It's kind of nerve racking.....

S

shiroikuma

New member
I got a Dillon 550B in an auction and I've been seting it up and getting components to try. My first 6 loaded rounds are .44 magnums. It's really nerve racking though! I have a balance scale to measure powder and checked each of the first 4 rounds on the scale after I finally got the powder measure adjusted.

I'm nervous because I loaded 19.4gr H 110 behind some hard cast 240gr .44 lead bullets but the speer manual I was using as a load guide had slightly different bullets listed (speer ones)and I just don't really get the crimping thing. The speer manual suggested 21 gr of H 110 behind the 250 gr bullet. I followed Dillons manual and put the crimping die on the case mouth, lowered the press and then screwed it down another 1/3 turn. The bullets seem in there good but the overall length of the cartridge is more than the max stated in the general guidelines. It's a little less than the length in the speer manual's 240 cast bullet example. Now they do fit in the Taurus .44 revolver I'm going to shoot them in but I worry.

Specifically I worry if about:

Overpreasuring the rounds because of to tight a crimp or the wrong bullet seating depth. Unfortunately I don't know how to tell if they are correct. None of the instructions explain this very well. I am thinking that making the round too long in OAL is less dangerous than too short in terms of raising pressure.

Any soothing advice.

I'm kind of nervous about shooting them. Anyone want to do it for me? :)

shiro
 
J

Joe Gulish

New member
Shiro

I just looked that up in the Hodgdon's 26th edition
manual. They give a max. charge of 24 grains of H110
for a 240 gr J.S.P. The hard cast lead bullet that you
loaded for should give you less preasure then the
jacketed bullet.

I would not worry about the chamber pressure to much.
BTW, I load my .357 mag with a max charge of H110 (19 gr)
with a 125 gr jacketed bullet. Works fine in my GP100.

I would shot them for you but I can't. If it really bothers you to shoot them. Then the best thing to do is
to take them apart with a bullet puller and get some bullets that you can find correct loading data for.

Hope this helped good luck.
 
H

Hutch

New member
Sweat it not, grasshopper

The only problems you may encounter in a revo with long cartridges is if they won't fit in the cylinder. It's the too short ones (that reduce case capacity) that can cause grief.

As for the crimping issue, take a look at a bullet. On most commercially available hard-cast 240gr bullets, there will be a single grease groove, filled with a blue, red, or occasionally black beeswax/alox lube. Above that (closer to the pointy end) there will be a small groove to allow easy crimping of the case into the bullet. That's what you should aim for in crimping. That will determine the OAL of your cartridge, and it's almost certainly gonna provide you something that's inside the specs you want.

The 1/3 turn after first contacting the case with the crimping die is PROBABLY about right, but you need to eyeball the product and adjust if it doesn't look right. A point to remember here. If you have some cases that are a little too long, you're gonna crimp 'em a little too much. That is not a problem until you get some that are soooooo long you wind up buckling the case.

Finally, IMHO, using H110 or any other similar slow powder, I don't think it's possible to apply so much crimp that you raise pressures dangerously. A good tight crimp is an aid to consistent ignition and burning with these powders.
 
J

Joe Gulish

New member
Glad to hear that they worked out ok. As far as crimping
goes I have to use a good heavy crimp to get all that
H110 powder burning.
 
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