Chronograph Data 38/357

S&W Model 19 4" barrel

Hodgdon website claims with 7.7" barrel 158 gr, LSWC and Win. SPP 3.1 grs W231 = 782 FPS 3.7 grs. = 834 FPS

My load #1: 38 Special 158 gr. Hornady LSCW/ 4.0 grs. W231/ CCI SPP/ Seated 1.500

731, 743, 675, 769, 658, 682 Average = 709

Load #2 38 Special 158 gr. Hornady LSWC/ 4.3 grs. W231/CCI SPP/ Seated 1.500 These bullets have no cannelure/crimp grove.

712, 726, 675, 769, 658, 682 Average = 704

Every one of these loads was hand weighed on digital scale. I was a bit surprised the velocity went down with the .3 more grains of powder. Granted 6 rounds isn't a definitive test.

I like W231, the groups were decent, very mild recoil, not dirty in my opinion anyways.

Now Unique in Model 19

Alliant website claims 6" barrel/ CCI 500 SPP/ 4.7 grs. Unique = 815 FPS

My results:

Load #1 38 Special 158 gr. Hunters Supply LSWC/ 4.3 grs. Unique/ CCI SPP/ Seated at 1.475 right in crimp grove.

819, 719, 717, 638, 679, 733 Average = 716

Load #2 158 gr. HS LSWC/ 4.7 grs. Unique/ CCI SPP/ Seated at 1.475

832, 794, 788, 725, 778, 793 Average = 785

Load #1 left some soot at top of spent cases, load #2 not so much. My model 19 didn't seem to like this bullet/powder combo as well as W231.

I've used Unique in 1911 45 ACP with good results. I think this is my first trial in revolver.

S&W 586 357 mag 6" barrel

Hodgdon website claims 357 mag. 10" barrel

158 gr Hornady XTP/ 15.0 grs H110/ Win. SPMP = 1,418 FPS 16.7 grs. = 1,591

My load #1 357 mag. 158 gr Hornady XTP/ 15.8 grs H110/ CCI SPMP seated cannelure.

1299, 1195, 1212, 1208, 1149, 1259 Average = 1,220 FPS

Load #2 158 gr Hornady XTP/ 16.2 grs. H110/ CCI SPMP seated to cannelure.

1201, 1222, 1230, 1236, 1247, 1232 Average = 1228 FPS.

So a good bit less velocity out of 4" shorter barrel than Hodgdon's website data. I was a bit afraid of the recoil/ muzzle blast with H110 but to me it wasn't that bad out of them 586.

My buddy standing behind me watching did comment on the muzzle flash, LOL. The 2nd load shot a very good group and seemed more stable than lighter 1st load velocity wise.

I believe I'll give that combo some more testing in 586.

I have had good luck with light 158 Lwc bullets , target loads with
fast burning powders.

Standard loads with medium fast powders and

Factory or +P loads with the slower burning powders.

Bullseye to CFE powders will work for target loads.

Green Dot and slower for factory or faster loads, works for me.

Carry on.

MM,
I've experienced, generally the same results as you have with Unique and W231. When I'm working up a load I measure the cases and trim. I've noticed this seems to give me lower ESs.

4.3g U w/ 158g swc gives me 900 fps in a 6" bbl, SD 1.365"
4.6g W231 w/ 158g swc gives me 850 fps in a 4" bbl, SD 1.430"

Some times the load manual are close and other times they are not.

jogn said:

MM,
I've experienced, generally the same results as you have with Unique and W231. When I'm working up a load I measure the cases and trim. I've noticed this seems to give me lower ESs.

4.3g U w/ 158g swc gives me 900 fps in a 6" bbl, SD 1.365"
4.6g W231 w/ 158g swc gives me 850 fps in a 4" bbl, SD 1.430"

Some times the load manual are close and other times they are not.

Click to expand...

I believe I'm going to dive into the W231 a little deeper and load up a bigger test sample. The Model 19 seems to like it and I don't want to shoot a bunch of magnums in it anyways.

I mean it's not like it's some super rare collectors item. But, it's also not like they make model 19-3's anymore either. And it's a pretty nice example.

I'll leave the heavy loads to the 586.

