45 ACP size problem

[Frozone]

You guys have just about beat this to death - but...

It does look like 2 different seating depths on the 'case gauge' photos.



OP what is the OAL of those 2 cartridges? do they match?
Do you trim your cases? Are the cases the same length?
Is your seating die setup correctly?

[bruce381]

I have loads that look like the gauge pictues BUT as long as they are that close they ALL fit in my 2 KART barrel guns so check it in your chamber.

[boatworks]

I blew up a Smith mod.99 with a range pick up case that was bulged.No injuries though.Apparently the round did not fully chamber but the firing pin still hit the primer. I told them what I did and they still replaced the pistol. Good outfit.

[MikeS]

45ACP brass can be reloaded almost forever. Anyone telling you that you've ruined brass because it stretched out of SAAMI spec probably wants to sell you more brass!

[farmer66]

I have the same situation as the OP. I use the same boolit, sized to .452. I use RCBS dies and changed from .448 to .450 expander die (that helped). I started out at 1.25 inches overall, crimped to .469, used 1 Glock and 2 Ruger barrels to check. Finally ended up at 1.16 inches overall, Glock and 1 Ruger OK, and 1 Ruger still only allowing proper seating 70 % of the time. The shorter I got, the more fit the barrels. My rounds at 1.16 look like the shorter round in the OP's pictures.

I measured 5 as cast boolits for min diameter and max. Average difference was 0.006 inch. This is much more deviation than my other molds. Parting line of mold is offset, so I tried to work by hand to minimize. Never was really happy with the rework, so I set it aside, and went back to the Lyman molds.

I like the shape of the boolit and may try a six cavity Lee mold, they are said to be better.

Hope this adds to the discussion.

Ken

[mpmarty]

Unless you plan to fire those rounds in the case length gauge put it away and quit playing with it. Pull the barrel from your pistol and see if the rounds will plunk into the chamber. If they will shoot them and quit obsessing over non issues.

[Captain_Howdy]

some cast bullets just need to be seated deeper than others. I just recently got a Miha .452-200 mold and I could not get the rounds to chamber in my 1911. Upon closer inspection I realized the bullet itself was coming in contact with the rifling in the barrel and it was stopping cold in its tracks. So I tried adjusting my seating depth. After a while I just seated the bullet's driving band even with the case mouth and all my probles went away. I could chamber and extract without incident. I then did some more research to confirm my actions and found out that this is what a lot of people using this bullet had to do.

After looking at the pictures of your samples I would suggest you try this as well.

Good luck and be safe.

[Faust921]

45ACP brass can be reloaded almost forever. Anyone telling you that you've ruined brass because it stretched out of SAAMI spec probably wants to sell you more brass!

A couple of buddies of mine who shoot IPSC said they'd load .45 ACP until they couldn't read the headstamp, and they were feeding race guns in which they invested a lot of time and money.

After years of contemplation, I reloaded my first handgun ammo today. I've spent weeks getting the equipment together from eBay, ect. I went with a used RC2 and will load .45 ACP and .45 Colt. to start.

I loaded 50 .45 ACP 230gr FMJ behind 3.8 gns Bullseye. 1.265 OAL. Did not crimp. Tomorrow I'll find out if 3.8 grains of Bullseye will run. Lyman's #49 had that as the starting load. After reading what others are doing, I wish I'd loaded 4.2 to 4.7 grains. Lyman's also had the OAL at 1.275 but some ammo that fed well in my gun was 1.265, so I seated to 1.265 OAL. Took my time and made a lot of measurements of case length, OAL and powder charge mass. I also got friendly with the powder measure and the hand primer, glad I invested in those. Already had a scale from shotshell reloading.

Plan to get into casting soon. This forum has been immensely helpful. Having worked in automotive helps with the casting. Of what I've read, the lead casting is very similar to the aluminum and steel casting, just cooler and smaller. As soon as I can get a old dutch oven, I'll get some ingots poured off the lead I dug out of the backstop at a local range. Thanks one and all for your tips and insight.

[Artful]

Faust921 welcome to the hobby without end - shoot 'em - reclaim 'em - recast 'em - load 'em - repeat.

I prefer to us my lee hand primer as well, even if I'm going to load 'em up on my dillon.

BigBuckJeff, did you try shooting the no-goes in your gun yet?