First Shots KKM 13 Twist Barrel

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

Well it looks like you are the RR.

dapduh2 wrote:Well it looks like you are the RR.

The RR got tired on low shot number 10
Jon

Wow!
3.5 Brazos 160!
(Frame mounted)

Woww, amazing. Casual shooting huh

That's some good shooting Jon, you must still dry fire a lot. Before you converted my RO to slide mount it would shoot Magnus 155gr with 3.5 BE and 10 lb spring pretty good at 50' and fair at 25 yds, but not at 50 yds probably not enough mass and velocity. I didn't like the feel of the recoil much then especially with heavier loads. I like my pistol now it feels good and it's shooting better with 180 Summers and 3.8 BE. I'm going to put another 300 rnds through it and see how it feels with 3.5. BTW I loved those 155 gr for indoor shooting.
  Keep up the good work, Stan.

This has been a neat experiment to watch.  Yea, Jon is the human ransom rest.  4 TF targets cleaned in a row with a project gun?  Fantastic.

Were you actively trying to shoot on targets older than yourself, or was that just a fringe benefit?

Last of my stash John. I have tons of 50 yd targets though 
Jon

So I just had to try the lighter 3.0 gr BE 180 Summers Enterprises lswc load. I loaded 30 rds and did some midnight shooting. Holy cow do they shoot soft and accurate. Here's 30 shot TF paced target. Called them all! Ejecting about 3 ft to the right. Now to try 2.8 gr BE
I had originally built this pistol to sell, now I'm having second thoughts.
Jon

Jon Eulette wrote:So I just had to try the lighter 3.0 gr BE 180 Summers Enterprises lswc load. I loaded 30 rds and did some midnight shooting. Holy cow do they shoot soft and accurate. Here's 30 shot TF paced target. Called them all! Ejecting about 3 ft to the right. Now to try 2.8 gr BE
I had originally built this pistol to sell, now I'm having second thoughts.
Jon

 I bet you'll have some offers on it, or some new builds.
Stan

Jon you've built a LOT of good guns and shoot a lot of client's guns. How would you compare the feel and accuracy to a typical setup?  What are you learning from this build?  

3.0 with 180's is light!  What's the spring on that setup?

Very curious about 50 yard results. Could this be used with jacketed ammo?

I’m having a friend RR this pistol when he gets back from vacation. Gonna test jhp with standard loads and reduced loads to see what it can handle. Will share the results Mike.
Jon

I have shot a ton of 2.7 WST / 180 summers thru a gun Jon built me on the short line. Got me lots of 10s and Xs, cycled great through an iron sight gun. With the new twist rate, might even be a viable 50 yard load now. Might be too light for a dot though, I was using 9lb spring with irons.

SmokinNJokin wrote:I have shot a ton of 2.7 WST / 180 summers thru a gun Jon built me on the short line. Got me lots of 10s and Xs, cycled great through an iron sight gun. With the new twist rate, might even be a viable 50 yard load now. Might be too light for a dot though, I was using 9lb spring with irons.

He's shooting a frame-mounted dot.

Just a question Jon, on the Brazos 160g bullets.    Are you using the lead or the gold coated bullets?    I tried some of the coated ones, and really like them.   I felt they had a bit more punch than my 160g lead ones.   I wondered if I could do with slightly less powder.

I was using the coated bullets. 3.5 of BE was warm, the 3.4 with 185 didn't feel as snappy. I need to pick up more of them to download.
Jon

Another question.   Do you think the barrel with this twist rate would be good for a ball gun firing mostly 185g Zero jacketed hollow points?  Or does the advantage of the 1/13 twist rate go away with jacketed ammo?

Don’t know yet how the 185 JHP perform, will know soon though. Will try factory ammunition and reduced hand loads. I expect it to shoot them fine.
Jon

Hey Jon I will be replacing my barrel in a couple of months and for over a year I was thinking about having a 1/13 twist made. I emailed KKM last week but have not heard back from them. I assume they will sell me one.

James Hensler wrote:Hey Jon I will be replacing my barrel in a couple of months and for over a year I was thinking about having a 1/13 twist made. I emailed KKM last week but have not heard back from them. I assume they will sell me one.

They will, i've got two on order... theyre custom runs still so lead time may be longer unless they have blanks drilled... those guys are great to work with...

Great

I will never buy from another barrel MFG. They are worth the wait, and KKM’s customer service is out of this world. They have done all kinds of unusual stuff for me, And after being a loyal customer for a few years they started giving me dealer pricing to boot. Believe it or not I actually got into KKM before I started shooting Bullseye, a Ranger in 2/75 recommended their Glock barrels to me.

Finally had a chance to shoot 2.7gr BE 185 Summers lswc. Loaded 20 rds and shot two TF targets. Here's the best target. Only had 50 yd targets with me. Brass kicking out 3ft to the right and slide locked back on all 4 strings of fire. I think 2.7 is a winner! Next trip out will be 3.5 gr BE 185 Zero JHP at 50 yds.
Jon