OAL for 45 ACP Hornady JHP XTP 185 grain?

You can't guess, you need to check your own chamber. HDY JHP contact your barrels rifling very close to the tip of the bullet so they tend to be seated shorter than other profiles like a round nose. I have to make the OAL around 1.195" for the HDY JHPs.

Easiest way to check you barrel is;
-take the barrel out of the gun (this is going to be your case checker)
-make a dummy round, a little long
-drop it in the barrel and press with your thumb.
-turn upside down and if it doesn't fall out, It is too long
-repeat seating the bullet 5 thou in further until you get consistent ones that fall out
A good length is about 2-5 thou shorter than the length of the ones that falls out but you can play with that.
Note do to shorter OAL your pressures will be higher so you need to start at the low end of the powder recommendation and work up.
 
Following intuition, I started out seating "stubbie" JSWC bullets way short but using the clunk test as recommended here by Seagull, I found the manuals not to be wrong. Bullets seem to be designed to take the necessary into account. Seat a dummy to "max" COL, verify using the clunk test and shorten (if necessary) by .01 increments till your rounds pass. Longer is better as long as cartridges pass this test, fit your magazine and can be ejected without issue.
 
Using the barrel as a chamber gauge, as described above, is a real good idea.

I have a number of 45s and find that the throat dimensions vary, with the Norinco being the shortest. They need bullets to be seated about 10 thou deeper than other other makes.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom