bullet acronyms

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basicbill

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I'm beginning my reloading experience!
I bought some 9mm, 124 grain, RN (round nose?) Berry bullets.
I am using Titegroup as my powder.
Using the Hodgdons Chart, I see 125 grain bullets listed with the following acronyms....
125 gn LCN
125 gn SIE FMJ

Obviously I'm ok with gn (grain) and FMJ (full metal jacket) but I don't know what LCN or SIE are referring to.

Also, if anyone is using this combo and would be willing to share their recipe...would be much appreciated.
 
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I'm surprised there isn't a sticky for this here already.

SIE is the short version of Sierra; the brand of bullet manufacturer.

RN - round nose
LCN - lead conical nose (no jacket, just lead)
LRN - lead round nose (no jacket, just lead)
FMJ - full metal jacket
TMJ - total metal jacket (even the base is sealed in copper)
MC - metal clad (generally the same as FMJ)
PMJ - partial metal jacket (often just called "jacketed")
SP - soft point or spire point (depends on manufacturer)
RFN - rounded flat nose (round nose with a flat bit at the tip)
WC - wad cutter
SWC - semi wad cutter
TC - truncated cone
HP - hollow point
BT - boat tail
HB - hollow base (base expands into the rifling upon firing)

I'm sure I'm missing a bunch since this is just off the top of my head.

There are also a lot of brand specific ones like Hornady's FTX, GMX, and XTP. Barnes has their TSX, TTSX, and MTX. Names with an "X" in them sell better (really, there where marketing studies on this.)
 
Acronyms can also be put together as in SPBT. .Spire point boattail or HBWC...hollow base wad cutter. I think the yearly hodgdon manual has an acronym listing for alot of them.
 
Nicely done and I would like to add/clarify a couple of additional

TMJ is actually a Total Metal Jacket, which is a plated bullet(originally copyrighted by Speer but seems to be improperly used by numerous mfgr.)
EMJ Encapsulated Metal Jacket, again another name for a plated bullet
CMJ is a Complete Metal Jacket NOT a plated but rather an actual full metal jacket with a small copper disc at the base to cover the exposed lead. Again it is often used incorrectly to describe a plated bullet

Theres more but these are the most common ones where they are often described incorrectly.
Cheers
dB
 
OP: I couldn't figure out what SIE stands for so I did a Google search for 125 gr SIE FMJ and the first result was a 1911 forum post where someone asked the same question you did.

Turns out that SIE means Sierra
 
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