It will take many tens of thousands of rounds of your W-231/HP-38 38 Special loads to wear out a Model 19-3. Wise decision to reserve the H-110/W-296 loads for your Model 586 as it was designed for a steady diet of full power 357 Magnum ammo.

stansdds said:

It will take many tens of thousands of rounds of your W-231/HP-38 38 Special loads to wear out a Model 19-3. Wise decision to reserve the H-110/W-296 loads for your Model 586 as it was designed for a steady diet of full power 357 Magnum ammo.

Click to expand...

Yup

And the 586 with the 6" barrel is just more comfortable to shoot full power loads with.

As I grow older I'm finding I'm less and less of a recoil junkie. And the 4" 19 gets uncomfortable with full power loads in more of a hurry lol.

Not sure what's going on but you're loads are on the slow side.

Here is a link to several reloading manuals that you can download for free.
index - powered by h5ai v0.30.0 ([url]https://larsjung.de/h5ai/)[/url]

There's a hornady 4th edition in there. It might be older but it has real world data using a 4" bbl'd model 15 for their 38spl data.

There's also a couple lyman cast bullet reloading manuals, a speer and others in there.

Anyway, free to download save and use.

Forrest r said:

Not sure what's going on but you're loads are on the slow side.

Here is a link to several reloading manuals that you can download for free.
index - powered by h5ai v0.30.0 ([url]https://larsjung.de/h5ai/)[/url]

There's a hornady 4th edition in there. It might be older but it has real world data using a 4" bbl'd model 15 for their 38spl data.

There's also a couple lyman cast bullet reloading manuals, a speer and others in there.

Anyway, free to download save and use.

Click to expand...

I've been wondering about the velocity ? I wonder if my 20+ year old Chronograph isn't just past it's prime ? Giving false readings for whatever reasons ?

However, my buddy has a new Savage 17HMR Bolt gun. He had some new ammo, forget maker, but the boxes were labeled at 2650 FPS. I shot a couple over my chronograph and got readings of 2712 and 2744. Sooo....

And I hand weighed every powder load. Again I have an old Dillon digital scale. And a Lee beam scale. I always weigh the little weight (50 grams) with digital scale and check the bullet weight. I even weighed a 36 grain Barnes varmit grenade. It weighed 35.9 grains. The Dillon scale is always right on the mark.

And I double check with old Lee beam scale 5.5 = 5.5 on both scales.

A lot of my primers are fairly old, 5 -10 years. Could that be issue ? They've been kept in factory containers inside house.

I must have 20 Reloading manuals. Lyman 47 and 49, couple older ones. Sierra from mid 80's, Hornady from mid 80's, newer Lee, Speer among others.

I've used a lot of Unique over the years, but about 10 years ago I discovered Longshot. It's cleaner-burning, and uses only slightly larger charges (usually 0.5 to 1.0 grain in 38 spl and 40 S&W loads) for similar pressure and higher velocities. I have one opened can of Unique on the shelf, and don't know when I'll use it up.

My standard 38 spl service duplication load with Unique is 4.5 gr behind 158 grain lead SWC for a long-ago chronographed 800-850 FPS from a 4" bbl.

biku324 said:

I've used a lot of Unique over the years, but about 10 years ago I discovered Longshot. It's cleaner-burning, and uses only slightly larger charges (usually 0.5 to 1.0 grain in 38 spl and 40 S&W loads) for similar pressure and higher velocities. I have one opened can of Unique on the shelf, and don't know when I'll use it up.

My stanard 38 spl service duplication load with Unique is 4.5 gr behind 158 grain lead SWC for a long-ago chronographed 800-850 FPS from a 4" bbl.

Click to expand...

Yep, I think I'm putting the Unique away for 38/357. It also doesn't meter very well thru my old RCBS powder dump. The dump lever gets hung up on the larger powder flakes and makes me blow mini gaskets, lol.

For decades, I used mostly Unique and 2400 in pistols; there are now many better choices, IMO. I don't even have any 2400 on the shelf now, having replaced it a decade ago with Lil Gun for 357, 41, and 44 magnums (no, it hasn't damaged my firearms ).

Look at my recent post in my 357 magnum thread. I tested Enforcer, Longshot, and H110. All were much slower than the listed loads. I think we can assume that the listed test barrels are not revolvers. So the listed data does not have a cylinder to barrel gap and gas leak. Data for Enforcer was with a 6" barrel and the listed ranfe was 1500 to 1600 fps. I got just under 1300fps in my 686 Competitor.

rhodesengr said:

Look at my recent post in my 357 magnum thread. I tested Enforcer, Longshot, and H110. All were much slower than the listed loads. I think we can assume that the listed test barrels are not revolvers. So the listed data does not have a cylinder to barrel gap and gas leak. Data for Enforcer was with a 6" barrel and the listed ranfe was 1500 to 1600 fps. I got just under 1300fps in my 686 Competitor.

