Sport pistol with 45 acp

[Dwb1957]

Looks great that's some good groups I'm really liking this powder it has worked out excellent for me in the 9mm and 45acp.

 

[vaalpens]

Looking Good!

Thanks for the range report.

But since 5.4 gr load produced second smallest SD number, do you plan to repeat the range test to verify accuracy of these loads?

I will retest SportPistol once I have completed the workup for the other powders. This retest will be mostly due to the bad chrono numbers for all the loads. Even with the good groupings I'm not sure if the loads will consistently give good groupings. Today was one of those days where the sun was out, then behind the clouds again, and it was going on the whole afternoon. I'm not sure if that had an affect on the velocities, but I did not see one good ES/SD number with all my testing.

I am at the point now where I will pick a load and start loading some smaller batches for practicing and evaluation. This is normally when I will just take out 5 of the rounds and retest them for accuracy.

Thanks for the comments.

 

[vaalpens]

Looks great that's some good groups I'm really liking this powder it has worked out excellent for me in the 9mm and 45acp.

Thanks! I have some pulled Speer 124gr GDHP bullets which are listed in the Alliant 9mm load data for SportPistol. For my next round of testing I will probably create a few test test loads using SportPistol and pulled Speer 124gr GDHP bullets. I just need to decide if I want to stick with 9mm, or venture into the 9mm +p range.

 

[Doublehelix]

@vaalpens : You are loading those pretty light, and still getting some pretty awesome accuracy. Nice!

 

[eo1bart]

Thanks bds. My initial load using HP-38 was 5.2, and it looked low based on the chrono numbers and erratic ejection pattern. I was leaning towards doing a 5.4gr in SportPistol, but maybe I'll just load up my normal quota of 6 loads and do a proper evaluation.

Have you calculated a VMD value for SportPistol yet?

I emailed Alliant a while back and asked for the VMD for Sport Pistol. Here's the response;


Bob,
The VMD for the new Alliant Sport Pistol is; 0.096

Duane V.
Technical Services Rep
Alliant/Blazer/CCI/Speer

 

[vaalpens]

I emailed Alliant a while back and asked for the VMD for Sport Pistol. Here's the response;


Bob,
The VMD for the new Alliant Sport Pistol is; 0.096

Duane V.
Technical Services Rep
Alliant/Blazer/CCI/Speer

Thanks for sharing the information. So it is a bit denser than calculated by us, but still very close.

 

[LiveLife]

The VMD for the new Alliant Sport Pistol is; 0.096

Thanks.

So I guess I wasn't too far off when I initially posted VMD as 0.100.

.49 cc disk hole ... drops 4.9 gr of Sport Pistol.

So, using Lee's formula of Charge in grains x VMD Factor = Volume CC

4.9 gr x VMD = 0.49 cc

so

VMD for Sport Pistol = 0.49 / 4.9 = 0.100

 

[vaalpens]

@vaalpens : You are loading those pretty light, and still getting some pretty awesome accuracy. Nice!

Based on the Alliant load data it seems that it is still on the light side, but I actually saw very good ejection patterns. I will have to retest SportPistol at some time to confirm the accuracy and see if I see the same chrono numbers again.

 

[LiveLife]

And I got the following drops:

.49 = 4.9 gr
.53 = 5.2 gr
.57 = 5.5 gr

I just realized something.

The "fluff" factor.

Alliant is measuring "absolute" density of powder with no air space between granules.

But when we meter powder, we "fluff" granules as they are dropped from the hopper and air space forms between granules. That would count for less dense VMD numbers as we metered higher charges. (With VMD of .096, .57 cc hole should drop more than 5.7 gr.)

So I would need to really pack that hole before I measure the weight from now on for VMD calculations.

 

[Walkalong]

Y'all worry way to much about VMD.

It's dense, or it is fluffy, or somewhere in between. It can fit in the case or not fit. IT has room for a double charge or not. That's about as technical as I get with it.

 

[vaalpens]

I just use VMD as a guide. If it is .100 or .096, I am still going to pull out my .5cc Lee dipper when loading SportPistol on 45acp.

 

[LiveLife]

Y'all worry way to much about VMD.

It's dense, or it is fluffy, or somewhere in between. It can fit in the case or not fit. IT has room for a double charge or not. That's about as technical as I get with it.

I agree. I never use VMD as Auto Disk guide is not accurate anyways and it always seem to drop lighter than what they are supposed to.

I just drop until charge weights normalize and go by scale readings.

With fluffy powders and larger slower burning powder charges near the top, I do calculate full case fill so I don't compress powder charge.

i know, i know, some flake powders like Unique/Red Dot/Promo can take slight compression and still produce consistent results.

 

[vaalpens]

This is just a follow-up to the previous post where I compared the Alliant online load data vs the load data from the pdf for 45acp. Just to close the loop on 45acp, I have also verified the data for the 45acp +p load data.

The following capture is from the online load data. The 3 highlighted loads have minor differences with the pdf version:
185 gr Lead SWC vs 185 Cast LSWC
200 gr Lead SWC vs 200 Cast LSWC
200 gr LRN vs 200 Cast LRNFP


The following capture from the pdf highlights 3 missing loads, and then the 3 differences in weight/type also listed above.

 

[alfsauve]

A few months late to Sport Pistol. I tested 5.2gr under an Xtreme CPRN 200gr bullet and got very similar results in my '70 1911. I like it. Hope they don't suddenly discontinue it.