75
 
I was also looking at those nice 150 gr SWCs that Bayou has. Would adding 3 grains make much of a diffference in load....perhaps just stick to 3.4 as a max charge or should it matter much at all?
 
Three grains doesn't matter much but I would look at seating depth.
If the SWC seats deeper in the case, it will call for a lighter load.
I once loaded some 158 gr .38 SWCs in 9mm. Seat them at the maximum OAL the magazine would take and they shot fine. Seat deeper and pressure went up.
Your chamber throat will govern.
 
Lol my chamber throat is as long as the grand canyon :D Magazine will dictate max OAL for me on this gun at least which I think holds about up to 1.165ish

So basically what your saying is I don't have to seat to where the edge of the SWC is close to the case edge? Can I actually seat with the lube groove (which obviously isn't lubed on the coated) sticking out of the case or does that have to at least be in there?
 
It has been a long time, but I recall seating .38 SWCs in 9mm either to the rear edge of the crimp groove or the front edge of the lube groove.
 
I have been using 3.4g of 231 with the 147's .365 diameter from X-treme and I LOVE them. Recoil is significantly less than standard 115's. I personally find that a heavy bullet going slower is less snap (perceived recoil to me) than a light bullet going faster.

Just figured I would toss that out there.

YMMV
 
On last thing I'm curious about. I've got a RCBS taper crimp seating die that came with a rn and fn plug. Should the regular FN plug work fine on the 150 SWCs or the rounded 148 FN from Bayou?
 
I have had bad luck with fast powders and 147 gr cast bullets in 9mm. I was getting keyholes until I started using Blue Dot. Excellent accuracy and functioning with the BD load.
 
Got my Bayous in today. Made some dummy rounds to test for chambering and such, and thank goodness the 150gr SWCs feed wonderfully. Plunk test found that the OAL that gets me off the lands is 1.123. After doing some mathesis I determined the SWCs are giving me about .23-.24 of depth in terms of case capacity.

Doing a 3.4 gr drop of W231 gave me approximately .01 space between the charge and the bullet. That 3.4gr charge is actually what I was going to use for the 147 FN. I was contemplating a 3.2gr charge (should buy me another hundredth or two of clearance) for the 150s, this is below the recommended charge for 147s but with such little case capacity and the super high viscosity of the Bayou coating I think this will still work.

I know I'm probably in fairly uncharted territory, but anyone familiar with the physics of this think that I will have pressure problems? I doubt I will have problems with the 147s as they have a good .03 more clearance set at the same OAL (seem like that 1.123 works great for both bullets, gets me about a hundredth or so off the lands).
 
I load 3.5gr of Win231 or HP38 with 147gr RFN cast bullets for 870 fps out of S&W 59. I also load 3.8gr of same powder for 135gr RFN cast bullet for 920 fps from same pistol. Both have light recoil and is accurate.
 
Well I got to thinking about it and decided to do some measurements on my dummies to try and determine if I'm swagging my bullets when seating. Unfortunately I don't have a collet or kinetic puller so I decided to put a primer only in one of my dummies and create a squib (figured its a good idea to know how one sounds/looks in my gun anyway for future reference). It was one of the SWCs so its got ALOT of bearing surface on my rifling and almost cleared my throat completely. Now the damn thing is stuck, got a rod just undersized for the bore put some from lube in there and it aint budging. I thought squibs were supposed to be easy to get out, as in a few light taps. Anyone know why this thing is being so stingy? My barrel slugs out at .355 and the bayous i got are .356.

At least its lead so if worse comes to worse maybe I can melt it out? Any advice?

Edit: Wow no sooner did I get done typing this up than I took one more good whack at it and it popped out. Guess it just needed time for the lube to get in there.
 
Glad to hear you got the stuck bullet out. Now - don't do that again!
But, now you know you have to buy the puller. Or practice your stuck bullet removal.