Click to expand...

Oh I agree. More often than not they're pressure barrels/universal receivers and usually longer than your average revolver. Quite often you're not going to get published velocity in real world firearms.

True, that's why I put a link to a hornady manual. In it they use a "real world" 4" bbl'd s&w revolver. Lyman manuals use 4" bbl's & the older ("better") allaint manuals (2003 & 2005) use 5.6" bbl's.
Alliant Manuals

Not only do you lose fps from the cylinder gap, You'll lose 10/20fps with shooting 38spl's in the 357 cylinder.

I'm not an expert at this by any means. But I will say out of any cartridge out there. the 38spl is what I;ve reloaded the most since the 80's. It's also the cartrige I've shot the most in multiple firearms with bbl's ranging from 2" to 10".

When I see something that looks out of place or odd I will mention it.

When you're looking at the results from test barrels you have to consider a couple of things besides length. I've got some old WW load data and at least from my copy, you'd be doing good to match starting load velocities with maximum load charges. OTOH, at least with Alliant rifle data, you won't get their velocities, but you'll usually match factory load velocities out of your gun.

I used to hang out on a now dead board where one of the members was a barrel maker. They made a lot of test barrels and the bore, groove and chamber dimensions were held to very tight dimensions & tolerances. The folks who did load data wanted worst case scenarios for their data. I don't recall if he ever mentioned having vents in the barrels to mimic the b/c gap.

If you own dan wesson revolvers it's easy to do real world testing to see how barrel gaps affect velocity.

A pair of dw 357mag revolvers that have custom 1 in 10 twist bbl's, heavy bbl shrouds and muzzle breaks installed (4" & 6" bbl's).


There are also standard 4" bbl's (2x), 6" bbl and a 8" bbl.

It's nothing to make up 100/200 rounds and go out and test them in multiple bbl's/bbl lengths looking for the "sweet" spot velocity & accuracy wise.

In regard to 2400 powder. After testing many loads for accuracy over the years in 357 and 44 spl and mag, 2400 is often the best grouper. I find it easier to get sub 2 inch 5 or 6 shot 25 yard handgun groups than most other powders. It may not have the highest velocity but it is close enough.

dogdoc said:

In regard to 2400 powder. After testing many loads for accuracy over the years in 357 and 44 spl and mag, 2400 is often the best grouper. I find it easier to get sub 2 inch 5 or 6 shot 25 yard handgun groups than most other powders. It may not have the highest velocity but it is close enough.

Click to expand...

Id say I'm going to be happy with 2400 if and when they get it available again? I'm not looking for the absolute top of the mark in velocity either. I'm in no way a recoil/muzzle blast junkie.

I just want a good accurate load that has some pop. But it doesn't have to make me wanna put the gun down after 3 shots.

Got a few more rounds in today between rains. And I must say a 125 gr XTP with 21.3 grs. of H110 has quite a roar lol. My buddy standing 10 feet behind me was mildly shocked. Even out of my 6' 586 is was a handful. And didn't shoot all that well either.



The 125 gr XTP with 17.3 grs. 2400 was more pleasant and shot better. I thinkk I'll mark H110 off the 125 gr bullet list. I'm just not into hand cannon anymore, lol.



I also shot 158 gr XTP's with 16.2 grs. H110 and they didn't seem quite so brutal even with the heavier weight bullet. And they shot decent.



These targets were shot at 25 yards out of my 586. I make no claims to being an expert pistol shot. But I do plan on shooting a good bit more this spring and summer and perhaps I can shrink my groups some.

Bottom line 125 gr bullets and H110 is out for me, I'm getting to old I guess, LOL.

I also shot to different 38 loads out of my 4" model 19

Load one: 38 special 158 gr. Hornady LSWC with 4.3 grs W231 CCI SPP shot very well except I'm not sure what was wrong with the gun on the two high ones? LOL



Load two: 158 gr. Hunters Supply LSWC with 4.3 grs W231 CCI SPP they shot well too, but. Those 4 touching Hornady's has me intrigued. I think I'll load up a box of them and fire for effect. I'd love to have a white front sight on that model 19.