Help reloading Frontier CMJ 245 gr. bullets for 44 Mag.

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schick

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I want to load up this big old box of 44 mag CMJ bullets from Frontier. They are not the usual 240 grain bullets I load for, but 245 grains. These bullets seem to have a copper plating rather than the usual copper jacket. I don't know why they went with 245 instead of the common 240 grains.:confused:

Can anyone suggest a load? I have a few pounds of 2400 on hand I'd like to use, as well as a bunch of magnum primers (needed?). I just don't want to use 240 grain loads, as they might be hot. I have reloaded for a few years, but have never experimented with loads for strange bullet weights.

Alos, I have never tried these before (someone else's loads). I wonder if anyone can tell what these are like. Anybody enjoying these bullets?
 
That little bullet weight difference won't change much, I've often adapted data to load unusual bullet weights. Just drop your initial charge by a few tenths of a grain.

If you want my advice here, my experience in the matter has taught me that CMJ bullets aren't suited to high-power magnum revolver cartridges. I only use CMJ bullets in reduced-power cartridges using faster powder. My reasoning's this: Slow-burning powder (2400, H110, W296) requires a heavy crimp on the bullet to ensure adequate combustion, and by their very nature CMJ bullets don't like heavy crimps.

Before I knew better, I used to load 125gr. CMJ in my .357, with slow-burning powder and a heavy crimp. I would get quite a bit of copper shooting out the cylinder gap, the copper plating was clearly coming undone because of the heavy crimp and higher velocities.

If I were you I'd keep the Frontier bullets for reduced-power loads using powder that doesn't require too much of a crimp, and buy FMJs for slower powders and bigger bangs.
 
Thanks.

Damn, I have to admit I never considered the crimp issue. Sounds to me like these won't be any good for silhoutte. I'll try these out with regular range loads.
 
I use them with 22 grains of H110 and they shoot accurately for me. I did try 23 grains, but I found that the bullets tended to jump the crimp, since they don't have much of a crimp groove.

I think that 240 grain bullet data will be fine as long as you start at the minimum and work up.
 
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