Good day at the range

[Kevin]

Some days are better than others when I'm at the range. Today was a pretty good day. I was trying out some new loads for both 357 and 9mm. I was trying Unique as a powder. I've used Unique before, but just for 41 and 45. Previously HP38 and HS6 have been the best 357 powders for me personally. I found 4.3 grains of Unique worked best. 4 grains were good, and accurate, and then I tried 4.3 It just sort of tightened up the groups a little. It's funny how that happens.

Then the 9mm I tried some 700X. two different loads, just a few bullets of each, but enough to see they have enough gusto to work the slide and send the bullet down range. 3.3 and 3.4 grains. Hodgdon's list 3.3 as a start and 3.7 as a max for lead round nose. I tried 2.8 a few weeks ago, but not enough force to operate the slide. Oh well, the 700X seemed fairly accurate too.

What do y'all like for 9mm powder? Are there any which might be even more accurate in my 9mm?

 

[Chuck 100 yd]

HS-6 is a very good powder in the 9mm. Good velocity,low pressure, meaters well and clean burning. I loaded 4K of them in the last few weeks. 124 gr. FMJ over
6.5 gr. HS6 using CCI 500 primer for 1155 fps. From a 5" barrel.

 

[Kevin]

Holy cow! 4000 9mm with 6.5 grains of HS 6 is like 3 and a half pounds of powder! Thanks though, I have some HS6 but need to go find another pound. I'm just not in love with 700X. It doesn't meter very well at all. And the bottle has "HI SKOR" written on it. I just hope the people at Hodgdon can make powder better than they can spell.

 

[Chuck 100 yd]

Hi Scor is a very good shotgun powder for target loads in the 12 ga. And usable in many handgun cartridges.
Yes, you do use more HS6 than say TiteGroup or 700x but one of the things I like about HS6 is the fact it fills the case up when loading 9mm so there is very little chance of double charging unless you worked at it. A double charge would spill all over the bench. Low pressure means it is not beating your gun up. Case life is longer.
Very accurate, feed and eject well from all of my 9mm's ( 6 semiautos ,3 revolvers).

 

[Jimbo357mag]

If you like Unique you should try Universal sometime. It is all that and a little bit more, it meters better, it's a little bit cleaner, and it smells like an apple orchard when you shoot it, at least to me.

 

[Chuck 100 yd]

Oh , I forgot, the name ' Hi Skor ' was a trademarked name for that powder back when it was being made by DuPont. Hodgdon aquired the rights to it and kept the name to avoid confusion. That is my story and I am sticking to it !!!

 

[phonejack]

With 124's I've settled on hp-38.

 

[Ka6otm]

I use 4.7 Grains of Bullseye under a 115 Grain Plated bullet for 9MM at this time.

I used to use 5.0 grains of Unique a few years ago, though.

 

[Chuck 100 yd]

There are many good powders for use in the 9mm. Just be carefull of double charges when loading fast powders. Several will allow double charges to fit in even that tiny case.

 

[cleardatum]

If you like Unique you should try Universal sometime. It is all that and a little bit more, it meters better, it's a little bit cleaner, and it smells like an apple orchard when you shoot it, at least to me.

i'll second the vote for universal. power pistol is also nice. meters real well. clean.