Loaded up 25 test 9mm rounds last night and got this problem at the range...

[bhhacker]

Should I be worried about my 4.7gr of unique charge and this much shorter OAL? I sometimes will dip into my small pistol magnum primers and its usually not a big deal because im not using anywhere close to the max load.

I would prefer to keep all my fingers if i had a say in it

 

[rondog]

No, you're only talking about what, .005 shorter? Be more worried about how good your crimps are. Bullet setback from the bullet nose ramming into the feed ramp and getting shoved back in the case is far more important than 5 thousandths of an inch shorter OAL.

Yes, the cases headspace on the case mouth so it can't be crimped too much, but the case mouth does need to grip the bullet good on autoloaders to prevent/minimize setback. Setback WILL increase your pressures to hazardous levels. And you're not likely to even know the bullet moved.

 

[zaphar]

http://38super.net/Pages/Overall Length.html#Anchor-35882

Here are some nice pictures to show what's going on.

 

[nevadabob]

zaphar...Thanks for sharing that website!

 

[tightgroup tiger]

bhhacker, My SR9 did that to me twice. I tracked it down to have cases with bulges on the head that weren't fully resized. They came from guns with unsupported chambers.

RC suggestion should show you this but you have to find another one of the cases first to prove it.

It easily could be bullets seated crooked and you should be using two different dies to seat and crimp with lead. I really helps a lot.

SR-9s are usually generous with the bullet leade in the barrel. I'd really be surprised if that were the problem. I been shooting SR-9s for 5 years and like I said, this has happened to me twice now.
I took a piece of wooden dowel rod and latterly pounded the load out of the barrel from the muzzle end. You have to have your hands wrapped around the slide so when it comes free you can hold it open or it will still the round again.

I think you have been Glocked as they say. Make sure your resizing die is completely down against the shell holder, I used a feeler gauge and kept about .005"clearance on my Single Stage and left it touch on my progressive.

After I set my resizing die down on the shell plate of my auto progressive press I have had this happen again now for 3 years. For me that was pretty definitive proof of what was causing it.

They sure jam tight, don't they?

 

[beatledog7]

If you ever load 9mm for a CZ, you'll find CZs chambers are tight and short. Apparently your chamber is as well.

When you seat a test round, do yourself a favor; completely ignore the manual's OAL listing There is an OAL range for every bullet in every chamber that is defined by the fatness of the bullet's ogive and the tightness and shortness of that chamber; no way the testers who publish the load data can try every possible bullet/chamber combination.

Assuming the brass is properly sized, seat the bullet, flatten the flare (if you flared, which you most likely had to for lead bullets) and keep nudging the bullet in deeper until it passes the plunk test. Now, will the round also go into your magazine without hanging up? If so, and if the bullets are consistent, that's your OAL for that bullet in that barrel/chamber. (Ogive can vary from batch to batch and even bullet to bullet in the same batch.You might find that a whole bunch seated to this depth pass the plunk test, and then one just doesn't--that's normal with bullets made to a more generous tolerance.)

Fat stubby bullets (e.g., many LRNs and JHPs) have to be seated more deeply to pass the plunk test in some chambers--that's just the way it is. So, you will want to carefully examine your powder charge as well, starting a bit lower for bullets that are more deeply seated. But also bear in mind that sometimes a fat bullet is also somewhat shorter base to tip, so seating it deeper doesn't necessarily result in smaller than usual case volume.

It's a lot to deal with, is it not? But deal with it you must.

 

[243winxb]

Using an auto pistol barrel find a MAX O.A.L with your bullet

Here is a great thread by Walkalong, many photos. http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=506678

 

[mstreddy]

OP,
Since I know a little about the brass that you are using
I'll suggest checking your sizing as well. Since I am using that same mixed bag of range brass I can tell you that I had to bring my 9mm sizer down to where it was reliably sizing the brass so it would pass MY plunk test.
I found that some brands of brass were harder to resize than others, R-P, for example took some fiddling to get the die down enough to fully resize it. And there is a good bunch of R-P in your stash -- right?
I use my Lone Wolf barrel with a very tight chamber and I find that in a batch of 500 I run into a few that stick out as yours do. I mark those and separate them for shooting in my other 9mm pistols with no issues.
Even though I don't normally do it for 9mm, you may want to sort that "'small" batch of brass you have by headstamp and size them to see how they work in your gun.

EM

 

[bjdiaz1]

Had the same problem on one of my Glocks using reloaded 125gr LRN snscasting.com bullets and HS-6 powder. Heck of a scare when you can't eject the round or even take the barrel out of the slide either because of the stuck round. The only way was taking out the back plate, which released the pressure on the firing pin and immediately there was enough tolrance to take the barrel out. I had to pry the round out with a key and discarded it. It was one of my very first reloads I was trying to get rif of since I have developed better technique and QC, which includes using a SAAMI caliper barrel. This one obviously was not checked properly and all your explanations make sense. It won't happen agian. Using the barrel itself to test the round is the simplest and surest way to make sure you stay within SAAMI tolerances. I aim now for 'averages'... 3/4" brass OAL and 1.132" round OAL. Biggest lesson... brass selection & prep.

 

[JWH321]

Dumb question.

Any chance you are reloading 9mmX21 instead of 9mmX19?

 

[9thchild]

I am having the same trouble with some 100 grain lead flat nose reloading both .380 and 9mm. I started my own thread but this one has been a lot more informative. I am nervous to keep lowering the OAL, even though I've undercharged to be safe.

 

[thelaststand]

I shoot the exact same lead cast bullet in my sr9 and my loads are similar to your original OAL and I have never had this problem.

Are you using the correct diameter bullet?
Are your cases the correct length?

 

[bhhacker]

Update guys. I wasnt crimping them enough. Plunk tests seem to be doing it. Loaded up 60 rounds and had one issue, but it wasnt as bad as the other 2.

 

[1KPerDay]

What COAL did you end up with?

 

[revolvergeek]

I have had the same problem in a couple guns with the Lee 356-125-2R. I have to seat it deeper than I would like because the ogive is too fat and sticks in the chamber throat.

 

[Matt Dillon]

I always run all my pistol rounds through case gauges as my final AC check. The case gauge acts like a barrel's chamber, and if the round enters easily and drops in place correctly, chances are you will have no problems chambering the round in your real weapon. They help you measure several dimensions and I have caught rounds that won't slip into the case gauge, due to brass stretching, that we're correctly resized and processed, but had problems that I would never have been aware of had I not caught the problem in the case gauge.

 

[Mad Chemist]

>1.2" for COAL is way too long for 9x19. SAMI max is around 1.69 IIRC.

Also you do NOT use the greater taper crimp to avoid set back in 9x19. You get proper case tension by not belling/expanding to deeply. You bell the brass just enough to seat the bullet and no more. Then you add enough taper crimp to remove the bell.

 

[Mad Chemist]

Whoops! I read that wrong. Initial COAL was 1.125. Still needs to be shorter with that fat ogive.