Lee TL356-124TC OAL

[tyeo098]

Casted out a bunch of Lee 124gr 9mm Truncated Cones, which look really cool!
However, the OAL has me confused. The closest I can see with shape/weight is the RCBS 120gr TC mold.
My TC's are sized to .3575-.358
The RCBS OAL says to use 1.05"

Generally I try to stay away from this number, and treat it as the *min* OAL. However, my CZ75B would have none of it. Failed every plunk test until I got to 1.05" exactly.
From eyeballing it, it looks like the bottom of the bullet is 1/16th" away from the top of my 3.5gr Bullseye powder.

Does anyone have experience with this mold and their OAL?

 

[NWcityguy2]

I use that mold and yes you will need to use a rather short OAL compared to LRN bullets. My OAL is 1.08" which works fine for both of my 9mm pistols. If you have to use 1.05" for them to chamber that is what you have to use. Work up the load to what you want and watch for pressure signs. Compressing a flake powder in 9mm doesn't mean anything good or bad in and of itself.

 

[jdgreen]

I load that 124TC at 1.045" OAL. That's where my plunk test took me. I get the best accuracy with 4.2 gr Unique, but also had some success with Universal, W231 and Bullseye. I did quite a bit of tinkering with different combinations before I settled on the above load. For me, a lot of the fun was in the experimentation.

 

[steve4102]

OAL is always bullet and firearm specific. Make a few dummy rounds and start out long, keep seating deeper until they chamber and cycle perfectly, that is YOUR OAL.

 

[GooseGestapo]

I've used this bullet extensively. Cast from aircooled w/w with 2% 95/5 leadfree solder added (tin/antimony), and sized to .357", they shoot ~1.5" at 50yds from my S&W PPC-9pistols.

I've seated them to ~1.15" - to the edge of the lube groove with the case taper crimped to the foward edge, to as short as ~1.040" which is near the edge of where the ogive begins. As long as they feed and don't get forced into the case, accuracy dosen't much change. Not as my pistols are concerned. My Springfield XD-compact feeds them at any reasonable length.


I've used Bullseye, as well as many others,(AA#2,AA#5, HP38/231,WSF,PowerPistol,BlueDot, Universal,Unique,HS6,vvN320,Trap100,4756,PB,HS7,GreenDot, RedDot,Herco,TiteGroup,WAP) and some others I can't think of just now but have found that nothing will beat Hodgdon "LongShot". I use 5.2gr for around 1,200fps (a little more from the 6", and a little less from the 4" 5906PC). I also use SPG lube.