First Shots KKM 13 Twist Barrel

First topic message reminder :

This morning I fired frame mounted Caspian 1911 with 13 twist barrel. I shot 3.7 BE 185, 3.4 BE 185 and 3.5 BE Brazos 160. Everything shot on call. 3.4 shot very forgiving at 50 yards. The 160 and 185 recoil felt identical. Target is 3.4 load. Using 10# recoil spring. I'm going to load up some softer loads and see how it shoots. I'm a slide mount guy, so this feels funny to me. Recovery is lightning fast. I've hardly been shooting but shook them in pretty good today.
I shot 95 & 96 SF, then 40 shots TF all clean. Best target 100-8x.
Looking forward to reduced loads next time out. Will be RR'ing in near future.
I think the faster twist really helped the 3.4 loads stabilize for 50 yds. In the past with 16 twist barrels its not very forgiving. Jerry Keefer was running 3.0 BE. Next time out I will try the same.
Jon

What do these Summers bullets look like? Picture?

Does the H&G 130 button nose work?

Thanks

Summer's 180 FB

https://summersenterprisesllc.com/product/45-180gr-452-swc-fb-500-ct-box/

Those are all i shoot now. Love them

bruce martindale wrote:What do these Summers bullets look like? Picture?

Does the H&G 130 button nose work?

Thanks

Bruce, I will be trying the H&G 130’s in the near future. Just ran into a limited stash of them and was gifted some to try. I’m guessing I will need to bump up the load slightly. They do not seat as deep into the case.
Jon

I think the 130 has the longest bearing surface of any out there so it seats deeper; bearing surf may be same as the Lyman 452460 200 gr. They also smoke more and have more recoil for that reason. I put tumble lube on top of regular to alleviate. Suspect a slower powder would be better for deep seated bullets

Bruce, thanks for correction. I have not shot them for 6-7 years.
Jon

Richard B. 
Read with keen interest your test results with WST powder. I find WST is my go to powder with 185 & 200 lead. Jon build a wadcutter for me with a kart barrel. A HM shot tried it out and was impressed. This grand senior appreciates how my shoulder feels using WST, utilizing "powder puff" loads, lead & reduced crimp. Look forward to hearing your additional findings with 200 lead.

For what its worth, i really like wst for the clean burn, low smoke and recoil feel between 3.4-4.1 grains with a 180/185/200 swc. 
Anything below that things started to get dicey. A lot of unburned powder, and a big variation in fps and felt recoil. I have found Bullseye, N310 and Vectan Ba10 to be superior for the ultra-light charges discussed in this thread. I have shot thousands of rounds of 2.7 gr be/ 180 swc on the short line.

jjbhonn wrote:Richard B. 
Read with keen interest your test results with WST powder. I find WST is my go to powder with 185 & 200 lead. Jon build a wadcutter for me with a kart barrel. A HM shot tried it out and was impressed. This grand senior appreciates how my shoulder feels using WST, utilizing "powder puff" loads, lead & reduced crimp. Look forward to hearing your additional findings with 200 lead.

I never intended to work with 200gr bullets, but a friend with a lifetime supply of Star 200s asked me to test some for him to see how this ultra low velocity thing worked out. I got great results with BE , but didn't have enough bullets to find the bottom charge for WST. 3.4 WST worked with both 185 & 200 , but with BE I was able to further lower the charge using 200s and still have good function / accuracy. The closer I get to my expiration date, the more I hate to clean guns. A quick blast with an aerosol cleaner blows out the ash residue from WST , whereas BE needs a more thorough cleaning. What's fascinating is the possibility of a 230FMJ , there has to be a point of diminishing returns . This barrel has been so forgiving I think that point may come when you lower the charge to the point where the bullet doesn't clear the bore.

SmokinNJokin wrote:For what its worth, i really like wst for the clean burn, low smoke and recoil feel between 3.4-4.1 grains with a 180/185/200 swc. 
Anything below that things started to get dicey. A lot of unburned powder, and a big variation in fps and felt recoil. I have found Bullseye, N310 and Vectan Ba10 to be superior for the ultra-light charges discussed in this thread. I have shot thousands of rounds of 2.7 gr be/ 180 swc on the short line.

