Problem loading 45ACP with cast bullets

[4barrel]

I had an extra 452460 Lyman 200 mold and had the ugly one cut out to a 245 grain but the bullet is the same ol length. 200 on the left and 245 on the right. This mold drops a 454 bullet so it is perfect for a 45 Long Colt and it works in a 1911 also but I have to size it .452 for that. If I had your Wilson it would only see 200 grain lead H&G 200's.

 

[boatbum101]

Either insufficent crimp & / or excessive OAL for your chamber .

 

[bigboredad]

This bullet is designed to be shot out if the 1911 or any 45 acp. I have that mold and have shot thousands of them. Everyone had you chasing your tail but a very few.

I can't tell you the overall length you need because I use my barrel as the gauge it keeps getting shorter until it fits. There is no in spec over all length. It's in spec when it fits your barrel.

Loading for the 45 acp is ridiculously easy. There is more info written about it than probably any cartridge. What you need to do is forget everything you think you know about reloading and read everything you can on the 45 acp and watch every iTunes that teaches how to load it. You and most on here are making way harder than it needs to be

Sent from my SM-T377V using Tapatalk

 

[minconrevo]

A .470-471" measurement at crimped case mouth will result in malfunctions; likely also why some of your rounds don't plunk in your test die. A .468" or smaller measurement will produce rounds that won't be as accurate as they could.

COL is critical for best operation. Too short will cause feeding jams. Too long will cause fit problems in the magazine. The suggested COL in the manuals for a specific bullet may be wrong for your particular pistol.

I've loaded 10's of thousands of cast .45 ACP over the years. My taper crimp spec is .469 +.0005", COL will vary with the bullet. The classic 200 gr H&G 68 style runs great at 1.255". I consider 235 gr as max for .45 ACP. My check gauge is the barrel pulled from the pistol; definitive IMO.

I've run both Dillon (currently) and RCBS (previously) dies with good results. Both sets contained a taper crimp die.

I don't own a .45 ACP trim die because I've never found a once fired cased that was over max. In my experience .45 ACP cases shrink with repeated reloading.

 

[asilcot]

You don't mention what brand of dies you are using other than the Lee factory crimp die. I had a similar problem when loading 45 for a Springfield XDM. The slide closed almost all the way but sometimes not completely. The ammo passed the case gauge and worked great in all my other 45's but would not pass the plunk test with the XDM barrel. I finally solved the problem when I switched from Dillon dies to RCBS. The Dillon has that "radiused opening" to make the progressive loader run slick but does not quite size all the way down to the case head. You can get by with that most of the time but it can cause problems in a tight chamber.

 

[Biggfoot44]

Some barells just lack a Leade .

I kind of doubted this ,until I had factory loads that wouldn't chamber in SA 1911 , but worked fine in Ruger .

 

[Forrest r]

I wouldn't worry about oal's, plunk tests, etc.

Get your taper crimp right so that the cases fall in and out of the case gauge.

How hard is it to put a .469"/.470" taper on a dummy round and test it in the case gauge?????

 

[STORMINORMAN]

Bullets too long to fit in a magazine, feed or chamber will fall out of MOST case gauges/ammo checkers (other than full length) all day long...

If you 1st determine what OALs are required with your fire arm(s), then adjust the powder accordingly (if and as needed) your reloads should work.

Longer isn't necessarily "better" in all instances. Loading some longer than usual (for caliber) bullets short (so they'll fit) is where pressure-related problems can occur.

Cheers!

 

[Ron IL]

I had a 3" EMP that had a short throat. The rifling started immediately in the barrel. I found that I had to use more pointed bullets or they wouldn't chamber. The 115 gr fit OK but the 125 and 135 gr had a fatter bullet profile and would not fit. The 147 gr would fit. They were a slimmer pointed bullet. The problem was the 115 would lead the barrel too much. The 147 worked. I made two different loads for my two different pistols. The Beretta 92 shoots anything. So I ended up trading the EMP off so I didn't have to mess with it any more. I couldn't find a local smith that could ream a little out of the barrel so it got traded. Make a round live or dummy and color it with a marker. Drop the slide on it to chamber it. Then pull it out and see where it rubs. Mine was so bad that it started putting a groove in the bullet and never got all the way in. I couldn't shorten it any more than it was. There are some better bullets out there with profiles that would have worked but were double the price.

 

[DeplorabusUnum]

Agree

I ONLY load cast for 45acp the past 10+yrs. You're trying to stuff too much bullet in your gun Brother. 230gr max for 45acp, and don't forget the most poignant part of the reloading process, the "Kerplunk" test!

***^This^***

 

[AlHunt]

Any bullet with a crimp groove was "most likely" originally designed to be loaded to the crimp groove... Was this a mold for 45 ACP or is it advertised for 45 Colt?

For revolvers, for the most part, OAL is more of a variable (will they fit in the cylinder?) vs. trying to get the same bullet to function well in a semi-automatic where chamber and magazine variations make feeding issues a bit trickier.

Cheers!

P.S. There is nothing I see in that bullet's profile that would lead me to believe there would be any feeding issues. The suggestion to run some through another 1911 is an excellent one.

The mold is something I traded into but I believe it's intended for 45ACP. It's a NOE mold.

 

[AlHunt]

OK, guys ... life kept me away from the reloading bench for a while but it was worth it. I'm back to it.

[Executive Summary: Seating deeper to get the case mouth above the bearing surface, then running the finished round back through the sizing die gives me a round that passes the case gauge]

I came back to it today with fresh eyes, set everything I had done aside and started anew.

I grabbed a few cases, checked length, sized them and case gauged them. They all gauged.

