Early this week I went out and shot a bunch of 9mm I had loaded up. The recipe was one which had previously worked in my gun, so I was expecting good things. Imagine my horror when numerous rounds:
1) Stovepipe jammed. Numerous of these.
2) Failed to go fully into battery. Pulling the mag and recycling the slide fixed this. Three or four of these.
3) Occasionally failed even to cycle (impact on the target confirmed that the projectile had exited the muzzle).
To me, the evidence points to insufficient charge for cycling the gun (Smith & Wesson M&P). But in this case, why should it not work where previously it did? Charges were thrown from a Lee powder measure, with intermittent checks.
Load was 4.2gn of 700X behind 115gn Hornady FMJ, under CCI or Winchester small pistol primers and Federal cases.
I could push the charge up to 4.3 or 4.4, but I'm pushing up against all the listed maxima I can find. I'm starting to suspect that all the maximum listed loads for 700X are wrong, because they date from the 1980s or so when the powder may have had a different energy per unit weight, burn profile or both.
Logic suggests that I should go on increasing the charge until it reliably cycles the gun, on the grounds that an unreliable load cannot possibly be over pressure, but am I making a horrible mistake in assuming this?
Could the powder have gone bad? My notebooks listing this handload as reliable for the gun date back from 2016. The powder did not smell bad when I opened the tins.
Am I right about a possible unsuitability of the pressure rate/burn curve? I thought to use it because I had ordered it in bulk for shotshell and knew that pistol loads existed, but I am now wondering if the time has not come to give up on that idea.
I am considering the purchase of a revolver, which will at least not have the feed issues. At least I will have something to use the powder in!
1) Stovepipe jammed. Numerous of these.
2) Failed to go fully into battery. Pulling the mag and recycling the slide fixed this. Three or four of these.
3) Occasionally failed even to cycle (impact on the target confirmed that the projectile had exited the muzzle).
To me, the evidence points to insufficient charge for cycling the gun (Smith & Wesson M&P). But in this case, why should it not work where previously it did? Charges were thrown from a Lee powder measure, with intermittent checks.
Load was 4.2gn of 700X behind 115gn Hornady FMJ, under CCI or Winchester small pistol primers and Federal cases.
I could push the charge up to 4.3 or 4.4, but I'm pushing up against all the listed maxima I can find. I'm starting to suspect that all the maximum listed loads for 700X are wrong, because they date from the 1980s or so when the powder may have had a different energy per unit weight, burn profile or both.
Logic suggests that I should go on increasing the charge until it reliably cycles the gun, on the grounds that an unreliable load cannot possibly be over pressure, but am I making a horrible mistake in assuming this?
Could the powder have gone bad? My notebooks listing this handload as reliable for the gun date back from 2016. The powder did not smell bad when I opened the tins.
Am I right about a possible unsuitability of the pressure rate/burn curve? I thought to use it because I had ordered it in bulk for shotshell and knew that pistol loads existed, but I am now wondering if the time has not come to give up on that idea.
I am considering the purchase of a revolver, which will at least not have the feed issues. At least I will have something to use the powder in!