One thing that surprised me with N310 and TiteGroup was that I began to get FTEs while the recoil was still very noticeably snappier than BE or WST. I had expected the snappier powders to be effective at much lower charge weights . In the Al Dinan article on reloading , he describes taper crimping to .460 , most people here seem to feel .463 is a heavy crimp. I think I'll try .460 with lead to see if WST stays clean and effective. My goal from the outset was to get a "modern" ball load that had acceptable accuracy while having a level of recoil that allowed me to shoot a match with control. 3.3 BE or 3.6 WST seems to be the load to do that , now the job is to duplicate that feel with a more economical lead bullet for practice.

I’m looking forward to see your results, i really wanted WST to work. I like the smell of it as well..

Wondering if at some point the taper crimp damages the bullet by making it tapered as well? May not matter with long bearing bullets like h&g#130 but could on shortv160s. Going from .470 to .461 also gave me 50 fps in limited, statistically insignificant testing. 

With malfunctions, l find oiled shells eliminated the issue. 

Lots of oils out there so here goes...pick your poison. l used to use 10 wt machine oil with 1/3 slick 50. A friend liked 50/50 Marvel Mystery oil and STP. Lately, l got into Mobil synthetic and l swear, it's like snot in a bottle. Never seen anything so slippery before.

I use mobil synthetic, as low as 2.5 WST with 180/185 functioned in my ball gun with 9lb spring.

Oil after loading? What's your process?

Oil your fingers, load the magazine...each one is then oiled.

bruce martindale wrote:Wondering if at some point the taper crimp damages the bullet by making it tapered as well? May not matter with long bearing bullets like h&g#130 but could on shortv160s. Going from .470 to .461 also gave me 50 fps in limited, statistically insignificant testing. 

Hi Bruce,
Setting the LEE FCD discussion aside..........the Lee insert has a 10 degree taper. Thinking along the same lines as you, I machined a 20 degree crimp ring for it.
I shot all season with this 20 degree/.463" crimp on my T&R ammo with no issues. I also use a 45LC sizing die like you suggested many moons ago.
I received a 1:13 twist barrel and am grateful for this thread!
Wes

Bearing surface:
130 .335
452460 ..430
Brazos 200 .275 to bevel, .325 OA

Sample 1 ea. I think the HG molds could be ordered to a spec'd weight, so this could be one of many possibilities. Weighs about 200 IIRC. I have some vintage (60's likely) bevel base that are about 195 I think.

I just recieved a 130 type (not a clone) Accurate mold with no lube grooves. Lots of bearing surface on that one.

Jon Eulette wrote:This morning I fired frame mounted Caspian 1911 with 13 twist barrel. I shot 3.7 BE 185, 3.4 BE 185 and 3.5 BE Brazos 160. Everything shot on call. 3.4 shot very forgiving at 50 yards. The 160 and 185 recoil felt identical. Target is 3.4 load. Using 10# recoil spring. I'm going to load up some softer loads and see how it shoots. I'm a slide mount guy, so this feels funny to me. Recovery is lightning fast. I've hardly been shooting but shook them in pretty good today.
I shot 95 & 96 SF, then 40 shots TF all clean. Best target 100-8x.
Looking forward to reduced loads next time out. Will be RR'ing in near future.
I think the faster twist really helped the 3.4 loads stabilize for 50 yds. In the past with 16 twist barrels its not very forgiving. Jerry Keefer was running 3.0 BE. Next time out I will try the same.
Jon

Wow Jon, have you noticed the view count on this thread? You've started a phenomenon. Thanks for bringing this to life. Hopefully , the info will enable some people to continue shooting and others to resume shooting careers put on hold.

bruce martindale wrote:Wondering if at some point the taper crimp damages the bullet by making it tapered as well? May not matter with long bearing bullets like h&g#130 but could on shortv160s. Going from .470 to .461 also gave me 50 fps in limited, statistically insignificant testing. 

With malfunctions, l find oiled shells eliminated the issue. 

Lots of oils out there so here goes...pick your poison. l used to use 10 wt machine oil with 1/3 slick 50. A friend liked 50/50 Marvel Mystery oil and STP. Lately, l got into Mobil synthetic and l swear, it's like snot in a bottle. Never seen anything so slippery before.

