I decided to dip my toe in the reloading pond by working up a batch of .45 Colts using an inexpensive Lee Loader with American Pioneer (Shockey's Gold etc. etc.) BP substitute and a 230gr cast lead bullet.
The bullet has a round nose, is hard cast, .452 dia. and it's pre-lubed. I used enough powder in the case to rise right up to the base of the bullet when seated, looked to be about 38/39 grains by volume when I checked it. And I used Winchester large pistol primers.
The result was very impressive from a shooting/fun factor! The loads are actually pretty hot and shoot with more authority than the cowboy action loads I buy from Magtech and Ten-X. Great boom & smoke blast which made everyone on the firing line look which is always fun.
Accuracy? Egads! Simply horrible. I shot two cylinders full of Magtech 250gr cowboy loads just to warm up and have a frame of reference and, as always with my 3.75" Montado, I shoot about 4" groups off hand at 15 yards but with the reloads I was all over the paper...and I do mean ALL over it. So we're talking like maybe 14" groups! If you could even call it a "grouping"...
I measured the powder as carefully as possible using a Lee dipper but even so it's hardly like I was using weighed charges. However, I honestly suspect that what's killing me is that one just cannot crimp the cases uniformly using a Lee loader. Each round gets it's own custom "whack it till it looks good" crimp. What the heck? And obviously I didn't crimp some of them enough because I had a few bullets pull out/forward under recoil and cause a jam! Live and learn - I tapped the bullet back in using a fired case and then shot them down range into the berm (I didn't use those shots for "grouping" purposes) but clearly that was another indication that I've got crimping issues.
I guess as another reporting point I should add that with 50 rounds of this stuff down range my pistol would still load just fine and the cylinder still turned without issue so I do find that American Pioneer shoots more cleanly than BP. However, I'm terribly unimpressed with its' lack of granular uniformity and where they get off calling this stuff "FFF" grade is beyond me because it doesn't look like or meter/flow like any FFFg black powder I've ever used. Despite the cleaner burn I will not buy another bottle of this stuff because I can't get it to meter out of my powder flask so using it with my cap and ball revolvers is a pain in the arse.
I guess what this boils down to is that I need to get a real reloader. Something that puts a uniform crimp on the rounds once you've got it dialed in. Where the heck I'm going to put it I have no clue (chalk it up to the "Arizona-no-basements and it's 900 deg. in my garage" syndrome). But do y'all think that's what was at issue with the accuracy problems? Or is it something else? Any comments or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Oly
The bullet has a round nose, is hard cast, .452 dia. and it's pre-lubed. I used enough powder in the case to rise right up to the base of the bullet when seated, looked to be about 38/39 grains by volume when I checked it. And I used Winchester large pistol primers.
The result was very impressive from a shooting/fun factor! The loads are actually pretty hot and shoot with more authority than the cowboy action loads I buy from Magtech and Ten-X. Great boom & smoke blast which made everyone on the firing line look which is always fun.
Accuracy? Egads! Simply horrible. I shot two cylinders full of Magtech 250gr cowboy loads just to warm up and have a frame of reference and, as always with my 3.75" Montado, I shoot about 4" groups off hand at 15 yards but with the reloads I was all over the paper...and I do mean ALL over it. So we're talking like maybe 14" groups! If you could even call it a "grouping"...
I measured the powder as carefully as possible using a Lee dipper but even so it's hardly like I was using weighed charges. However, I honestly suspect that what's killing me is that one just cannot crimp the cases uniformly using a Lee loader. Each round gets it's own custom "whack it till it looks good" crimp. What the heck? And obviously I didn't crimp some of them enough because I had a few bullets pull out/forward under recoil and cause a jam! Live and learn - I tapped the bullet back in using a fired case and then shot them down range into the berm (I didn't use those shots for "grouping" purposes) but clearly that was another indication that I've got crimping issues.
I guess as another reporting point I should add that with 50 rounds of this stuff down range my pistol would still load just fine and the cylinder still turned without issue so I do find that American Pioneer shoots more cleanly than BP. However, I'm terribly unimpressed with its' lack of granular uniformity and where they get off calling this stuff "FFF" grade is beyond me because it doesn't look like or meter/flow like any FFFg black powder I've ever used. Despite the cleaner burn I will not buy another bottle of this stuff because I can't get it to meter out of my powder flask so using it with my cap and ball revolvers is a pain in the arse.
I guess what this boils down to is that I need to get a real reloader. Something that puts a uniform crimp on the rounds once you've got it dialed in. Where the heck I'm going to put it I have no clue (chalk it up to the "Arizona-no-basements and it's 900 deg. in my garage" syndrome). But do y'all think that's what was at issue with the accuracy problems? Or is it something else? Any comments or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Oly
