The AoG PIF V-Crown 125gr 9mm journey

[vaalpens]

This week I received 25 beautiful Sierra V-Crown 125gr 9mm bullets from AoG. Thanks again AoG!

This is the same bullets that are loaded in the Sig brand of bullets. Since I load 357sig, I immediately decided that these bullets have to be loaded for 357sig, obviously if they will work.

I contacted Sierra and they graciously sent me some load data for both 9mm and 357sig for the Sierra 125gr JHP, even though these bullets are not exactly the same. They did indicate that I could use the same load data as the Sierra #8125 .355" 125 grain JHP bullet. Obviousluy I thanked them for the information and asked if they were planning on including BE-86 and CFE Pistol in their load data, and that I was planning on using BE-86 since I have some baseline data. They could not say if and when they will do it, but the ballistic technician took the time to look up the BE-86 data and suggested a range to me.

The first thing I had to decide on was a COL to load. Based on my experience with previous bullets, the length of the bullet and my ogive test, I decided on a COL of 1.125" instead of the standard 1.135".

Next I had to make sure the bullet will work in 357sig. This was done through my normal ogive, plunk, setback and bathroom scale tests. The bullet passed all the tests and confirmed I will be able to use it.

Following is an image of the dummy bullet I created which was used in the above tests.

I then had to decide on a target velocity I want to shoot for. There is not much velocity data for these bullets, but I did find a test on YouTube where a Glock with a 4" barrel was used. I tallied all the shots and saw an average of 1282fps. This velocity is just a bit higher than the average I get for my JHP's using BE-86 of 1258fps.

Based on the above information and my previous tests I have done, I decided to go with a BE-86 starting load of 7.6gr with increments of .1gr giving me 4 loads of 7.6gr, 7.7gr, 7.8gr and 7.9gr.

Following is an image of the completed 4 loads I will be testing.

These bullets will be tested with a chrono, and at 10 yards for accuracy. After the test I will pick a load close to 1282fps, assuming it performed ok accuracy wise, and then load the last 5 bullets with the load data. Hopefully I can then test these last 5 rounds against some medium to get and idea of the expansion.

This is the first of a few posts, and I will follow up with all test results for these bullets in 357sig.

 

[ReloaderFred]

I talked at some length to the Sierra rep at the SHOT Show about this bullet. The skiving is done on the inside, and to the lead core, before the final nose forming. For the 357 Sig bullet, the skive to the mouth of the jacket is very small, just enough to get the mushroom started into petals upon impact. It's an interesting way to make the JHP bullet and to ensure the core will mushroom into petals, rather than the customary round mushroom we're used to.

The 9x19 bullet has more skiving to the jacket mouth to account for the lesser impact velocity, but still has the internal skiving to the core. This gives it about the same expansion effect as the 357 Sig, but at less velocity, and with a little less penetration, which is to be expected.

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[ewlyon]

For a while Midway was offering these bullets for a really good price. I regret not picking up more. From digging them out of the ground I saw good expansion, and besides that the accuracy from my sr9c was pretty good. Sadly they are now selling for a lot more.

 

[vaalpens]

I talked at some length to the Sierra rep at the SHOT Show about this bullet. The skiving is done on the inside, and to the lead core, before the final nose forming. For the 357 Sig bullet, the skive to the mouth of the jacket is very small, just enough to get the mushroom started into petals upon impact. It's an interesting way to make the JHP bullet and to ensure the core will mushroom into petals, rather than the customary round mushroom we're used to.

The 9x19 bullet has more skiving to the jacket mouth to account for the lesser impact velocity, but still has the internal skiving to the core. This gives it about the same expansion effect as the 357 Sig, but at less velocity, and with a little less penetration, which is to be expected.

Hope this helps.

Fred

Fred, thanks for your informative comments. The bullets I received indicates they are for 9mm, so I assume based on your comments that they are specifically then for 9mm, and maybe won't need any higher velocity.

I will still stick to my plan to get around 1280fps out of a 3.9" barrel to get a feel of the performance. With 25 bullets my testing will be limited, but hopefully I will learn something, and maybe it can provide some information for somebody else that is maybe looking at these bullets.

 

[vaalpens]

For a while Midway was offering these bullets for a really good price. I regret not picking up more. From digging them out of the ground I saw good expansion, and besides that the accuracy from my sr9c was pretty good. Sadly they are now selling for a lot more.

ewlyon, thanks for the input. For now I am using some of the RMR JHP's for my loads, but is always looking for something else. This is why receiving these bullets is such a great help. It gets you started with the testing, and then if you decide to purchase some of them, then it reduces the number of bullets you need for testing, and leaves more for carry loading.

