New really hard way to pull bullets....

[rwsmith]

I've done it both ways.......

you seat and crimp in the same step ... doncha

the seating operation moves the bullet.
the crimping operations stops movement.

In essence, your slamming on the brakes before you got the car there. the second you separate seat from crimp, your OAL runout drops to aerospace tolerances.

Do this, and kiss the random jam goodbye.

I used to do all seating/crimping in two steps. But recently I started doing 9mm in one step because the amount of 'crimp' wasn't as critical with a taper crimp as with a roll crimp (I REALLY don't like doing roll crimps in the same step). I think that once the bullet gets into the case, the flare can be taken off and the bullet could still be seating. My OAL runout is usually only a couple of thousandths ONCE I get the dies set right. However, I started doing this about the same time I got the Kel tec, so it's hard to tell whether it's the reloading process or the gun. I think I've pretty much figured out that the chamber in the Kel tec is pretty short. I think the chamber in the Shield might be somewhat short, but not as bad as the Kel Tec. Like you say, though, I will go back to the two step process and see what happens.

 

[venomballistics]

I used to do all seating/crimping in two steps. But recently I started doing 9mm in one step because the amount of 'crimp' wasn't as critical with a taper crimp as with a roll crimp (I REALLY don't like doing roll crimps in the same step). I think that once the bullet gets into the case, the flare can be taken off and the bullet could still be seating. My OAL runout is usually only a couple of thousandths ONCE I get the dies set right. However, I started doing this about the same time I got the Kel tec, so it's hard to tell whether it's the reloading process or the gun. I think I've pretty much figured out that the chamber in the Kel tec is pretty short. I think the chamber in the Shield might be somewhat short, but not as bad as the Kel Tec. Like you say, though, I will go back to the two step process and see what happens.

the opposite has been my experience.
Roll crimp might not be as strong in a one step, but it almost never caused an issue.
Taper crimped auto cartridges .... depends on the gun.
ran into a few that you could not possibly one step, and consistently pass the plunk test.
In either case, however, I have found better performance and consistency from split steps.

 

[rwsmith]

Wow.....

the opposite has been my experience.
Roll crimp might not be as strong in a one step, but it almost never caused an issue.
Taper crimped auto cartridges .... depends on the gun.
ran into a few that you could not possibly one step, and consistently pass the plunk test.
In either case, however, I have found better performance and consistency from split steps.

Isn't that weird? My logic (?) is that in roll crimping, a quarter turn either way gets too much of not enough crimp. To me at least, taper crimping isn't quite that exacting. There is a good bit of die movement between just getting the bell off the mouth and actually pressing the mouth against the bullet.

Well, whatever. I'm going to try split steps again to see if that helps.

 

[rwsmith]

That's almost it....

OK, lets get this post clarified without mixing in two guns and other bullets. Do factory RN bullets run in the KT?

With the KT are you saying the LSWC will not feed and are getting stuck when you pull the slide back?

Yay or Nay?

Factory practice ammo (Disintegrators) worked fairly well in the KT but I don't have any left to measure. They are RN but have a small flat on the tip so they act something like a HP.

The LSWCs were a disaster. Would not feed without bridging the ramp and the bolt face. They never got into the chamber. I decided to nix those for now and concentrate on the simplest configuration and one that I plan to use for defense, if I can get it reliable, which will be RN for trouble shooting and hopefully be able to shoot JHPs without problem.

The RN FMJs that I reloaded well within the max OAL, got the noses stuck in the lands when a round would chamber. If I could 'bap' the slide into full battery, the round would fire and eject. But if I couldn't get it into full battery the thing was an absolute bitch to open. And when I did get it open, it had pulled the bullet out of the case and was stuck in the barrel which I had to knock out with a rod.

It was hard to trouble shoot all of this on the range and some I figured out when I got home and started this thread. I had no idea that a bullet was in the barrel, until I tried running cartridges through the action and none of them would chamber. That's why I said that this was a hard way to pull bullets.

In addition, while at the range, the gun started running rough and I thought maybe I messed it up forcing it open but I figured out what it was. When the bullet pulled, the powder in the case fell into the works of the gun. A good cleaning got it running smooth again.

This had me thinking, "I've got two revolvers that I'm going to keep for SD until I figure this mess out." I was having some trouble with the Shield too, but the KT had all my time and concentration. I've got to break this down into parts and fix all the probs before I'll depend on either gun.

My full size 3rd gen eats any ammo and this is the first time I've run into compact guns with short chambers.


Thanks to everybody that responded I'm getting through this and the next range test is going to be much different.

 

[rwsmith]

If a gunsmith has a chamber reamer......

If a gunsmith has a chamber reamer I might get him to cut back the lands a little, but I looked at them and they cost about $80 on up. I'd LIKE to do it myself, but that's a little expensive for two guns. Especially the KT which is a 'cheap' gun. I may get something nicer down the line but I do want to get this to work, and I'll feel like I accomplished something if I do.

 

[rwsmith]

I can't afford.....

hi folks,
i see this as a different problem. he states that he want this gun for sd, so why would anyone carry reloads in your sd gun, factory all the way..002

It's going to take some work to 'master' these compact pistols and I can't afford to shoot factory for practice.

