Lead or brass

I want to reload my own 380 bullets. I have a chance to buy a good .355 95gr mold. The question is does it matter, when it comes down to it. I have one person saying that I should stay away from lead and another saying it doesn't matter. I have a ton of soft lead.

 

I have shot lead and jacketed in my 380 ACPs with no problems. I prefer to use a lead alloy harder than dead soft but generally velocities of the 380 are low enough that dead soft should not be a problem.

When I was casting bullets, I cast a Lee 105 SWC sized to .356" that worked great in my Beretta M84.

 

I shoot my cast lead bullets in my 380's all the time - works fine. I would use something harder than dead soft lead.

 

I shoot lead in all my handgun calibers from .32 ACP to .45 ACP. If loaded correctly you should have no problems and yes .380 is one of the calibers I reload for.

I cast and reload for the following
.32 ACP
.380
.38 Spec.
357 Mag
9 MM Lugar
9 MM Largo
9 MM Makrov
.40 S&W
.45 ACP

These are only the handgun calibers, I also cast and load for many rifle calibers.

 

You need to slug you barrel to confirm the size you need. Bore + 0.001" is recommended. I have shot lead in my 380 without any problems. Sizing is probably the most important thing when it comes to shooting lead.

 

FYI, Be aware that some pistols like the Khar P380 has polygonal rifling and the manufacturer states not to use cast lead ammunition, only jacketed and plated are supposed to be used. Some here will tell you they shoot cast lead bullets through their Glock or other polygonal rifled pistols without problems, but I will comply with the manufacturer on this issue. Do what you think best, but just letting you know. LM

 

Many manufactures also state in the manual that comes with a new handgun not to shoot reloads.

Now what does one do?

Should one cut the tag off the matteress?

 

Yep! I just picked up a new PT845 this morning and that's what the book says. SOOO I'll run a couple of hundred factories through it (I need the brass anyway) then I reckon I'll void the warranty.

 

When firearms manufacturers say "don't shoot reloads", that's their liability release in case you decide that Clark's loads are kinda wimpy, and upping all published max loads by 50% is reasonable... I mean really, what firearm manufacturer can say "Oh, any reloads are just fine!"

But when a manufacturer says "don't shoot lead through our polygonal-rifled barrels", then I tend to listen more closely.

 

that is EXACTLY the reason RidgewayCO.

 

Where does the Kahr say not to use lead ammo? http://www.kahr.com/PDF/kahrmanual.pdf (I think Glock says that.) They do say not to use reloads or cheap ammo

 

What's the question?
Matter in what way? Damage to the gun? Accuracy? Warranty?

/Bryan

 

So they say don't use/do this and one shouldn't

Then they say don't use/do that and its OK

Quite a conundrum.

What to do, what to do!

 

I've never cast 95g .380 but I cast a bunch of 102g .380 for my Bersa 95. That was with a lee mold I found at a gunshow when actually looking for a mold for my .380 .

I never had a lick of trouble with it. Pistol fed fine, shot well, I lubed them with Lee Liquid Alox.

Make sure you get a bit of flare to the case mouth to enable seating w/o shaving. The crip die will iron that flare back out.

Clutch

 

zxcvbob, not all Khar firearms have polygonal rifling, mostly just the PM series along with the P380. Thats one of the differences between the PM9 and the new CM9. Least thats what I have been told. LM

 

That's why I went and looked up a P380 manual -- that's what the link was in my last post -- and I didn't see where it said anything about using lead bullets.

I have a CZ with polygonal rifling. I watched it pretty carefully when I first started using lead bullets to make sure there wasn't a problem with the load I was using. I think that's all you really have to do. (and it doesn't lead at all; maybe I got lucky)

 

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2008/05/01/kahr-p380-new-micro-compact-380-carry-pistol/
Here's the spec's on the Khar P380. LM

 

i shoot a lot of wheel weight lead through my 380's using the lee 6 cavity 105g 38 special swc mold. i size them down to .356 and load them. as long as you get the oal correct (you may have to experiment a little), they function fine. i do not have any leading issues. i have shot 400 rounds in one session with each of my guns using them. no cleaning what so ever in there. there is no reason not to use cast bullets in a 380. my soft lead is quite limited, so most of what i shoot is w.w. lead. so i do not know how the soft stuff will work.

 

the .380acp is one of the rounds I load for but I cast slugs only for my black powder guns, and usually buy MasterCast for the centerfire handloads. I've got as good groups if not tighter than jacketed with cast in .380 - mine is a BDA.
the loads are R Dot about midway on the data for powder charge. recoil is easy and I've used this load to 'coach' several women that had never shot a pistol after 'starting' them with a .22lr revolver and Ruger MkII. just one said the 'blast is too much' and she got a .32acp Beretta that she does ok with.
a couple of these gals moved on up to 9mm Para pistols.
IMO the .380acp is an underated s-d and h-d round. as is the .32acp and S&W long .32