.38 Special question

C

cdoc42

New member
You know, getting older carries a lot of good memories but you've got to be able to remember them. I've been loading for 40 years and every now and then I feel the need to question a load I've been using for a long time.

On my labeled ammo, I never include the source of the load. Just the usual caliber, bullet weight, OAL, powder weight, primer and manual reported velocity unless I graphed the load.

I am in the process of loading the last 50 of 300 cartridges of .38 Special, Winchester 125gr JHP, 1.470" OAL, Unique 6.5gr, CCI 300 primer (small pistol).
I didn't have the velocity labeled.

Just for the heck of it - why now instead of at first I'll never answer - I looked at the .38 Special section of Lyman's 50th edition and found the max load for Unique is 6.0gr for 895fps out of a 4" barrel, 1 6,700 CUP. Hmm.....where did I get 6.5gr that I've been shooting for at least 20 years?

Well, I checked everything I have back to the 25th edition of Hodgdon and I cannot find that 6.5gr recipe. The 26th edition lists a +P Load of 5.9gr, velocity 1019 fps, CUP19,900, 7-inch barrel.

I turned the page to.357 Mag and found the load for the same 125g JHP with Unique is 8.4gr, velocity 1294 fps with 37,700 CUP.

I breathed a sign of relief. If my Ruger GP-100 can handle the .357 load, it surely can handle the 6.5gr load in the .38 Special..........Right?
 
The Speer #8 has that load as a start with max at 7.5 gr.

The book was first printed June, 1970.

Unique has changed since then and the newer manuals publish 6.0 gr as max.

That is probably why you are loading the 6.5 gr Unique.

It is time to reformulate your pet load to bring it into current times.
 
I agree with changing to match the times since I understand powders differ from older ones. In fact, I might even change recipes to newer powders like TiteGroup, CFE Pistol,etc.

But the bottom line is my question, if .38 Special can be fired out of a .357 Mag. handgun, I should be able to safely fire this apparent +P load out of my Ruger GP100 because it is much less powerful than a .357 Mag load.

Right?
 
cdoc42,

The 1987 Hercules reloading manual for .38 Special lists: 125gr JSP, 6.5gr Unique, 1070fps, 14.6k CUP. FWIW, powder manufacturers don't radically change their powders while retaining the same name. To do otherwise would make reloading down right dangerous and bring lawsuits up the ring ding. Changes that are typically made (especially by Alliant which bought Hercules) involve making the powder cleaner burning, so I would not hesitate to use that load as listed.

Don
 
There will be bad data in old books. Almost all the data in them was developed by testing in a production firearm (usually looser and therefore producing lower pressures than a SAAMI test barrel) while watching for pressure signs and a great many of them were never pressure tested. Those that were pressure tested were usually tested in a copper crusher. These can work if, as large-scale ammunition manufacturers do, you first fire a set of reference loads of known peak pressure and divide your pressure reading into that known pressure to get a correction factor to apply to all your subsequent readings. But if you don't fire reference loads and rely only on the tarage table that comes with the copper slugs, readings can be off by over 10% pretty easily. The error is usually about half that for hydraulically calibrated piezoelectric transducers. So, yes, it was very easy for a lot of those old loads to be out of spec by modern standards.

That said, even the ones that are off are usually not dangerously off unless your gun is a lot lighter than the one they developed the loads in. If 6.0 grains of Unique has been checked by more modern and better measurements or at least by calibrated measurements if not by a better method, then square the ratio of the two loads to get a very coarse approximation of how much higher the pressure is going to be. That number is not very good and can vary quite a bit by powder type, but at least you have a very (very) rough idea.

(6.5/6.0)² = 17% pressure increase, so if 6.0 is a max load of 17,000, the extra half grain will take it to around 19,900 by that estimate. By comparison, a maximum proof load for 38 Special is 29,500 psi (same for +P; the original separate proof load is obsolete). So you've got room for almost half again more pressure before you have to start worrying about permanent damage to the gun. And all this assumes 6.0 is dead on maximum, which it won't be because Alliant allows some room for some lot variation. QuickLOAD, with a case that has 24 grains water overflow capacity, thinks about 18,500 psi is a better estimate. Incidentally, even though SAAMI puts a MAP of 17,000 CUP and 17,000 psi on the 38 Special, the CIP uses 1500 bar (21,756 psi), so if European ammunition hasn't been blowing guns up, neither will that particular load.

And that's just 38 Special guns. Go to the 357 Magnum and the pressure goes up accordingly. Remember Keith, Sharpe and Wesson developed the 357 Magnum by overloading 38 Special cases in a heavy frame revolver. So you are correct in your assumption that it makes you safer.
 