 

[4barrel]

If a gunsmith has a chamber reamer I might get him to cut back the lands a little, but I looked at them and they cost about $80 on up. I'd LIKE to do it myself, but that's a little expensive for two guns. Especially the KT which is a 'cheap' gun. I may get something nicer down the line but I do want to get this to work, and I'll feel like I accomplished something if I do.

I know the guys at a local machine shop & can rent a reamer or cough up a 12 pack when I bring it back. A bullet is supposed to nearly touch the lands. Seat it a little shorter & use less powder? I would like to know what the fix was. A lighter bullet? A more pointed bullet? You can find plated for less than a dime each. Put a dummy fired case & bullet in & chamber. That should give a starting point. If it sticks seat deeper. If short ream it. Pointed hard lead bullets shoot really good in 9mm. Then no problem?

 

[rwsmith]

According to the book....

Take the barrel out a plunk test them(crimped) until they drop in and out freely in THAT gun.

The rounds need to be taper crimped as it headspaces on the case mouth so if they are still a little flared they are gonna stick. Not all barrel leades are the same. If you try plunk testing without crimping it is not gonna work

I know you said you plunk tested but some guns just do not like LSWC. You should only have a a finger nail width of the driving band showing (give or take)

I made all reloads according to the 'book' OAL. That was my big mistake assuming that a round made within standards would work in any gun.

And of course I'm taper crimping before plunking them. Only finished rounds get plunk tested. Apparently I thought they were plunking better than they were but Nevada got me straight on that.

And yeah, LSWCs are going to be a new trick altogether.

 

[Rule3]

Factory practice ammo (Disintegrators) worked fairly well in the KT but I don't have any left to measure. They are RN but have a small flat on the tip so they act something like a HP.

The LSWCs were a disaster. Would not feed without bridging the ramp and the bolt face. They never got into the chamber. I decided to nix those for now and concentrate on the simplest configuration and one that I plan to use for defense, if I can get it reliable, which will be RN for trouble shooting and hopefully be able to shoot JHPs without problem.

The RN FMJs that I reloaded well within the max OAL, got the noses stuck in the lands when a round would chamber. If I could 'bap' the slide into full battery, the round would fire and eject. But if I couldn't get it into full battery the thing was an absolute bitch to open. And when I did get it open, it had pulled the bullet out of the case and was stuck in the barrel which I had to knock out with a rod.

It was hard to trouble shoot all of this on the range and some I figured out when I got home and started this thread. I had no idea that a bullet was in the barrel, until I tried running cartridges through the action and none of them would chamber. That's why I said that this was a hard way to pull bullets.

In addition, while at the range, the gun started running rough and I thought maybe I messed it up forcing it open but I figured out what it was. When the bullet pulled, the powder in the case fell into the works of the gun. A good cleaning got it running smooth again.

This had me thinking, "I've got two revolvers that I'm going to keep for SD until I figure this mess out." I was having some trouble with the Shield too, but the KT had all my time and concentration. I've got to break this down into parts and fix all the probs before I'll depend on either gun.

My full size 3rd gen eats any ammo and this is the first time I've run into compact guns with short chambers.


Thanks to everybody that responded I'm getting through this and the next range test is going to be much different.

OK so lets hope Alk8944 reads this.

For the KT if the regular RN bullets you load are jamming then they are too long (COL) You need to seat them a tad deeper and plunk test them until they fall out. You also have to do the plunk test after the bullet taper crimped. You can still adjust the COL after it is crimped.

Take a sized case and drop it in the barrel, It should fall in and fall out. A loaded bullet should do the same thing,

Use just RN bullets for now much easier to figure out the COL than SWC.

What is your COL of the RN round???

 

[reddog81]

Different bullet shapes can cause a variety of problems. It sounds like the bullets are hitting the rifling and getting stuck. I have had the same problems with lead and 9MM. The throat/leade of the barrel varies from gun to gun and determines how much of the bullet can stick out into the barrel before hitting the rifling. There's a guy over on the castboolits website named dougguy that can fix the problem for you. I am planning on sending him some barrels in the future to making loading lead in 9MM a bit easier.

 

[rwsmith]

It seems that the ones over.....

OK so lets hope Alk8944 reads this.

For the KT if the regular RN bullets you load are jamming then they are too long (COL) You need to seat them a tad deeper and plunk test them until they fall out. You also have to do the plunk test after the bullet taper crimped. You can still adjust the COL after it is crimped.

Take a sized case and drop it in the barrel, It should fall in and fall out. A loaded bullet should do the same thing,

Use just RN bullets for now much easier to figure out the COL than SWC.

What is your COL of the RN round???

It seems that the ones that gave the most problems were a few thousandths over 1.40". When I made a dummy as per above advice 1.40" and shorter plunked REALLY well. I was shooting the same type of reloads that always shot fine in my mod 5943 full size 3rd gen. I tell you what though, for a bullet that is supposed to max at 1.60" OAL, 1.40" is a pretty dang short chamber. But other people have mentioned having come across chambers that short.

