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Old June 25, 2000, 01:52 PM   #1
sjones
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What causes this and how can it be avoided? Some of my reloads do this,not all but every once in a while,thanks sj
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Old June 25, 2000, 02:37 PM   #2
Mike Irwin
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SJones,

You need to tell us exactly WHAT you're loading, powder, bullet, primer, case, and what you're shooting it in.

There are a TON of things that can cause this problem, from bullets that are too hard or too soft to a shot-out barrel on an older gun.

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Old June 25, 2000, 03:08 PM   #3
sjones
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I am shooting a new kimber ultra carry and loading 200 grain swcs,4.8 grains tite group,cci primers,win cases,and setting the oal at 1.245.also a couple of 230 round noses did the same thing. same loading except the oal was 1.260. I set the crimp at .470 on both loads.
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Old June 25, 2000, 07:46 PM   #4
CCV
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Try some factory ammo to see if it a reloading problem or gun problem.

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Old June 25, 2000, 08:31 PM   #5
El Chimango Pete
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Last IPSC i participated (after a fashion - i never compete in IPSC these days - just sort of wander through the courses of fire shooting up things more or less according to the layout - I had reloaded some 230 gn lead ahead of just under 6 gns Unique - i know they were keyholing because many of the paper targets had holes the exact shape of the round nose lead slug - sideways. Very amusing - about 800 fps and a loud bang that sure got everyones attention, as well as a lot of smoke and that very special smell of burned Unique (wonder if thats why they called it that? together with Hoppes #9 must be one of the aromas that contribute towards making shooting such a delight) - but i digress
The pistol in this case was a Ballester Molina - a 1911 near-clone. Never keyholed - in this case, tumbled, bullets before and i figure there may hvae been at least two related problems:
(1) was driving too fast and
(2) the problem seemed to progress along the course ... about 160 shots in total. Unique is especially 'dirty' and velocity (as well as general perfomance) may have been a culprit as the barrel generally coked up. But then again, I may be completely wrong.

Peter Knight - Cordoba - Argentina
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Old June 25, 2000, 09:01 PM   #6
Archie
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The only problem I ever had with keyholing was from a Ruger single action 357M. If I recall correctly, I used 158 lead bullets and a fairly stiff charge of Unique. My thought is that the bullets (locally made) were too soft and were stripping in the rifling, not spinning correctly.

Someone argue with me if required, but the only reason for bullets "tumbling" in flight is instability due to lack of spin. Yes? No?



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Old June 25, 2000, 10:49 PM   #7
Mike Irwin
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With that setup my first guesses are that:

(lead bullet, right?)

1. The bullet is too soft and is stripping through the rifling.

2. The bullet is too hard and the powder charge isn't enough to make it "upset" into the bore.

3. The bullet is undersized.



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Old June 26, 2000, 12:24 PM   #8
Hutch
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Yeoww! I concur w/ CCV. You have to have realllllly messed up reloads to get that kind of action. I'm not familiar w/ Titegroup, but it sounds as if you have your specs in line. Ummmmmmm.... try field stripping the pistol after the keyholing starts and see if you can still see those funny spiral marks in the barrel. Let us know what turns out to be the problem
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Old June 26, 2000, 03:00 PM   #9
Quantrill
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In addition to all of the other excellent suggestions, add, make sure the forcing cone is clear of lead. Once had a lot of trouble with a leaded forcing cone upsetting the lead bullets. Quantrill
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Old June 26, 2000, 06:02 PM   #10
beemerb
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Mike the slugs you are useing!The only time I had a that problem was with undersize slugs for the bore.The other problem would be oversize bore and you have some bullets harder then what you normaly use.They are not expanding to bore size.So I would do 2 things.
1-mike bullets
2-slug bore

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