 

[Artofgolf]

...This is why receiving these bullets is such a great help. It gets you started with the testing...

Good to see the initial impressions are favorable, vaalpens
I really like the design ~ innovation from Sierra is welcome here.

I talked at some length to the Sierra rep at the SHOT Show about this bullet. The skiving is done on the inside, and to the lead core, before the final nose forming...The 9x19 bullet has more skiving to the jacket mouth to account for the lesser impact velocity, but still has the internal skiving to the core...Fred

Thanks for the added information, Fred. I always enjoy your comments and insight.

 

[ReloaderFred]

vaalpens,

I also talked to Jake and Ryan of RMR at the SHOT Show. Both are really good guys, and Jake still posts here when he has time. He's another success story in the firearms industry, in that he started in his livingroom and has grown to 10 employees and probably going to have to hire more. It's a story similar to John Nosler, Vernon Speer, etc., in their early years. I really wish him well in the future. Oh, and he's excited about his JHP bullets, and bringing in his own bullet making machines for the .223 bullets.

Artofgolf,

Thank you for the kind words. I try to limit my comments to personal experience and to keep it positive. At least I try to.......

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[vaalpens]

Good to see the initial impressions are favorable, vaalpens
I really like the design ~ innovation from Sierra is welcome here.



Thanks for the added information, Fred. I always enjoy your comments and insight.

Thanks AoG.

I did not forget about the Sierra 9mm 90gr JHP bullets. I just need to decide what I want to accomplish with the bullets, and then decide what to load. For now I am leaning toward CFE Pistol or Autocomp, with CFE Pistol having the slight edge since it seems it gets closer to the 1400fps using published load data, if that is what I want to accomplish.

 

[vaalpens]

vaalpens,

I also talked to Jake and Ryan of RMR at the SHOT Show. Both are really good guys, and Jake still posts here when he has time. He's another success story in the firearms industry, in that he started in his livingroom and has grown to 10 employees and probably going to have to hire more. It's a story similar to John Nosler, Vernon Speer, etc., in their early years. I really wish him well in the future. Oh, and he's excited about his JHP bullets, and bringing in his own bullet making machines for the .223 bullets.

Artofgolf,

Thank you for the kind words. I try to limit my comments to personal experience and to keep it positive. At least I try to.......

Hope this helps.

Fred

I like the RMR 124gr JHP's and I load them in both 9mm and 357sig. The only complaint I have seen so far is the jacket separation. It would be nice if RMR can incorporate a low cannelure type crimp to prevent the jacket from separating. To me it is not that big a deal, but I have seen some comments regarding the jacket separation.

 

[JimKirk]

You should have have no problems running that 90 gr at over 1500 fps ....

I can get close to 1600 fps(90 gr XTP) out of the #31 with HS 6... that is not even at a max load...

 

[vaalpens]

You should have have no problems running that 90 gr at over 1500 fps ....

I can get close to 1600 fps(90 gr XTP) out of the #31 with HS 6... that is not even at a max load...

JimKirk,

Thanks for the input. You are correct that I should be able to get 1600fps out of the 90gr bullets if I load them for 357sig. I was actually planning on loading them in 9mm, which is how I came up with the 1400fps.

The 1600fps number is intriguing though.

I also looked at the Sierra 357sig load data and they have the exact bullet maxing out at 1450fps using HS-6. It could be because they combined 90gr and 95gr, but it is strange why they would stop at 1450fps if they have other powders loaded to 1550fps.

 

[JimKirk]

Hodgdon list 1642 fps out of a 4" barrel with CFE , 1634 fps with HS 6 ...

The #31 has an extra .48" barrel to work with also...

Sorry about mis-reading the 9mm/357 SIG ...

 

[Artofgolf]

... The only complaint I have seen so far is the jacket separation...

That's one of the intriguing design features of the V-Crown ~ the cannelure to minimize jacket separation.

NEW PRODUCT!
Sierra Bullets® has partnered with SIG Sauer® to bring you the ultimate defense
bullet line delivering optimal weight retention and expansion at all effective distances combined with Sierra’s world renowned accuracy.
The line features a stacked hollow point bullet design with additional hollow point cavity. For the #9924, #9925, #9465 and #9820
a cannelure halfway up the shank locks the jacket to the core ensuring maximum weight retention and terminal expansion.

Courtesy: Sierra Bullets

I'm wondering if Snuffy would be willing to do his ballistic-wax test with this one?

 

[ReloaderFred]

Core bonding is both messy and labor intensive, so they come up with mechanical means to try to hold the two parts together. Hence the deep cannelure. This will work under some circumstances, but there is always the set of circumstances where it doesn't.