Most responses involve the gun being used to fire the round. WHat about the cases themselves? Are .38 special cases different than .357 mag cases? That is, are they thinner and potentially less capable of containing increased pressure? Or are .38 just shortened .357 cases?
 
My thought is the cases are thinner is not an issue. They are shorter. They hold less powder. But if a .357 is fired in a revolver that is structurally too weak to handle anything other than a standard .38 Special load (not to mention it won't fit in the cylinder) you have a pressure problem.

So it makes sense (I think) that a +P .38 load that might be too much for your standard .38 to handle is just fine in a handgun designated as .38/.357. That said, what might appear to be an excessive .38 load might still be less than one used in a .357.

I think Unclenick agrees.
 
But the bottom line is my question, if .38 Special can be fired out of a .357 Mag. handgun, I should be able to safely fire this apparent +P load out of my Ruger GP100 because it is much less powerful than a .357 Mag load.
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Yep. While I won't recommend it, I have used some lighter 357 data in my 38 Special brass, and fired in a 357 revolver. I think the big difference in today's manuals it the better testing/pressure measuring methods. I'm not a ballistics expert, but I don't think the CUP pressure measurements are consistently accurate. The smarter-than-me techs developed the method and I'm sure it was a good method for the time, but electronic pressure measurement is way more accurate and consistent. Better testing showed some load data to be a bit high and manuals lowered the charges...

And nope, I don't believe the "lawyer-ed down" theory.

But that's just from my reading and thinkin'...
 
Shoot them out of a 357 magnum . In some way label and identify these loads as magnum loads ...or , if you are afraid of "memory Lapse and or accidents happening...
break out the bullet puller.
The older I get the more cautious I become. If there were any chance of these loads getting into a 38 special , mine or another persons, I would pull them all down.
You can resize the primed cases and load them ...better safe than sorry.
Gary
 
"...found the max load for Unique is..." It'll change from manual to manual and powder lot to powder lot over time anyway.
"...cases are thinner..." No, they aren't. .38 and .357 cases are different in length only. +P cases are no different than non +P either. The head stamp is there so the factory workers don't mix 'em.
 
"I breathed a sign of relief. If my Ruger GP-100 can handle the .357 load, it surely can handle the 6.5gr load in the .38 Special..........Right?"

If you're shooting them in a GP-100 .357 Mag. I see no problem. Looks to me like the load could be in the 38/44 level. The 38/44 S&W was the predecessor to the .357 Mag. and is a fine cartridge. Problem is it'll go fit in any .38 Spl. revolver.


"The Speer #8 has that load as a start with max at 7.5 gr.

The book was first printed June, 1970.

Unique has changed since then and the newer manuals publish 6.0 gr as max.

That is probably why you are loading the 6.5 gr Unique.

It is time to reformulate your pet load to bring it into current times."

The Speer #8 has several bad loads which may include the .38 Spl. data you mention. At the time of printing, Speer was using the copper crusher method of measuring pressure. Normally no problem but they received the wrong tarage tables for one batch of crusher pellets thus the wrong and way too hot data. The Speer #9 came out very quickly after #8.

Paul B.
 
That's why I write with pencil now days. When I run into this situation I load a few at the new published load and if I like it I erase make the change and move on. I if don't like the new load, well I can't tell you what I do but I do it and move on. As for remembering, I tell everyone that "I'm old i'm not retarded".

So if they are changing the data all the time then that makes me feel a lot better, I thought it was just me.
 
A win 125 sjhp should be fine with 6.5 grains unique in a 38 special case, if fired in a GP 100. A lot of the older loads in manuals were never officially pressure tested, cup or otherwise. Speer # 8 likely does have some dangerous loads in it. Speer # 9 specifically states they didn't start using test barrels and copper crushers to develop the loading data until Speer #9. Whether that information in Speer #9 is accurate or not, i do not know.

Also would not count on pressure increase being linear relationship with charge increase.
 
greaseswabber said:
Are .38 special cases different than .357 mag cases?
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Again, remember Elmer Keith and Daniel Wesson and Phil Sharpe developed the .357 Magnum by loading .38 Special cases to .357 Magnum pressures, so the .38 Special cases of the day could certainly handle the pressure and I don't believe they make them any thinner now. The main reason for creating a separate .357 case afterward was just to prevent the higher pressure loads from being chambered in a .38 Special too light to handle them, which could happen, as .357 Magnum maximum pressures do exceed .38 Special proof pressures. The longer case also gives a little more room for powder.


zeke said:
Also would not count on pressure increase being linear relationship with charge increase.
Click to expand...

As I explained in my previous post, the difference is exponential, not linear. In the case of the rough estimate that exponent is 2 (squaring). You never just extrapolate pressures to outside a published load range.
 
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