I did some experiments when I discovered that my Dillon dies were swaging down the .452 Zero bullets to .450 . I believe it was you who suggested using a 45LC sizer. I ended up with the LC sizer and a PhotoEscape powder thru die. I'd load up some dummies , pull the bullets and measure , then drive the bullets thru a barrel to find out what was happening. The imprint on the bullets from the lands was consistent from the exposed lead above the case mouth to the bullet base , no break in contact in the crimp area. I assume that's not the case where the bullet rides the grooves. I can't imagine any loss of accuracy from the heavier crimp. The loads in this current test were assembled with a Dillon sizer and PhotoEscape expander because I was switching back and forth between lead and jacketed so much. It seems to work just fine. I'll still use the LC die for production because my long suffering elbow appreciates the ease of sizing. Very early in this thread , I believe there was a post that claimed gas cutting doomed the posters' experiments with ultra low velocity loads. I believe the above scenario with bullets being resized by a too small sizing die could have been to blame. Also , leading has been eliminated , it wasn't a huge issue before , now it's a non-issue.

Richard Benoit wrote: I assume that's not the case where the bullet rides the grooves. I can't imagine any loss of accuracy from the heavier crimp. The loads in this current test were assembled with a Dillon sizer and PhotoEscape expander because I was switching back and forth between lead and jacketed so much. It seems to work just fine. I'll still use the LC die for production because my long suffering elbow appreciates the ease of sizing. Very early in this thread , I believe there was a post that claimed gas cutting doomed the posters' experiments with ultra low velocity loads. I believe the above scenario with bullets being resized by a too small sizing die could have been to blame. Also , leading has been eliminated , it wasn't a huge issue before , now it's a non-issue.

Well, now it became very interesting.  And it is not because of mentioning of my products.  I'm very interested to learn more about barrel leading issue.

Richard, 

Can you please elaborate on this topic?  I'm interested to know where specifically you observed leading, how it represented itself, location of the leading (top of lands?, right after chamber or further down the barrel?, etc.), what bullets created the most of leading (leaving aside JHPs), i.e. lead versus coated, flat base versus beveled base?

As an FYI - I finished testing and now have out to secondaries new 45-HTC PTU specifically designed for loading Flat Base bullets for 1:13 barrels.  First batch is limited to about 50 units.  It will be available in couple of weeks.

Also, in my testing #130 bullets performed exceptionally well in my JE13 / Frame Mounted dot.  2.8gr of N310 for short line, and 3.1gr for long line.  Crimp is 0.463", using CCI Magnum 350 primers. OAL - 1.15" / 0.92".  Other bullets, like four or five different 180-185gr flat base bullets performed well also (3.1BE - short line, 3.4BE - long line), and 200gr BB (2.8gr BE / 3.1gr BE), crimp 0.465", same primers, 1.24" / 0.92"

AP

Alex, do you know your velocity? I had previously mentioned to JE that I had some good 50 yd results with 200s at 3.3 BE but also some failure as l, unlike Jon, am not a human machine rest (anymore) side note , l used to be, but trigger frequently was my issue...nuf said

Anyways I would like to understand shootability of slow loads by average users. Great RR groups are one thing but long barrel times in an average hold are another, making it soft in recoil but harder to shoot well. I could be wrong here.

Third thing, trying to get #130 to shoot well, 3.7BE and up smoked and was too snappy due to requirements for deep seating. Recently a 3.2 BE test with it was really nice at 25 yards. 50 not so much but I really want a soft clean indoor load. Putting tumble lube on with this load feels good.

Edited to state that I don't have a 13 twist barrel...

Bruce,
I am not ready with results as I didn't have chance to test all loads I want to test.  All I can say, that my feeling is that 2.8gr of N310 under coated #130 feel, if I'd speculate, well sub-700 fps.  Keep in mind, I'm using frame mounted gun.  And I must say that this is EXTRAORDINARY gun!  Accuracy / grouping is with everything I tried at 25Y (and 3.4gr under 185gr FB #68 at 50 - according to CMP I leveled up in September) is exceptional. 

Also, I do not want to divert this thread from discussing guns with 1:13 barrels.  So, let's limit discussion of #130 bullets to the following.  I tested this projectile in several guns with slide mounted dots (all AP 9000Sc) including 1911s with 1:16 barrel, one 1911 with frame mounted dot (also AP 9000Sc) and 1:16 barrel and Pardini GT45 (slide mounted AP 9000Sc). Most liked 3.3gr N310 charges, one liked 3.5gr.  None liked any charges with CCI300 LP, but rather CCI350 or WLP.  Range of charges tested was from 4.4gr on high end to 3.04gr on low end.  All other parameters remained the same.  With that said, my experience is that if you get good 25Y load, try adding 0.3-0.4gr of the same powder and test at 50Y, and vice versa. 