I've done some work of my own in bullet swaging and trying to get the core bonded to the jacket with reliable results. Some people use soldering flux, which is an acid, and then heat the core and jacket together to effectively solder the core to the jacket. The biggest problem with this is the flux. It takes constant cleaning of the swage dies to keep the acid from ruining expensive swaging dies. This isn't conducive to mass production at all.

What I came up with, quite by accident, was during the annealing process I heat the jackets, with the cores inside, to a temperature of 1,125 Degrees F., turn off the kiln and then let them soak overnight. The kiln will still maintain an internal temperature at just over 250 Degrees F. after 12 hours, so it's a slow soak and cooling process. Then I take the cores and jackets out of the kiln and after cooling the rest of the way, do the final core seating, which at this point is just uniforming the cores inside the jackets, and produces a more uniform bullet. Then they're bathed in a citric acid bath to remove the debris from the annealing, and rinsed and dried. Then I do the notching and final nose forming. Then a cannelure is added, if I so choose.

I found that the overnight annealing/soaking performed the same bonding as the flux method, without the mess and damage to the dies. Now, the only way I can separate my cores from my jackets after recovering them from the dirt berm is to melt the lead off the expanded jacket.

It's not rocket science, but it works. Now, to do that on the scale that a large bullet manufacturer does would require a whole shop area dedicated to just that process, with large kilns, racks, etc. Once the jackets and cores are annealed/bonded, they have to be carefully handled, since you can fold fully annealed brass with just your fingers. If that happens while moving them around, you get messed up bullets (that's a technical term). They couldn't be poured into tubs or bulk handled at all, since they're pretty delicate at this stage.

I'll stop there, since this is getting pretty long, but I hope that gives the reader an idea of what goes on with the bonding process for bullets. I also hope it explains why the cup and core process is so much easier for bullet production.

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[vaalpens]

Hodgdon list 1642 fps out of a 4" barrel with CFE , 1634 fps with HS 6 ...

The #31 has an extra .48" barrel to work with also...

Sorry about mis-reading the 9mm/357 SIG ...

JimKirk, not a problem.

I am slowly starting to chase/look at maximum velocities, and will probably catch up to you some time in the future.

For now I am happy to slowly increment my max velocities, and it would probably get interesting when I started pushing my 357magnum loads.

 

[vaalpens]

Core bonding is both messy and labor intensive, so they come up with mechanical means to try to hold the two parts together. Hence the deep cannelure. This will work under some circumstances, but there is always the set of circumstances where it doesn't.

I've done some work of my own in bullet swaging and trying to get the core bonded to the jacket with reliable results. Some people use soldering flux, which is an acid, and then heat the core and jacket together to effectively solder the core to the jacket. The biggest problem with this is the flux. It takes constant cleaning of the swage dies to keep the acid from ruining expensive swaging dies. This isn't conducive to mass production at all.

What I came up with, quite by accident, was during the annealing process I heat the jackets, with the cores inside, to a temperature of 1,125 Degrees F., turn off the kiln and then let them soak overnight. The kiln will still maintain an internal temperature at just over 250 Degrees F. after 12 hours, so it's a slow soak and cooling process. Then I take the cores and jackets out of the kiln and after cooling the rest of the way, do the final core seating, which at this point is just uniforming the cores inside the jackets, and produces a more uniform bullet. Then they're bathed in a citric acid bath to remove the debris from the annealing, and rinsed and dried. Then I do the notching and final nose forming. Then a cannelure is added, if I so choose.

I found that the overnight annealing/soaking performed the same bonding as the flux method, without the mess and damage to the dies. Now, the only way I can separate my cores from my jackets after recovering them from the dirt berm is to melt the lead off the expanded jacket.

It's not rocket science, but it works. Now, to do that on the scale that a large bullet manufacturer does would require a whole shop area dedicated to just that process, with large kilns, racks, etc. Once the jackets and cores are annealed/bonded, they have to be carefully handled, since you can fold fully annealed brass with just your fingers. If that happens while moving them around, you get messed up bullets (that's a technical term). They couldn't be poured into tubs or bulk handled at all, since they're pretty delicate at this stage.

I'll stop there, since this is getting pretty long, but I hope that gives the reader an idea of what goes on with the bonding process for bullets. I also hope it explains why the cup and core process is so much easier for bullet production.

Hope this helps.

Fred

Fred, thanks for the insights into bonding the core to the jacket. When I started this thread I did not expect to get this wealth of information, but this is THR and we should probably not be surprised by the scope of information that is being shared.

