Lee Auto Disc

Small grain flattened ball powders meter well in the Auto Disk. Winchester 231 or Hodgdon Universal have been my "go to" powders for range loads in those calibers.
You're limited to only two or three small charge size options with the Auto Disk. I suggest that you consider the Lee Precision Adjustable Charge Bar.

HS 6 is good for the 9 and 40 meters great don't know how it will work in 45 , I do not load for the 45 but I believe it is a lower pressure round to load for and may do better with its own powder as the 9 and 40 can share a powder just fine I sure someone here loads all 3 you listed and can give some better advise

HP-38/ Win231 will do well in the autodisk and all calibers listed. Be careful with that 700x. Anything under 4.7gr will meter poorly in the autodisk and often give light charges as low as a half a grain. Expect to see up to a .4gr swing between charges with 700x. Honestly, with all the powder available on the shelves, 700x isnt worth the trouble.

I use HS-6 in all three, good stuff!

But beware, you can easily double charge 45acp with HS-6, be vigilant! Follow published data, stay in the middle of the charge range, be safe.

I use HP38 and Unique....but do yourself a favor and get the powder charge bar...it will fix a lot of issues you run across with the disks

I use Blue Dot, Red Dot, Bullseye and Unique with good results, consistent drops.

Hp 38/Win 231. Works great in anything from 380ACP-45ACP and anything in-between.

Another nod to Win 231/HP-38. Meters thru my Lee disks with great consistent charges. It's also very easy to create your own 'custom' sized disk holed for any load. Extra disks are pretty affordable. Just select a size that throws too light a charge and drill it out in small steps until it's throwing just what you want. then mark that custom size with a dab of liquid paper or whatever and store it with the dies and shell holder for that caliber.

Some folks have also just filled one of the very large sized holes with JB Weld, sanded it flat and smooth and then drilled it out,

Most ball powders will work fine with the disks. I used W231/HP38 when I used the auto-disk. I have since started using the drum powder measure and my disks sit unused.

Jeff

I went with the drum as well I prefer it to the disk too

CFE psitol powder seems to meter well but as others have said get the Lee powder charge bar other wise your going to only have the option to go up or down by .3 gr. I just ordered mine yesterday and hope to have it by the end of the week. I saw some videos on youtube about using JB weld to adjust the charge bar for smaller loads but not sure if that is needed yet.

MarkDido, I agree the others here. HP-38/W231 is a safe bet all around for you. Meters well, works with any handgun cartridge, and lots of load data out there.

You said you want to load for range use and plinking. the disc's should be adaquite for that use. As stated before any of the above powders work well. I've used them all. As long as you load in the mid data there should be no problems

MarkDido said:

I finally got all my reloading components together.

As the title indicates I have a Lee press with their auto-disc powder measure.

I will be reloading strictly "range" ammo in 9mm, .45 and .40 cal

Is there a good overall powder that will charge all 3 cartridges and will meter accurately?

I understand that different types of powder (ball, stick, flake) meter differently.

Thanks in advance.

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BE-86 powder is well supported for recipes by Alliant for all three cartridges. Some of the ones mentioned earlier are rather fast (burning) for 40 S&W.

The charge bar is great for larger load sizes. Works great for my 10mm but it can cause problems with smaller charges and certain powder combos. Sometimes dropping nothing or just a single gr. for 9mm loads using Red Dot I use the disk.

With the pro Disk There's a mod for a spring to auto return the disk on the down stroke. Makes for an easy change out when removing the heads on the turret and progressive presses. Also works well on a single stage eliminating the need for a chain on all presses.

MarkDido said:

I finally got all my reloading components together. As the title indicates I have a Lee press with their auto-disc powder measure. I will be reloading strictly "range" ammo in 9mm, .45 and .40 cal Is there a good overall powder that will charge all 3 cartridges and will meter accurately? I understand that different types of powder (ball, stick, flake) meter differently. Thanks in advance.

Click to expand...

MarkDido said:

I finally got all my reloading components together. As the title indicates I have a Lee press with their auto-disc powder measure. I will be reloading strictly "range" ammo in 9mm, .45 and .40 cal Is there a good overall powder that will charge all 3 cartridges and will meter accurately? I understand that different types of powder (ball, stick, flake) meter differently. Thanks in advance.

Click to expand...

