.38 special HBWC with 1.4 grains Bullseye

Walkalong said:
Yes, and I have tested a lot of pistol powders in .38 Spl cases, both powder back against the primer, powder forward against the bullet, and powder level. 2400 actually likes level. :)
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Yeah, I'm not a fan of down-loaded 2400.
Did it once long long time ago, and they were erratic. In the bag of brass at the end, like a tablespoon full of unburnt kernels in the bag. Lots of annoying hot-pin pricks to the face when firing.
IIRC these were 357 Mag with 125gr bullets and about 10 grains of 2400.
I strongly advise against it :)
I really like Alliants advice on it, which is the standard starting load of 10% less than max, and I was well below that.
 
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Palladan44 said:
Yeah, I'm not a fan of down-loaded 2400.
Click to expand...
Me either, it doesn't download well, but it is very consistent powder level, even a tad faster than powder back,
which is unusual, at my max 14.5 Grs under a 158 Gr bullet load.
IMG_5437.jpeg
 
I've heard stories about this sort of thing forever. Back in the day, it was called "squib load detonation" and was a hot topic with PPC shooters, who burned a lot of Bullseye, 2.7 grains at a time.

I obviously can't prove it doesn't happen, but I suspect there is a lot of "correlation vs. causation" stuff at work here. Personally, I kind of doubt that a grain or two of Bullseye contains enough energy to damage a gun under any circumstance - I doubt a grain ot two of TNT would do it, for that matter - but as always, you pays your money and you takes your chance.
 
Walkalong said:
If it had detonated, it would have destroyed the gun.
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It was high pressure. As i said, the recoil was higher, the rim of the brass was ripprd off and left the brass in the chamber, and the extractor was ripped from the bolt

Whilst it did destroy the gun it was higher pressure. Maybe more than a proof load but not enough to blow the receiver.
 
They can't purposely reproduce light load detonation in a lab, but you can reproduce it accidentally? Seems as thought the lab would have accidentally reproduced at least one incident. Just saying.
 
I'll bet they stay in the barrel at that loading. Go up a little to 2.8 and you should be good to go. 3.2 is one of the most accurate load's I've used with the 148 HBW.
 
Walkalong said:
A low charge weight/velocity/cycling test.

Low Charge Weight Velocity & Cycling Test

Curiosity killed the cat, and it almost got me a time or two. ;) Results later today.
www.thehighroad.org
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Interesting. It reminded me of an article that kinda did the experiment suggested at that link. A squib in the blowback gun used in the article stuck a bullet and cycled and loaded a fresh round. They did the same test in a Glock 19, and found it would not cycle with a squib. Interesting result.

americanhandgunner.com

The Extreme Danger of Squibs - American Handgunner

We all know squibs are bad. The most common result is a bullet stuck in the barrel. If the shooter is not aware of what’s happened, they might try to fire the gun again. This could result in the gun exploding and injuring or killing the shooter or bystander.
americanhandgunner.com americanhandgunner.com
 
Heh. :)

Seating the bullets deep like that really helps consistent burn/pressure. Carry on. Care to test six each powder back vs powder forward?
 
Caution, the only bullet I have ever stuck with a reload was because I seated 125 gr bullets to the same .38 Special OAL and same light powder charge as for 158 gr SWC. Bringing the gun up from low ready threw the powder forward against the bullet and the primer flash had a long way to go. Once, too far to ignite. I noticed the first five shots were erratic but kept on and the sixth stuck in the barrel, just protruding from the muzzle of the 2" Model 12.
Opening the cylinder let unburnt powder fall out of case and barrel. It took more of a whack to push the bullet back than I had expected.

So be sure to spot each sub-load on target.
 
Well I fired off about 10 rounds or so. They all went off fine. I checked my charge weights every 5 rounds or so to confirm I was at 1.4 grains of Bullseye. They all seemed pretty consistent.

Nothing got stuck in the bore. You can hear the flat bullet cutting through the air very clearly. It’s like an audible tracer. In addition to this you can actually watch the slug fly through the air up until impact.

I have a 50 pound rock back behind my house probably 100 feet or so and I need to aim a foot or so high to hit it.

Some people have asked what the purpose of these rounds are. Well basically this rifle is an oversized reloadable .22 rifle for me and I’m trying to make the equivalent of a .22 CB cap but in .38 special. And to be honest I’m just messing around and having fun too.

I had a few old pressure treated deck boards I’ve been using for penetration testing. They are very hard. The wadcutter wouldn’t even go through the first board. I compared this to my standard general use load for this rifle which is a Berrys thick plated 158 grain flat point pushed by 5 grains of Unique. The standard load makes it through 3 boards and lodges in the 4th.

IMG_3260.jpeg IMG_3261.jpeg IMG_3262.jpeg IMG_3263.jpeg IMG_3264.jpeg

All in all this has been a lot of fun! I’m going to shoot up the rest of this box over the next few days and reload them again to have on hand.

I appreciate everyone’s help and words do caution.

Thanks,

Dan
 
Also about detonation. So from what I’ve read detonation could possible occur because of too much volume inside the case. This is why I’m seating them back further. They really aren’t crimped either. I just took the bell off the end.

I think the theory of how detonation could occur is that in a large volume case a single grain of powder could develop enough velocity to jump from deflagrating to detonation. Similar to the way it takes a fast enough bullet to get tannerite to detonate. In addition to this the heat buildup inside the case from the primer lowers the velocity required to achieve detonation.

Once again that’s why I’m pushing them further back into the case. To reduce case volume and not give the grains of powder a long runway to build up speed.

Dan
 
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In our commercial days, we loaded tens of thousands of 148 grain hollow based wadcutters over 2.7 grains of Bullseye with never a problem. Out of my K38 over at Gil Hebards using his Ransom rest they'd cluster in one ragged hole at 50 fet. I imagine 3/4" for six. I always shot a whole cylinder for groups. Tell you if there was an off chamber. Mild load.
 
Jim Watson said:
The old NRA Handloader's Guide had a procedure for ultra light loads with Bullseye and .38 wadcutters.
Reduce the powder charge until you stick a bullet. Add back a quarter of a grain. Spot each shot on target to be sure you don't stick another.
Click to expand...
That's one I haven't tried. But as memory runneth, one day in a fit of Wild Hair, I tried lowering my load of Unique By increments, as recommended by a gunzine article of the day. I got it to 2.2 gr. under a cast 158 SWC. It probably...maybe...would have made it from a 2" barrel. but it went about 2 1/2" in my 4". :what: Fortunately, the range had a brass rod of sufficient size, and a vise and hammer. That caused a little kid to ask his mom; "Why is that man hammering on his gun?":rofl: 3.5 gr. Unique/158 cast SWC is as low as I go nowadays, which will get the 158 SWC + 10 gr. Cream of Wheat... a "lead cleaning load", probably from the same gunzine don'tcha know? Out and gone! Haven't tried Bullseye, because my Unique loads are satisfactory...that said, I have 3 powders to playo_O....uhmmm... experiment...yes, EXPERIMENT...that's what I meant to say... with.:cool: Good luck, and be well. And, as always ymmv!
 
PapaG said:
In our commercial days, we loaded tens of thousands of 148 grain hollow based wadcutters over 2.7 grains of Bullseye with never a problem. Out of my K38 over at Gil Hebards using his Ransom rest they'd cluster in one ragged hole at 50 fet. I imagine 3/4" for six. I always shot a whole cylinder for groups. Tell you if there was an off chamber. Mild load.
Click to expand...
That was the std load for 148 hbwcs for years
 
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