In any event, you were asking about the load at the
OAL that gets me off the lands is 1.123
Click to expand...
See if you can get quickload or maybe someone around here can run the numbers for you.
But, from the data above, they are using OALs of 1.115 to 1.135, and some members posted their OALs. Mine -- has been 1.115 @ 3.5grs.

Good luck, and keep us posted.
 
I used to load MBC 147s with Win 231 using Lee data. They were accurate and pleasant to shoot. After reading posts like the above from rcmodel and ArchAngelCD I switched to HS-6 and liked it better. Now I'm just starting to use Longshot because I can't find HS-6.
 
Rush, I was referring to the 147grs with the data/OALs I've posted. I haven't tried any 150s. As someone else mentioned, there should not be much difference in the 3 grs from 147s to 150s.
It seems as if you will use the 147 data for the 150s, so I was listing my COAL since you asked about what OAL to use.

Eddy
 
Okay that answers my question about case capacity then. It looks like you have about .3" of the 147s sticking into the case? So you're only sitting a few hundredths or so off the top of your powder with no problems ehh? Sorry I'm just trying to grasp how the physics of available case volume to powder volume to powder speed works. Anyone know a site where I can get calcs for this type of stuff, I'm a bit of a hobby physicist/mathalete so I could probably understand it pretty well.
 
Finally got a chance to go out and test the new loads.

I started off by firing some factory and some of my Berry's 124gr loads as a bit of a control.

First off tried 5 147gr FN over 3.4gr 231. Holy crap was this a sweet load. Wish I had rolled up more of them. The lightest kick I've felt yet on my 9mm (with alot less muzzle flip compared to straight back recoil). Also no pressure signs, nice clean burn and cycled my action perfectly. To top it all off this round is showing me just how accurately I can shoot with a handgun. I honestly thought I was a much worse shot but managed to place all 5 of those 147s in about 2.5" at 7yds offhand slow aim. That is vastly better than even my Berry's were shooting.

Next I moved to the 150gr SWCs over 3.2gr 231, loaded 10 of those. Quite a different story with these rounds. First off they had slightly more kick I think than my Berry's 124gr, although not as much as factory rounds (I swear I'm about done with factory rounds, I'd rather go buy once fired from the local range now instead of making my own once fired). Accuracy was a bit worse then the 147s but still much better than any of the other stuff. Every brass I picked up from this batch also had a white flake or two on it. I wonder if this is the bayou coating turning to ash and sticking to the cases, never seen anything like it with any other rounds. Also they burned pretty darn dirty....about as dirty as factory. To top it off I think I'm seeing my first signs of pressure, the primers are filled flatter into the primer pocket. The actually firing pin dents didn't get popped out any though and they certainly aren't loose in the pockets.

I'm guess I would be correct in assuming I probably need to back off .1 if not .2 gr for the 150s? Does it sound like I just have a hot round, not necessarily dangerous just hot n snappy?

Forgot to mention one thing, I REALLY liked the 150s for the holes they punched. They were pretty. The 147s weren't bad either but didn't leave a flawless hole like the SWCs. I really hope I can work up a good load for those 150s though as those SWCs will make it alot easier on judges in IDPA and 3 Gun.

All and all though I'm happy. 2nd and 3rd loads worked up without blowing up my gun :D Also no keyholes which for some reason I was worried about with the 150s (from the 2 dummies I pulled I think I swaged them slightly from .356 to .355 and actually that squib showed me my barrel is .3535 at the start of the rifling so I dont think I'm undersizing them). Also as far as I can tell I have no leading, granted I don't quite know what to look for but my barrel just looks like its dirty with burnt/half burnt powder.
 
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Rush,
What was your OAL on those 150s? You may reduce pressure a bit by seating them a bit longer, and maybe experiment with dropping .1 or .2 grains. Do you have access to a chronograph? It might help in the load dev phase.
On the SWCs cutting neater holes in the paper, that is what they are designed for. The sharp edge/shoulder on them will cut clean through paper.
Eddy
 
They are at 1.105ish. Thats max I can seat without hitting my rifling. And yes I know thats what swcs are made for, just nifty to see first hand. Im trying some 3.0gr next time I can get to the range.
 