I also had a factory round on the bench as a standard.

I grabbed some of my sized bullets and made a couple of dummy rounds. I took my OAL down to 1.200, trying to get above the bearing surface. I had measured the factory bullet just above the case mouth and it was below .451. Maybe .445? I succeeded in getting the cast bullet to about that diameter right above the case mouth.

Taper crimped. They would not drop all the way in. FCD'd. Would still not pass the cage gauge. Measurements up and down the dummy round and the factory round were ballpark close.

Attached are a few pics, probably out of order. The round with the primer is the factory round, the empty primer pocket sticking up is the dummy round.

So, I colored the offending round with a sharpie, dropped it back in and spun it. You can see the mark a bit below the case mouth. That area on the factory round is .4685 and the reload is .4720. I ran it back through the sizing die (with the decapping pin removed) and Voila! .4675 at the mark and it case gauges just fine.

I'm not sure I like having to run the finished rounds back into the sizing die. All I'm doing is swaging my bullets down.

But, I'll make up a few rounds and function check. If they function (and I think they will), I'll make up some to test for accuracy.

Thank you to all who have contributed to my little dilemma. I'll update this in a few days once I have time to test things out.

As a footnote, I have my eye peeled for a 180 to 230 grain mold.

 

[ddixie884]

Have you tried a taper crimp die? I got one a while back and I really like it.......

 

[AlHunt]

Have you tried a taper crimp die? I got one a while back and I really like it.......

Do you mean something besides the one that came with my die set? I'm pretty sure the RCBS is a taper and I know the Lee FCD says it's a taper.

 

[AlHunt]

So let me follow up with this and put a cap on the solution because don't we hate it when some nitwit starts a thread like this and never posts the fix? So, dear future reader with my exact problem, this post is for you.

As stated earlier, some barrels have no leade and one of them is mine (meaning the rifiling starts RIGHT at the chamber).

My powder coated bullets have flaws and lumps on some of the noses. Never a problem in numerous 9mm. But in this case, those little bumps were contacting the rifiling and causing some rounds to not go into battery.

I got my hands on some Lee TC-452-230 powder coated and some of the same in Hi-Tek. All nicely done with clean noses. A little smaller nose on these bullets. I was able to seat these into about 1.185 and they chambered and ran fine.

My 250 grain bullets are really a bit large, but I sorted some with clean noses and (see attached pic) cut a couple of small slots into a case and tinkered with it until the empty case would chamber and I could just start a bullet into it. The slots are to allow the bullet to move easily. Then I pushed it into the chamber until the case was flush with the barrel hood. Had to tap it out (like a squib). This gave me the max cartridge length to the lands of the rifiling, 1.242. I assembled another dummy round without the slots and started seating it. I really thought it would plunk test somewhere in the 12.30-ish range but had to get down to 1.205 before it would drop in and out of the chamber and give me that satisfying brass on steel sound when it bottoms out.

Which brings me to my last point - the case gauge is fine but doesn't have a barrel attached! All it tells you is that your CASE dimensions are in spec. The bullet can (and did) hit the lands causing a failure to go into battery. Use your barrel as a case gauge, as mentioned earlier in this thread.

The other solution, by the way, is to have someone ream the throat and the guy mentioned earlier in this thread is apparently the go-to guy for that. But, it's 60 to a hundred bucks and seemed (to me, anyway) that if the factory could build ammo that chambers, I should be able to as well. I'm happy I stuck with it.

So, I thank the numerous contributors to this thread. I never imagined, after the scads of 9mm I've loaded that 45ACP would be such a problem.

 

[stansdds]

Thanks for the follow up post. 1911 barrels often have little free bore because the bullet diameter and profile of the 230 grain FMJ bullet does not require much free bore when seated to the designed OAL. Things can get real "sticky" with bullets that have a shoulder or bullets that do not have an ogive that matches the dimensions of the 230 grain ball load.

 

[mtgianni]

It could be that the mold was designed for 1917 revolvers or 45 Auto Rim. If you can get sure feeding it would be an awesome bullet but it looks iffy at this point.

 

[SMSgt]

Easy method of finding max COL for your pistol with any given bullet.

With firing pin/striker retracted, insert cleaning rod into bore and let it rest against breech. Wrap a piece of tape around the rod where it exits the muzzle, as accurately as you can.

Now insert bullet of choice into chamber and point the muzzle straight down. Let the bullet slide into the lands, don't push or shake it down. Insert cleaning rod into bore until it gently touches the bullet. Wrap tape around rod at muzzle again. If you using a HP bullet, you will need to fill the HP or tape over it to keep the rod from entering the HP and giving a false reading.

Measure the distance between both upper or lower edges of the tapes--either will do. That will give you the max COL for that bullet to the lands. That does not mean the round will fit the mag or feed, but gives that COL Max with that bullet.

This works with rifles also.

 

[Nevada Ed]

When loading larger weight bullets for pistols...........

The depth of the bullet being seated needs to be .......

1. less, than where it starts to bulge the center of the case or
2. short enough to where it does not hit the lands or
3. where it will pass a plunk test.

A bullet too long or fat from factory ammo, is not a good thing.

 

[dla]

It almost looks like he is using a bullet designed for a revolver. It looked he used a taper crimp into the crimp groove. If so, give up cause it will never work.
Storminnormin is right.
Update: I pulled up the mold drawing and it confirmed my suspicion - this is a bullet designed for a revolver. So it is not going fit the leade on most 1911 barrels.

Download the SAAMI spec for details: https://saami.org/wp-content/upload...FP-and-R-Approved-2015-12-14-Posting-Copy.pdf