New 230 TC mold

[Ole_270]

After the thread the other day I went ahead and ordered the Lee 230 TC mold for my 45 acp. Yes I know the 200 #68 is more popular, but I've still got the 2 banger for that one and can always pick up a 6 cavity after the 30 lbs or so already cast are used up. Any excuse for a new mold, right?
Mold came yesterday so I washed it down with brake cleaner, then dropped it in a pan of soapy water and brought it up to a boil for a few minutes. After cooling a bit and rinsing it fairly well I put it in fresh water and brought that up to boil. This afternoon I fired up the pot with the latest alloy mix, 0.7% Sn, 1.7%Sb and tried it out. This one may be the easiest casting mold I own. I had the Lyman PID set to 730 and it made a pile of bullets in a hurry. After cooling, I miked a few and got .4515-.452. The low tin percentage was showing it's head. Shouldn't be a big deal since this Sig Stainless Target 1911 has a tight barrel and I normally size .451.
I ran a few through the luber/sizer filled with Ben's Red. Made up a dummy at 1.25 OAL and pulled the pistol apart. Lo and behold, it plunked, actually .005 below flush. Fits in the magazine fine as well.
What would you do about the oal? I know at this length the pressure and velocity will be down considerably since the published data I've found is for 1.17. I've thought about dropping to 1.20 like I use for the Lee 200RF, but thought I'd ask here. I'd like to run this one near full power and use the lighter bullets for lighter loads. If I stay at 1.25" should I take published velocity with a certain powder, increase the powder weight till I get close to the same velocity or what would you do?
Powders on hand are HP-38, Universal, 800X, and Longshot. Universal would be the preferred powder since I use it in other cases, especially 16 gauge, but any of them would be ok.

 

[Cherokee]

With that bullet, I used 4.5 to 5.3 gr of 231/HP38 @1.185 OAL. 5.3 gr gave me 875 fps. I have also used 1.21" for other loads with this bullet. I would load to the longest that works in your gun(s). Stick with the recommendations from your manual and see how it goes start low and work up.

 

[Ian]

Ole, I too size that bullet to .451+ but do it after powder-coating. Since I wanted to make a one-size-fits-all cartridge/load, it was necessary to check a bunch of "throatless plastic wonders" as well as my much more generously-throated 1911s and DI-45 carbine. What I found was 1.200" was the maximum OAL that would reliably chamber in everything (over a dozen examples checked) and give a .002" minimum headspace.

After trying a bunch of powders I settled on Universal because it gave the cleanest burn, as well as functioned my gas guns fully, plus it reduced the powder fouling in my suppressors and didn't react badly with the powder coated bullets. The only time I chronographed the load it was running around 860 fps from my 1911 and about 1,000 fps from my carbine.

 

[Ole_270]

Thanks Ian, That's right in line with what I was planning. I don't have that many boxes though, they'll just get dumped in larger plastic containers.
The one time I tried PC with this pistol I had trouble with lead and PC fouling. Never had trouble with any of the rifles I use it in. Not sure if the larger mass of the bullets increased the time needed for full heat soak or if it's a problem with the barrel. Doug Guy throated it for me and showed pictures of the chamber being out of alignment with the bore. He thought he was able to correct it, but there might be a small area still causing trouble with the PC. Haven't had trouble with lubed 200 gr bullets in light loads.

 

[Ian]

Best I can tell, 5.3 grains at 1.200" is about a 95% of max load with the coated bullets. QL predicts 18,000 PSI peak but it chronographs about 30-50 fps faster than Winchester white box or Federal 230 grain ball. I'd recommend starting at 5.0 grains with plain lead bullets and chronograph them before increasing the charge.

Any load with an appropriate powder (Herco to 231) that slings 230-235 grains at 850 fps from a full-sized 1911 is safe but about as much as you would want for a steady diet, so I think you're on the right track to focus on published velocity if you alter OAL and compensate by increasing or reducing powder. Changing seating depth in the .45 ACP even a little has a dramatic effect on peak pressure and it's really easy to go over maximum pressure if you aren't thinking through what you are doing.

 

[Cherokee]

Ian -like your labels, a man after my own practices. Every box is labeled. And all my shelving is 2x12".

 

[Ole_270]

Did some chronographing today, the bullets tested 12.5 in my cabin tree tester this morning up from around 9.5 2 hours after casting. These were non-PC bullets lubed with Ben's Red, seated to 1.200".
5.3 Universal-746fps, 47 ES. Way low according to everything I've seen. It kind of spooked me so I dug out some Win White Box Hardball to check
Win Hardball-825fps, 16ES. Much better, had me worried aout the chronograph
5.4 HP-38-825fps, 16 ES. Much closer to book values, not sure what's going on with the Universal. The first load was an old bottle, everything else a brand new 4 lb'er
5.6 Universal was 782-40ES,
Started stepping up with the Universal, next step was 808-25ES, finally got 855fps-27ES on a charge I won't mention. I deleted one shot out of the string that was well above the others making me think I need to back off a bit. I'll try a step between the last two a couple times to see if it repeats.
I've got some new castings PC'ed, one batch air cooled, one quenched out of the oven. We'll see if it makes a difference, I did have some glitter on the patches when cleaning the bore afterwards.
It got me wondering why the HP-38/231 hit close to the charts and the Universal is so much lower. Even lower than Ian got on several different guns.

 

[Pistolero]

W231 is a very good powder for .45 ACP, as are Bullseye and TiteGroup. IME, Unique, similar to Universal in burn
rate, is inconsistent in velocities in .45 ACP, esp with 200 gr cast, although even with large velocity variations, it shoots
accurately, something I have yet to quite understand. I have never used Universal, actually never owned any.

