Light .40 S&W Loads?

[Doublehelix]

Looking to make some light .40 S&W loads for Steel Challenge.

Anyone have any loads they would like to share? There is no Power Factor in SCSA, so no need to have a minimum except that which will cycle the gun 100% reliably. I am open to recoil spring changes if necessary, but that would not be optimal.

These are for my STI 2011, which takes long cartridges, I am currently loading to 1.180" for Major PF.

 

[VERT]

Make Right With a ".40 Lite"

 

[madvarminter]

i tried that in my sti and figured out pretty quick a spring change was in order to make the light loads work

 

[Doublehelix]

Make Right With a ".40 Lite"

i tried that in my sti and figured out pretty quick a spring change was in order to make the light loads work

Thanks guys. I will see what I can come up with, and as I mentioned I am not totally opposed to a spring change. I have been shooting steel with my 9mm SIG, and thought it might be better to be consistent and use the same gun for both USPSA and SCSA. Same gun, same holster, etc.

Swapping springs is not the hardest job in the world, but it can be easy to get the springs mixed up if you are not careful and then have a bevy of misfires on your first stage of a match until you can get to the safe table and get the right spring installed. I can see myself forgetting to change the spring, being in a hurry the morning of a match and messing things up.

 

[madvarminter]

yeah i have a pile of springs now and really no way to tell what is what
swapped my 9x23 barrel into my 38 super colt and had an 11 lb spring in it OOPs just took one round to figure it out but dang

 

[1mil-high]

I used to load 4.2 grains of Titegroup under a 180 FP FMJ and OAL 1.125 with pretty good results. I, however, didn't use them in a STI. Mine were used in a Glock 27 and Glock 22.





**Use the load data at your own risk

 

[kennedy759]

the problem I have with light loads is the gun shooting high, the bullet is still in the barrel when it starts to flip up from recoil, this happened in my sig 226 .40 and 38 loads for my python.

 

[Doublehelix]

I used to load 4.2 grains of Titegroup under a 180 FP FMJ and OAL 1.125 with pretty good results. I, however, didn't use them in a STI. Mine were used in a Glock 27 and Glock 22.

Were those hitting minor power factor do you know?

the problem I have with light loads is the gun shooting high, the bullet is still in the barrel when it starts to flip up from recoil, this happened in my sig 226 .40 and 38 loads for my python.

Hmmmm... never thought of that. My 9 mm mouse fart loads for my P226 seem to be pretty accurate honestly, but this is a really interesting post, and I need to think about this some more. Thanks.

 

[actaeon277]

would painting the springs help identify them?
Pick a color for light load, and a color for defense?

 

[ckcollins2003]

the problem I have with light loads is the gun shooting high, the bullet is still in the barrel when it starts to flip up from recoil, this happened in my sig 226 .40 and 38 loads for my python.

How long is your barrel?!?!


Back on topic... just gonna leave the math out of that lol. I loaded my light .40's for my Glock 22 with 4.0 gns of Titegroup and 180 gn Xtreme's with great results. That was with a well worn factory spring and double taps were easily controllable. I think the trick is to keep a dowel rod handy while testing your loads, just in case. I just found that 4.0 was on target with my sights and had very light recoil.

 

[Doublehelix]

would painting the springs help identify them?
Pick a color for light load, and a color for defense?

I thought about doing that as a matter of fact. Right now, I keep them all in well-marked baggies and it is a recipe for disaster.

 

[Doublehelix]

Back on topic... just gonna leave the math out of that lol. I loaded my light .40's for my Glock 22 with 4.0 gns of Titegroup and 180 gn Xtreme's with great results. That was with a well worn factory spring and double taps were easily controllable. I think the trick is to keep a dowel rod handy while testing your loads, just in case. I just found that 4.0 was on target with my sights and had very light recoil.

Thanks. Great advice about the dowel rod. I went to the range the other day with a laser sight bore in my gun that I could not get out for anything. I was ticked because I did not have a dowel then too. I need to put one in my range bag for sure.

Thanks for the load info. I have tons of titegroup. I was thinking about trying a lighter bullet, 165 gr or less. Higher velocity sort of idea, but if the charge is higher, than the felt recoil might be more as well.

 

[Good on paper]

You could just grow a pair and shoot major power loads
I put together some 180gr blues with 3.8gr 231 and they were soft but ran with a #12 spring. The plates in a rack would fall over rather than be knocked down. They were a little sooty but not too bad and I didn’t feel like reliability was going to be an issue.
I’ll load some up tomorrow and give them another try

 

[Doublehelix]

You could just grow a pair and shoot major power loads
I put together some 180gr blues with 3.8gr 231 and they were soft but ran with a #12 spring. The plates in a rack would fall over rather than be knocked down. They were a little sooty but not too bad and I didn’t feel like reliability was going to be an issue.
I’ll load some up tomorrow and give them another try

That's awesome, thanks for the post. You mention reliability (most important), but how was the accuracy? (Good/fair/poor?)

Is this is a 2011 or another type of gun. Do you happen to remember what COAL you loaded to?

Thanks again.

 

[Good on paper]

I actually rolled some last night and ran them at the range this afternoon
1.185” oal out of a Edge with tri topped and lightened slide
They weren’t stupid light, probably like a 9mm out of a polymer gun. I shot 50 rounds after 200+ 4.2 WST so the gun was a little dirty but it never felt sluggish.
I was shooting a plate rack at 15 yards so i didn’t really see any accuracy difference but it was a little faster
I had some powder flecks on my arms after as well
I think I’m gonna try some WST at 3.5 - 3.7 gr, there seemed to be a lot of room in the case with the 231 and I’ve heard that contributes to incomplete burn

 

[romack991]

I shoot 40 minor for production. 165gr SNS RNFP, 1.125 OAL 3.6gr TG was ~132PF, 3.8gr TG is ~138PF with my Stock II.
I also used 180s but slide felt a little sluggish. Log shows I used 3.2 TG at 1.125 but I didn't record the PF. Wouldn't notice a difference in a match but 165s are cheaper so I went with those.
For reference, 165s with 4.8gr TG and 1.125 runs 170 PF for major.

 

[Mattroth54]

Just from a price prospective, SNS has some coated 140gr 40 bullets that I thought would be interesting to work up for a light load. Published load data is very limited. Anyone messed around with these?

 

[Twangbanger]

I also shoot 40 minor for Production. 4.6 of Ramshot under a 180*will cycle my 226 stainless elite with a 9mm (red) spring and eject well clear, while the same load just barely (but reliably) bubbles out of a G35 with the stock spring in place. This is about 140 PF in the SIG, last I checked.

(* Berry's plated)

 

[Doublehelix]

I just ordered some Bayou Bullets 140 gr., 155 gr., and 165 gr. to do some load workups. Should be here early next week.

Not exactly sure what I am going to use here, but I might try TiteGroup, WST or W231 (or maybe Bullseye). I got 200 of each bullet weight, and I like to work up 20-25 of each load to get a good feel for the performance and accuracy. The W231 is the slowest of that group, so I might pass on the W231 for the first run through.

I am not totally opposed to spring changes as I have mentioned multiple times, but boy it sure would be nice to run the same springs for both Major and Minor... I'm probably dreaming, but hey, this is America!!!

 

[Good on paper]

3.6 gr WST filled the case pretty well but I’m guessing that it’s not going to be as soft shooting as we’re looking for because some people are getting major out of 4.2 gr.
I might run a couple 3.4 to see how they feel and cycle