 

[Rule3]

It seems that the ones that gave the most problems were a few thousandths over 1.40". When I made a dummy as per above advice 1.40" and shorter plunked REALLY well. I was shooting the same type of reloads that always shot fine in my mod 5943 full size 3rd gen. I tell you what though, for a bullet that is supposed to max at 1.60" OAL, 1.40" is a pretty dang short chamber. But other people have mentioned having come across chambers that short.

A 124gr FMJ 9mm should be around 1.150 or so.(Hornady) Speer is 1.135"!When crimped measure your diameter of the case mouth just were the case ends and the bullet starts, your crimp should be around .375" give or take a a thousandths, depending on the brass used.


The max SAMMI MAX length for the 9mm is 1.169 but that is a spec. In theory that should fit any 9mm mag or barrel but not to many are loaded at that.

 

[4barrel]

I think you have cured the problem. If the bullets for that gun groups ok in the other guns on a bench drop the powder charge back a little & seat all the same. Let us know of the outcome. You can reseat a factory bullet if it is long. I know people that have older ammo that before they shoot it will kick it back a few .001 to break the seal in case it is stuck especially .308 & .223 & it still groups good after 20 years.

 

[gwpercle]

During 50 + years or casting and reloading the 9mm Luger round is the only one that has caused me to say choice words at it. Several choice words, more than once !
My WWII era Walther P-38 would handle anything , even cast SWC 38 special bullets, but these new guns....they just seem so finicky aboiut what they like and don't like.
Just keep trying, don't give up you will get it sorted out .
Gary

 

[venomballistics]

During 50 + years or casting and reloading the 9mm Luger round is the only one that has caused me to say choice words at it. Several choice words, more than once !
My WWII era Walther P-38 would handle anything , even cast SWC 38 special bullets, but these new guns....they just seem so finicky aboiut what they like and don't like.
Just keep trying, don't give up you will get it sorted out .
Gary

every so often, Ill pick up a gun and it'll kinda sing to me.
at which point, it'll follow me home.
the latest to do so, was a P-38

 

[m657]

......the more I load for 9mm....the less I like the round, the alleged SAAMI specs, the pistols that pretend to like factory 9mm rounds, the very targets that show me EVERY time regardless of what model pistol/which recipe reload/whatever factory load....

....it ALWAYS ends up I get farFarFAR better reliability/accuracy/satisfaction out of Old Ugly & the 230 g 45 acp.

 

[Engineer1911]

9 mm Joy & 45 ACP

The above posts are why I have two 9 MM semi-autos and thirteen 45 ACP 1911s. The 45 is so much easier to load because there is something to hold on to when sitting at the reloading press. Accuracy is better, also.


Let the flames begin!

 

[rwsmith]

OK, here it is. The range report...

Informal range report:

I'm kinda bushed so here is what I found out about C.O.A.L. in compact 9mm pistols in short form.

The good thing is that reliability went up a LOT with both compact pistols.

The bad thing is that the reliability didn't go up to quite satisfactory levels.

Using mostly FMJ and JHP ammo at about 1.135" OAL. There was some 1.143" thrown in the mix.

As a 'control', my full frame 3rd gen ate up all kinds of ammo without a hitch. None, Nada. At least I know that the shorter cartridges are still good with this gun as well as longer stuff.

The Shield improved from 35% to 95% with some cartridges still stuck in the chamber and it actually pulled one bullet and left it in the barrel. Dang.

The Kel-Tec improved from about 20% to about 70% with a LOT of stoppages that were nearly all due to short leade. At least this time it didn't stick a bullet in the barrel with this pistol.

I know I'll be able to improve this further, with a batch of bullets a little bit shorter BUT STILL, After the next test I'm going to contact both factories with a complaint of REALLY short lead and what I can do about it. I think it's weird that the chambers are not only short in both guns, but that both guns are REALLY short.

Oh, a bonus was that I realized that the flat tips weren't on the ammo originally, they had a nice round nose. I didn't notice this, because I'd bought RN factory ammo before with flat tips. After doing lead SWCs I changed my bullet seating stem that is much nicer to the noses of the bullets and they are round again.

QUESTION: To what COAL do you reload cartridges for the Shield with FMJ bullets, or name another compact pistol that you load for and its COAL?

PS I've shot up the old stuff and some that I had reduced the length by a few thousandths. Now I can make a new shorter batch. And I guess I'll have to plunk test each one through both compact barrels.

 

[Nevada Ed]

Hodgdon has the 115gr LRN .356" at col 1.10" with all powders.
They also have a 115gr FMJ .355" at col 1.169" with WSF powder. Sierra list it at col 1.10" with all powders.
pay attention now.............

Hodgdon also list the 125gr SIE FMJ .355" at a col of 1.090" with all its powders listed.

So only you can prevent..................
me from getting confused.

At times like this I put my fingers in my ears and walk forward very slowly as I tamp the ground in front of me, with each step.

Have fun.

 

[rwsmith]

Thanks...

Looks like it would be beneficial to have a Hodgdon manual handy. I'm using more of their powders now, anyway.