I can't obviously not contribute much to the jacket/core bonding discussion, but I am definitely learning things I did not know before, and hopefully other member also takes the time to read Fred's post and learn something from it.

 

[vaalpens]

Following is the test data from the V-Crown bullets loaded for 357sig using BE-86. Al the loads were test at 10 yards for accuracy with the chrongraph at 9ft:

The first load load is the same load I use for the RMR 124gr JHP's except for the COL which has been adjusted to compensate for the bullet length/shape. This is my goto load for JHP using 7.6gr BE-86. The load is very accurate and the average velocity is withing 4fps from other bullets I have test with this load. Very consistent.

357sig, SIG P229, 3.9"
COL: 1.125"
Sierra, 125gr, JHP, BE86, 7.6gr, CCI500
Average: 1254
ES: 20
SD: 8
Force: 436
PF: 156
Velocities: 1249, 1248, 1268, 1253, 1256

The following load gave me excellent SD/ES numbers and I also think very good accuracy. I seems I had a flyer, so I will put the accuracy on par with the first load even though it measures to 1.14". The velocity is close to where I want to be.

357sig, SIG P229, 3.9"
COL: 1.125"
Sierra, 125gr, JHP, BE86, 7.7gr, CCI500
Average: 1271
ES: 7
SD: 2.7
Force: 448
PF: 158
Velocities: 1271, 1267, 1274, 1273, 1272

The next load does not have the great SD/ES numbers, but to me it is still very good for the velocities I am achieving. I think this is the velocity I wanted to be at, so my last 5 bullet load will probably this load, but I still have to make a decision. The accuracy was very good, at .83".

357sig, SIG P229, 3.9"
COL: 1.125""
Sierra, 125gr, JHP, BE86, 7.8gr, CCI500
Average: 1288
ES: 28
SD: 11.4
Force: 460
PF: 161
Velocities: 1271, 1295, 1295, 1299, 1284

The last load still performed very well, but it seems things started spreading a bit when looking at the SD/ES number and the accuracy with a 1.61" grouping. This is probably not the load I will be selecting.

357sig, SIG P229, 3.9"
COL: 1.125"
Sierra, 125gr, JHP, BE86, 7.9gr, CCI500
Average: 1293
ES: 16
SD: 6.9
Force: 464
PF: 161
Velocities: 1297, 1289, 1304, 1288, 1289

I really thing these bullets performed very well and I would have no hesitation loading and using them. This BE-86 load I have been using is very consistent and work well with different JHP bullets. I would still like to test the bullets for expansion, but that will be another test for another day.

 

[Artofgolf]

Following is the test data from the V-Crown bullets l...

Good test results, vaalpens
Looks like Load #1 & Load #2 are contenders for your SIG P229.

I think the new V-Crown has a place in our arsenal for SD/HD.
I'm lookin' forward to my G-19 tests in the spring (once the hip gets better).

Thanks for takin' the time......AoG.

 

[vaalpens]

Good test results, vaalpens
Looks like Load #1 & Load #2 are contenders for your SIG P229.

I think the new V-Crown has a place in our arsenal for SD/HD.
I'm lookin' forward to my G-19 tests in the spring (once the hip gets better).

Thanks for takin' the time......AoG.

AoG, thanks for the comments and thanks for setting all this in motion.

It is nice to load up a good quality bullet with a specific load and then expect certain performance, and the walk away not disappointed. These are definitely quality and accurate bullets.

 

[vaalpens]

Part of my test is normally to evaluate the cases and primers to see if there is anything outside the normal.

These cases are clean since 357sig loads normally operates at higher pressure and the primers all look good to me. Following are the pictures with loads from left to right, 7.6gr, 7.7gr, 7.8gr and 7.9gr:

 

[JimKirk]

Those bullets are looking good .... may have to see if I can find a box to try ...

 

[vaalpens]

Those bullets are looking good .... may have to see if I can find a box to try ...

JimKirk, that was definitely my impression. I measured the not so good groupings without the one shot flyer and saw groupings of .54" and .68". It would be interesting to see how these bullets perform at 15 and 25 yards.

 

[JimKirk]

What yardage are these test?

 

[vaalpens]

What yardage are these test?

The chrono is at 9ft and the target at 10yards.

 

[Artofgolf]

That's one of the intriguing design features of the V-Crown ~ the cannelure to minimize jacket separation...I'm wondering if Snuffy would be willing to do his ballistic-wax test with this one?

I sent snuffy a PM and he graciously agreed to do the wax-media expansion test on the new Sierra V-Crown bullets.

The bad news is that it won't happen until the spring thaw, as they really got whacked this year with snow in Wisconsin

AoG