Originally Posted by Hammerman
"I have a WWII luger that I've been shooting winchester white box in. Now I'm starting to reload the brass using 115 fmj with CCI 500 primers.
"In that article, it states that a slow burning powder is best for the luger and it recommends a load of 4.1grs. of Red Dot.
Red Dot is nowhere near the original powder, but will shoot nicely in a Luger, anyway. With 115 grain bullets, your load should be between 3.8 to 4.1 grains. Load up a full magazine of 8, each, of these and test for function and accuracy. Getting your pistol to function properly and accurately is your goal and somewhere in this range you will find the "correct" load that your pistol prefers.
"It say that Red Dot is the closest to the original German loads. The part I don't understand is that when you look at the powder burn charts, Red Dot is in the top 5 for one of the fastest burning powders??? So is Red Dot really good to use, or was the magazine wrong?
"Experts" come and go in the magazine world, but a really excellent article, on making the Luger shoot accurately, was written in Handloader Magazine, No 41, January-Feburary 1973, page 32, by Ken Waters. (Private Message me for a copy).
The two best powders I have found for a 9mm Luger, after years of study, are:
SR4756 and Power Pistol. These two are, indeed, near to the original DWM powder. Each is capable of both excellent accuracy and perfect function in a Luger (X ring for eight rounds fired with perfect function).
Ken had just about everything down perfectly except the proper OAL issue. In fact, his loads were so short that he could only fire five in a magazine without jamming his Luger. When loaded to proper OAL, you can easily shoot a full eight rounds without an issue.
"Also, I'm using rcbs dies and it's had to get the bullet to seat straight. I know you want the bullet to be seated out farther with the luger, but the farther you seat it out, the harder it is to get the bullet seated straight.
You need to, ever so slightly, bell the mouths of your cases. This should eliminate this issue.
With a round nose bullet, your OAL should be 1.173 inches. I know, this seems very long, but the pistol was designed to shoot cartridges of this length.
"Thanks for any help.
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