favorite 9mm load for your P08 and P38's
 

Curious what's your favorite loads?

Found some 700x which some I've heard others say is working very well for their 9mm (modern).

I also have some CFE pistol, haven't tried it yet.

What powders have you tried in your p08 and / or p38's and what did you like not like about it?

9mm load
 

I use a medium load of Green Dot for all my 9mm loads. I have fired the loads with 115 gr jacketed bullets in my P08s, LP08 (Artillery), and P38s. Bill

I like AA#5 for casual plinking loads. As a ball powder, it meters much better than the flake powders, very consistent charge weights. 5.8gr with a 124gr bullet or 6.0 with a 115 make a fairly mild load that wont beat up your gun.

so with p38's I've heard in reloading forums that you should never go above 115gr. Not sure I'm following the pressure reason, especially if you're reloading and not hitting the +P or self defense pressures.
You guys use 124,147s in lugers and p38s? I see 124 above for luger.

I have some 700x and CFE pistol. Can't find AA2 or 5. Love their 7. hopefully one of these will burn cleaner. Might have a HP-38 lined up. (I collect powder too. trade all the brass I can for powder and projectiles).

Hi,

For the Luger, I've personally found Power Pistol, SR4756, AA#5 (particularly outstanding with lead bullets), HS6, and for a fast powder, Bullseye, all to be excellent, and in that order. With all of these, my most accurate loads are all below 1,100fps.

As to the 115 grain statement for the P-38, they were designed to shoot 123 grain bullets, so this is somewhat of a mystery to me.

On your BYF 43 Mauser produced P-38s, there was a production flaw that lead to slid cracking during that year's production. Be careful with your loading if you have one of these.

I, personally, won't load or shoot 147gr bullets through my Lugers or P-38s, as they were not designed for them.

Hope this helps.


Sieger

Byf43 cracked slides
 

Sieger- will you expand on the slide cracking problem with byf43's? Was this a widespread problem specific to that year's Mauser P38s or what? Was a cause determined? Thanks, Bill

Hi,

Sure. I read about this years ago, I think, in the American Rifleman.

This was the first year of mass Mauser production of the P-38.

It really is quite simple. Where the locking block engages the slide, the area there is quite thin compared to the other areas of the slide. Right at that point is where the failure occurs, and usually, for some reason, on the right side of the slide.

Later production cured this issue, with some modification. I don't know whether the heat treating was involved or not. This problem persisted into the postwar models as well, and the frame and slide of the pistol went through several modifications.

Fast forward to our adoption of the M9. The M9 also had slide cracking issues in early production, because it uses a similar locking block as did the P-38. This system can be traced back as far as the locking block used on the Mauser C96 pistol.

Hope this helps.


Sieger

The powder situation is STILL pretty bad...going on three years it's at the point of absurdity....I like AA5744 for my .45-70 buffalo loads...found one can of it at Sportsman's Warehouse yesterday...35 DOLLARS. :crying:

Hi,

Well, you may remember the fake gas shortages of the 1970s. The government certainly didn't tell us the truth then either, did they?

The powder is all being bought up by the government, as is the ammo, specifically, pistol ammo.

This has been documented fairly well, and even Congress has been asked to investigate it. Ball-less as they are, I'm sure they won't.

For a good powder, that is available, even on sale, try Blackhorn 209. This is an outstanding powder that is really a smokeless formula that has been formulated to produce some smoke. It will definitely fill your 45-70 cases and give you great velocity. I use it in my 11mm Mausers and it is fantastic both in velocity and accuracy. Give it a try.

Sieger

Sieg...is it at all corrosive like Pyrodex? The smokeless wouldn't be, but wondering about the smoke producing part.

"Gunpowder shortage", it's something unconceivable, I thought that phase was over now, I've ben using my reloads for about 15 years now, and not to be able to reload because of powder shortage would be awful for me, also because if I'm not wrong this situation has been going on for quite a long time now!

Sergio

Hi,

Blackhorn 209 is totally noncorrosive and cleans up with your traditional oil based solvents; whereas, Pyrodex is horrible in both accuracy and cleanup.

Try it, I know you will like the results. I certainly did!!!

Sieger

Hi,

It's a criminal fraud!

Sieger

>Well, you may remember the fake gas shortages of the 1970s. The government certainly didn't tell us the truth then either, did they?

I remember the press covering a bunch of oil tankers off the SF coast to show that the oil companies were holding oil back. However, every ship was floating rather high, showing they were all EMPTY.
Go complain to OPEC.

Finally got to the range today. 700x loads at 3.3, 3.5 and 3.7 very small window there from min to max according to the data.

3.5 gave the best accuracy. 3.3 was livable accuracy, 3.7 wow. pretty hot, put a ring at the end of the brass. Primers began to flatten a little.
All loads cycled perfectly even the lowest locked the lug on empty mag. COAL was 1.125 which seems to get me perfect feed results in all my mags new and old.

Will be sticking with 3.5 as it was a 3 inch grouping at 12 yards free standing no rest.

Got 3 lbs of Unique in a trade for some brass just this past week, going to try it out next. 4.5, 5.0 and 5.5 workups. Can't wait.

To Bob, asking about power availability.

About the first of this year, pistol powders began showing up again at the reloading store and gunshows in the area.

The store had BE-86 priced at about $19 (it's the new formulation of BullsEye) as well as RedDot. The BE-86 is less dense, and meters more per load than other powders. I got 8 pounds of the new Hodgdon CFE Pistol powder for $178 at our local gunshow. This is in the Triad and Triangle regions of North Carolina.

The shows were selling out of what pistol powder that they had before the end of the weekends.

As to the loadings, I had been using a moderate load of Hodgden HP-38 (also Winchester W231) behind a 115gn jacketed round nose bullet, and never had problems with cycling or feed on a matched 1937 Mauser shooter Luger I have. I've also shot truncated cone cast lead in the same configuration without any problem.

Now that the old powder is gone, I'll give the new powders a try.

Marc

I have found Unique powder to give me the kind of reliability and performance that I was looking for in my Lugers. The other powder that I can personally recommend is Power Pistol. Both of these powders are non-existent for sale in my part of the Country, but I keep a good inventory. Both of these powders are medium burners.