AP

PhotoEscape wrote:

Richard Benoit wrote: I assume that's not the case where the bullet rides the grooves. I can't imagine any loss of accuracy from the heavier crimp. The loads in this current test were assembled with a Dillon sizer and PhotoEscape expander because I was switching back and forth between lead and jacketed so much. It seems to work just fine. I'll still use the LC die for production because my long suffering elbow appreciates the ease of sizing. Very early in this thread , I believe there was a post that claimed gas cutting doomed the posters' experiments with ultra low velocity loads. I believe the above scenario with bullets being resized by a too small sizing die could have been to blame. Also , leading has been eliminated , it wasn't a huge issue before , now it's a non-issue.

Well, now it became very interesting.  And it is not because of mentioning of my products.  I'm very interested to learn more about barrel leading issue.

Richard, 

Can you please elaborate on this topic?  I'm interested to know where specifically you observed leading, how it represented itself, location of the leading (top of lands?, right after chamber or further down the barrel?, etc.), what bullets created the most of leading (leaving aside JHPs), i.e. lead versus coated, flat base versus beveled base?
As an FYI - I finished testing and now have out to secondaries new 45-HTC PTU specifically designed for loading Flat Base bullets for 1:13 barrels.  First batch is limited to about 50 units.  It will be available in couple of weeks.

Also, in my testing #130 bullets performed exceptionally well in my JE13 / Frame Mounted dot.  2.8gr of N310 for short line, and 3.1gr for long line.  Crimp is 0.463", using CCI Magnum 350 primers. OAL - 1.15" / 0.92".  Other bullets, like four or five different 180-185gr flat base bullets performed well also (3.1BE - short line, 3.4BE - long line), and 200gr BB (2.8gr BE / 3.1gr BE), crimp 0.465", same primers, 1.24" / 0.92"

AP

My comments on leading refer almost exclusively to Zero 200 or 185 lwchp . The leading would begin to appear shortly in front of the chamber and extend forward about1.5". It would show as little lumps in the grooves. A quick cleaning would clear the bore of everything else , but the little lumps would persist. I never let them build to the point of malfunctions . As I said , no longer a problem. As an interesting aside , I did try some Brazo's coated bullets. Great bullets , clean loading , etc., however , I have COPD and for some reason they make me choke. I can tolerate it outdoors , but I gag indoors. BTW , why would a 1:13 barrel require a different expander?

bruce martindale wrote:Alex, do you know your velocity? I had previously mentioned to JE that I had some good 50 yd results with 200s at 3.3 BE but also some failure as l, unlike Jon, am not a human machine rest (anymore) side note , l used to be, but trigger frequently was my issue...nuf said

Anyways I would like to understand shootability of slow loads by average users. Great RR groups are one thing but long barrel times in an average hold are another, making it soft in recoil but harder to shoot well. I could be wrong here.

Third thing, trying to get #130 to shoot well, 3.7BE and up smoked and was too snappy due to requirements for deep seating. Recently a 3.2 BE test with it was really nice at 25 yards. 50 not so much but I really want a soft clean indoor load. Putting tumble lube on with this load feels good.

Edited to state that I don't have a 13 twist barrel...

Bruce , this is really the crux of the matter. In a perfect world , I'd be very happy to keep shooting the old Marine load ,  X-ring all day. My arm has been battered and abused and operated on to the point where after a couple rounds the nerves/tendons/ligaments go into spasms. The arm feels like a guitar string has been plucked , and you have to wait for the vibration to end, hopefully, so you can try another shot. My goal was to find a load that doesn't aggravate the arm to the point of total loss of trigger control. I hope I've found it with some of the loads tested. I was initially afraid that I'd have to sacrafice a great deal of accuracy for soft recoil , that has not been the case. If a longer barrel time allows a shot that should have been a 9 or 10 to drift out into the 8 ring , I'm thrilled with the improvement over visible misses and sometimes off the paper misses. The other major advantage would be that correcting the error is now within my control , follow through , trigger technique ,etc. That's a huge psychological boost.  I've also learned that different people perceive recoil differently. I could never grasp the advantage of the 160s , they felt way too snappy , whereas the gentle push of a 200 in front of 2.8 of BE feels sweet to me , yet feels sluggish to others. Whatever combination allows you to score better is the one with better shootability. I've got a little more refinement to do with these loads , then it'll be time to revisit the Fundamentals page. Can you grasp the pistol somewhat lighter and still maintain control? What's with this theory that you should hold the gun like you're holding a childs' hand as you cross the street? To me , this will be the real advantage of the 1:13 , it may once again allow the execution of the fundamentals as opposed to the gun controlling me.