MarkDido said:

I finally got all my reloading components together. As the title indicates I have a Lee press with their auto-disc powder measure. I will be reloading strictly "range" ammo in 9mm, .45 and .40 cal Is there a good overall powder that will charge all 3 cartridges and will meter accurately? I understand that different types of powder (ball, stick, flake) meter differently. Thanks in advance.

Click to expand...

W231 works well for me .

Lots of things will work I don't own a .40 but lots of powders will work in all three.
I like HP38/W231 for practice .45 loads and something slower for 9mm.
WSF is my go to powder for 9mm, I also like CFE-P and Universal for 9mm. WSF+CFE-P work well for full power .45s.
I have never used 700X but I hear it is one of the less friendly powders when it comes to metering.
BDSs has powder pictures posted, in general the smaller the grain size the better it will work in the Lee disk measure.
There are exceptions, for example Promo which has larger flakes metered better than Unique for me.
Unless you want to weigh and adjust every charge with some powders you may need to load for the "swing"
Say metering was + or - .2 I would always make sure I was at least .2 or .3 below the max.

You can adjust disk sizes if a drill bit or dremel if one is close to but not quite what you want charge wise.
Lee publishes VMDs for powders. Some are close some are not.
Disk size/VMD = charge | VMD*charge=disk size
I don't know how close it is but 700X is listed at .1343 VMD so for example the .43 disk / .1343 = about 3.2gr
I setup a spread sheet to do the calcs for lots of charge weights when I plug in a VMD.
I have it posted here someplace let me find the thread and I will add a link to it.

Lots of things will work I don't own a .40 but lots of powders will work in all three.
I like HP38/W231 for practice .45 loads and something slower for 9mm.
WSF is my go to powder for 9mm, I also like CFE-P and Universal for 9mm. WSF+CFE-P work well for full power .45s.
I have never used 700X but I hear it is one of the less friendly powders when it comes to metering.
BDSs has powder pictures posted, in general the smaller the grain size the better it will work in the Lee disk measure.
There are exceptions, for example Promo which has larger flakes metered better than Unique for me.
Unless you want to weigh and adjust every charge with some powders you may need to load for the "swing"
Say metering was + or - .2 I would always make sure I was at least .2 or .3 below the max.

You can adjust disk sizes if a drill bit or dremel if one is close to but not quite what you want charge wise.
Lee publishes VMDs for powders. Some are close some are not.
Disk size/VMD = charge | VMD*charge=disk size
I don't know how close it is but 700X is listed at .1343 VMD so for example the .43 disk / .1343 = about 3.2gr
I setup a spread sheet to do the calcs for lots of charge weights when I plug in a VMD.
I have it posted here someplace let me find the thread and I will add a link to it.

Here it is if your interested.
DOUBLE Check any data I have in it. I believe the data is correct but I have been know to make a mistake every now and then
(OK about every 10 minutes to be truthfull)

Lots of things will work I don't own a .40 but lots of powders will work in all three.
I like HP38/W231 for practice .45 loads and something slower for 9mm.
WSF is my go to powder for 9mm, I also like CFE-P and Universal for 9mm. WSF+CFE-P work well for full power .45s.
I have never used 700X but I hear it is one of the less friendly powders when it comes to metering.
BDSs has powder pictures posted, in general the smaller the grain size the better it will work in the Lee disk measure.
There are exceptions, for example Promo which has larger flakes metered better than Unique for me.
Unless you want to weigh and adjust every charge with some powders you may need to load for the "swing"
Say metering was + or - .2 I would always make sure I was at least .2 or .3 below the max.

You can adjust disk sizes if a drill bit or dremel if one is close to but not quite what you want charge wise.
Lee publishes VMDs for powders. Some are close some are not.
Disk size/VMD = charge | VMD*charge=disk size
I don't know how close it is but 700X is listed at .1343 VMD so for example the .43 disk / .1343 = about 3.2gr
I setup a spread sheet to do the calcs for lots of charge weights when I plug in a VMD.
Spreadsheet above

Dudedog said:

Lots of things will work I don't own a .40 but lots of powders will work in all three.
I like HP38/W231 for practice .45 loads and something slower for 9mm.
WSF is my go to powder for 9mm, I also like CFE-P and Universal for 9mm. WSF+CFE-P work well for full power .45s.
I have never used 700X but I hear it is one of the less friendly powders when it comes to metering.<snip>

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Some powders used to cover all three will leave 40 as suboptimal.

I use 700-x for 44-40, loading with a Lee Auto-Disk, and have no issues with it.