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If the old ammo was as hot as you claim and it wasn't causing problems, why then did SAAMI reduce the pressure limit as you claim they did?
I'll answer that one but then SP can defend himself and answer it as well. I am convinced they reduced the pressure limit simply because of liability and the lawyers. Litigation is so bloody expensive these days people and corporations go to even ridiculous lengths to avoid it.
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I still fail to understand why, if the old ammo was just fine and wasn't causing problems, the lawyers would have problems with it. A good lawyer isn't going to tell his client to make their product less marketable for no good reason. I'm sorry but I just don't buy that the ammo-makers and their lawyers suddenly turned into a bunch of spineless bed-wetters without some precipitating incident.
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I've used this argument before and will repeat it here. When I got into guns and reloading (late 1960s & early 1970s) the standard load for the 38 Special "service round" was a 158g RN cast bullet over 3.5g Bullseye. This delivered around 850 fps from a 6" barrel (like the M14) and closer to 800 fps from a 4" barrel (like a M10). I personally knew a number of shooters who had fired tens of thousands of rounds of that hand load and most of it through K-frame S&Ws. The first Star reloader I ever saw was set up to turn out that very load of 38 Special.
That level of performance is what I have recently chronographed from so called +P FBI loads, i.e. 800 fps from 4" barrels.
Today's 38 Special ammunition is wimpy. There's no other way to explain it and no other name for it.
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Was 850 from a 6" barrel your chronograph numbers or what was listed in the loading manual? The reason I ask is because Alliant still lists a very similar load as a standard pressure .38 Special (they currently list it with a SWC instead of a LRN bullet) and they now claim it to go 814fps from a 6" barrel.
http://www.alliantpowder.com/reloade...tid=30&bdid=52
My suspicion is that the old loads never were as hot as you and SaxonPig seem to think that they were, it's just that improvements in both accuracy and availability of chronographs have made the ammo makers and loading manuals more honest over the years.