Bill

 

[Ole_270]

I'm not quite ready to give up on the Universal. The low tin content left the castings at .451-4515 or so. The .451 sizer just barely touched them. With the soft alloy there may be some gas escaping. I'll try the PC bullets and maybe some harder alloy before I give up on it and switch powders.

 

[Brad]

I size to .452 with traditional lube but .451 with PC. Preventing gas cutting seems to be one of the things PC does very well.
A harder alloy won’t likely help BUT adding some Sb could give slightly fatter bullets so you can size .452 and prevent leading.
Do you have a .452 sizer?

 

[Ole_270]

I have both 451 and 452. Both size a bit large depending on bullet hardness. The 451 was right on with this softer alloy. When Doug Guy throated the barrel he said the size was tight so use a 451 sizer. I just never experimented with the larger one.

 

[Brad]

Where in the bore was the leading? I find that in the throat region is usually a fit issue, along the lands towards the muzzle is gas cutting.
Sounds odd but a light coat of BLL or other liquid lube may stop some leading too

 

[Ole_270]

Couldn't see where but with my eyes that isn't unusual. There is a spot about 6 oclock at the junction of the chamber throat and bore with a step that didn't quite clean up when he throated it. Chamber was out of alignment with the bore and it didn't quite correct it when rechambering and throating. Some day I may rebarrel it.

 

[Ian]

Aw chit. I forgot to tell you I was using NEW, purple Universal for the 5.3 grain load, and it has more poop-per-pound compared to the old ADI Universal (at least it does with the respective lots I have, about 6% more).

I'm also using the TL version of that bullet, powder-coated, and about .467" of heavy taper crimp. I also chronographed with a Magnetospeed strapped to the suppressors of my 1911 and carbine.

 

[Pistolero]

Heavy TC helps with Unique to raise velocities and tighten extreme spreads on velocities. I suspect it may
help with Universal, too. I think both are just a hair on the slow side for .45 ACP and need a bit of help to
really work best. Lighter bullets definitely exacerbates the velocity variation with Unique (no idea on Universal)
altho the accuracy doesn't suffer, inexplicably.

 

[Ian]

Universal has a short burn curve, which is one reason it burns so cleanly in pistol systems. Unique has a looooong burn curve at comparable system pressures. Bullseye is regarded as a fast powder but in truth all that means is it lights and builds pressure very quickly in straight cylindrical systems while the rest of the story is it SUSTAINS pressure for a long way down the barrel and generates a lot more velocity in a given system than comparable powders like Clays or Red Dot which have a similar initial burn but peter out as fast as they build up.

For 230-grain bullets from 4.5-5" barrel, universal gives the best of all worlds. 231/HP-38 should be perfect and indeed once was, but I haven't found a can of it in over 25 years that would burn consistently, ckeanly, ir shoot as accurately as Titegroup, BE, AA#5, Unique, Universal, Clays, or even Ramshot True Blue. True Blue at 7.1 grains is filthy but crazy accurate and consistent in my .45s and gets easily into the 870 fos ranfmge from a 1911.

Another thing going on is a proper throat job will lower pressures considerably. 1.200" OAL is probably a lot shorter than necessary and the jump and/or reduced engraving resistance of the longer throat taper makesbthe powder "see" a much larger case volume....hence lower velocity.

 

[Pistolero]

Things you can learn from QuickLoad. In the process of making powder models that are useful for simulations, it is
necessary to quantify the powder burn curves in ways that are not obvious otherwise.

Since I was a simulation guy for 40+ years, this is all very interesting to me. I really do need to get a copy of
QuickLoad.

 

[Ian]

It's pretty obvious when you chronograph the models of half a dozen powders and several different bullets using 4, 5, and 16.5" barrel lengths.

 

[Ole_270]

Another thing going on is a proper throat job will lower pressures considerably. 1.200" OAL is probably a lot shorter than necessary and the jump and/or reduced engraving resistance of the longer throat taper makesbthe powder "see" a much larger case volume....hence lower velocity.

Wouldn't the 1.2" oal with the powder "seeing" a larger case volume due to jump be close to the same thing as seating to the 1.25", thereby reducing the jump but increasing the case volume? Guess being closer to the lands it might meet resistance and start building pressure quicker.
It does sound like I need to crimp tighter, just barely taking out the flair. Hardly any real crimp. .471 if I remember right, trying to not scrape the soft lead undersized on exit from the case.
Edit to add: When I went up in charge with the Universal the ES went way down as I got closer to 800-825 fps. It just bothered me having to throw more than half a grain more powder than Ian or the books for the same speed. Granted this thing was throated for the 200RF bullet, so it's fairly deep.

 

[Ole_270]

A little more experimenting this morning. I checked the 4 lb bottle of Universal and it said "Made in Canada".
I switched to the water dropped out of the oven PC bullets. Tightend down the crimp some. Still measures .472, but a noticeable increase in press handle pressure. Win cases. ProChrono setup at 3 paces.
5.3 gr Universal gave 821 fps and 35 ES Seated at 1.20"
5.3 gr Universal gave 783 fps and 50 ES Seated at 1.25"

I went back and tried the bare lead lubed with Ben's Red and got 5.3gr-804-51 at 1.2". This after shooting the PC bullets and no cleaning of the bore. Saturday I got 744 fps with the same load, not sure what gives other than maybe the extra crimp or PC'd barrel.
I had some leading towards the muzzle, I'll have to do some more testing to see if it's the PC bullets doing it or the lubed. I've got both drying from an application of the original BLL.