Well just got back from my second IDPA match. Used the 147s over 3.4gr for the match and they performed wonderfully. No malfunctions, rounds felt consistent (best I can recollect through the adrenaline rush at least), accuracy was good at least with the bullets not so much me. Barrel cleaned up in 5 patches with no discernible leading. Was nice having less recoil as I was getting back on target quicker.

Also got a chance to try out 10 of those 150s after the end of the match that I rolled up last night. Put them over 3.0gr with that 1.105 OAL. These were a treat to shoot. Recoil was so freaking light I almost thought I was shooting a .22. They all barely cycled my action and had just enough to lock my slide back. Spit brass a foot and a half to the side of me too whizzing fairly close to my face, should be nice for keeping my brass together at an indoor range. Unfortunately I couldn't really test accuracy because they had just picked up the target stands, but as far as I could tell I was seeing dirt fly right on my POA so they should be good. Still had fairly flat primers (seemed a bit less than before but not much) but I doubt I can go any lower without having cycling issues. Seriously though talk about bunny fart loads. If you have a heavier action I would probably try 3.1gr (not sure exactly how light my action is on my CZ clone). All in all it is definitely workable to use 231 on these although I will probably switch to RS Silhouette once I find some of that, hopefully that will alleviate the slight pressure signs I'm getting.
 
Had an interesting day at the range today with my two loads (as well as getting to blow up a car with tannerite as well as getting to shoot a bolt action 50 :D).

150gr all performed consistent and accuracy seemed good (wasn't on paper today, just steel) although I was pulling rounds to the left all day for some stupid reason, I think it had something to do with shooting at the line instead of in a match and not getting my stance correct for most of the day, doubt it was the load. Shot almost 200 of em and only had one fail to feed where the round ended up almost vertical. I think maybe the round before didn't quite cycle enough to catch the case head and dragged it out a bit by the extractor groove. Had another fail to feed on the first round of a mag that I think might have been because I was hand cycling it and not hitting my slide release. Probably doesn't help that I have a coke bottle going on halfway down the case probably throwing it of spec (I don't have a case gauge I just use the plunk test) but its still got an almost 99% reliability in my barrel. Anyone think a Lee FCD will fix this without swaging the base of my bullet?

147s came out pretty crappy today. Fired off a little over 50 and had one stovepipe and 3 that were wet farts, kept checking for squibs after these but they all left the barrel. Honestly though when I loaded these up the other night I noticed my .34cc cavity on the autodisk was all over the place compared to what I've seen on the rest. Had a few times I did a check that came out 3.2gr. Pretty sure what happened was one of my cats that is obsessed with being in w/e room I'm in probably threw a bunch of static on my hopper and made my throws sticky in the disk. Either that or the crazy 9" overnight thunderstorm we had when I was loading it. Going to have to whoop out a dryer sheet to try and remedy. Anybody ever notice static problems reloading inside the house during a thunderstorm?
 
231 is my powder of choice and my lead 147gr bullets arrived yesterday so this is a timely thread for me.
I'm going to start out with 3.3gr and go from there. OAL to me is usually determined by your barrel. If it fits in the mag and fits in the barrel, its where you start from. Too many times I have gone by the OAL listed in the book and it won't go all the way into the chamber because it engages the rifleing.
Right now I shoot a 122truncated with 3.7gr of 231. When I bump it up to 4.0gr the group starts to spread out with a few fliers. I also use a powder disc powder drop, but my problem is the disc does not always go back and reset. I found you have to clean and lube the tube every thousand rounds or so. My scale showes the drops to be right on when I do this maintenance. Keep writing and experimenting with these. Very interesting.
 
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