Newbie. 9mm grouping badly

R

ravohs

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Hi,

I'm new to reloading. I'm using a dillon 650 with mr bullet feeder. I'm shooting out of a glock 17.

I bought some reloads from a local company. I'm getting 3-4" groups at 25 yards. They are 124gn loaded with titegroup

I'm making my loads with 124gn bdx bullets (the gold ones for reference in the photos). They are grouping all over the place at 25 yards. If I had to guess I would say a foot and a half (and for some reason the middle of this grouping has shifted to the left). My original thought was my crimping was squishing the bullet. I pulled a few bullets and measured to new ones and they are the same. My second thought was that the bullets I'm using are a smaller diameter then the ones that group well. Not the case. I tried the ones I'm loading over a chrono (I don't own one yet) and they were consistent 1070-1080fps. I'm using the dillon 9mm carbide die set. I have changed the flare/powder drop out to the mr bullet feeder one per the install manual. Testing was as follows. 20 of mine grouping all over. 20 purchased reloads grouping tight. 20 of mine grouping all over. My load right now is 4.1gn titegroup 500 cci small pistol.


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A pistol will have a preference for a load. You know what it does not like. Find out what it does like.

First, clean the barrel. It might be badly fouled. Use a copper removing solvent. Let it soak over night a couple of times, till the patches come out clean.

Assuming your ammo is well made, try different powder charges. TiteGroup is a good choice.

Try 3.2, 3.5, 3.8 and 4.1. 10 of each and shoot some groups.
 
OK. I'll try a couple different powder loads. I was hoping it was something obvious that I was doing wrong. My plan is to use these in ipsc production so my fps does matter. The bullets are bdx and I was told that they are a great product. Could my oal have anything to do with it? Should I seat them lower?
 
Many handgun shooters are disappointed with their groups at 25 yards but never established basics at five yards.
Using a plain piece of paper for your target, fire one round to establish your aiming point and now try to group.
When you start producing groups under two inches and approaching 1", you can move to 10 yards.
This is one of the best educational strategies I have seen.
Since your groups have started moving to the left, I have include the "Clock Analysis".
When having a problem, limit the maximum number of rounds fired to 50 and then analyse your errors. Firing more than 50 rounds will only compound errors.
Producing good reloads is fairly basic so with groups expanding as you report it might be the shooter rather than the gun or the reloads.

 
See the thing is I can only shoot at 25. When I shoot my purchased reloads I'm in a 3" circle. When I fire the ones I reloaded I'm in an 18" circle and a bit left of were I was grouping before. I'm taking my time with every shot. I will do 20 of mine all over the place. 20 purchased tight. 20 of mine all over the place. Then 20 purchases in a nice group.
 
I assume the bullet does not touch the rifling. If it does not touch the rifling OAl is not the issue.

Try the different powder charges. If they all suck, it is something else. if 3.5 shoots a tight cluster, but does not make PF, you need a slower powder, like Power Pistol. Tightgroup is an accuracy powder, not a power powder.

One thing to check. How much are you flaring the case mouth? It should be just barely enough to allow the bullet to start. the crimp should be just barely enough to remove the flare.
 
When I first loaded my 9mm's I used federal 124g ammo as a reference and made my reloaded rounds exactly the same dimensions and they fired about the same with common target loads of Bullseye.
 
My flare is 0.005 when I zero the calipers out a bit from the top. My crimp is set to 0.001 or 0.000 5 depending what round I measure. On the crimp I did a full stroke. Screwed down hand tight. Dropped the plate. Gave it a 1/4 turn tighter. Then locknut in place. I also pulled the crimped bullet and checked that it measured the same as before. I think tomorrow I will try the different weights of powder to see how it affects the group. I also have w231 here so if I get it grouping well but not enough fps I'll try a different powder.
 
Pull one of the reloads that work, measure the bullet diameter. Is it .355 by chance, for most 9mm I ever loaded I use .355 with a taper crimp. Only used .356 for my 38super.

Just a thought
 
Which are your loads, the OAL of 1.128 or 1.142? That's a fair bit of variation. I had a case where my reloads were actually tumbling out of my Sig 226. I moved them out about 1/16th of an inch and the groups tightened up considerably and the tumbling disappeared. Not saying this is your problem but I would certainly experiment with a variety of seating depths.
 
The gold color are the ones that don't work. 1.142 is from the ones that work but may be one that i tried to pull (on further measuring they are all around 1.134). 1.128 are the ones that I was putting together. Would 0.006 oal change this? I think I'll try the powder thing first and if that doesn't get me my results I'll mess with oal.
 
I think the powder is where to start. My 9mm CZ likes Unique and CFE pistol. Hates N320 so far. Have yet to try my W231. Unique is cool as my CZ, my Gp100, and my dads Alfa all like it. I guess it is Unique after all.
 
OK. So I changed the powder loads and didn't see a change. Someone told me I wasn't crimping enough. So I put more of a crimp on till it was leaving a ring around the bullet when I pulled it. Something I noticed is that the ring is deeper on one side and actually comes off a bit on the other side. On further investigation I see that my bullet seater only contacts the tip of the bullet. Is it putting it in off center? Is there something that will fit my bullet better than the Dillon die?
 
On the advice of others I tumbled the bullets to remove some sort of lubricant that was on it and I also increased the flare a bit. The grouping is night and day. Now it's time to get a chrono and fine tune this load.
 
ravohs said:
On further investigation I see that my bullet seater only contacts the tip of the bullet. Is it putting it in off center? Is there something that will fit my bullet better than the Dillon die?
Click to expand...

If you are running dillon dies, the seater can be flipped for round nose and flat point bullets. Pull the clip and it drops our of the die.
 
About the projectile, my glock like copper metal jacket,plate bullets a little bit worse if you shoot 25yds
 
Tend to agree with horseman2--may not be entirely a reloading issue. While I love my old Glock 17 it's not for its accuracy or repeatability compared e.g. to my equally ancient Ruger 22 (lighter, less kick) or S&W 686 (357 magnum, heavier, more kick). Shoots the same no matter what commercial ammo or what combination of components I've tried, perhaps slightly better after replacing the stock barrel with a rifled Storm Lake barrel. In my case dismissed it as an "It's me, not you" problem--I just can't adapt to it.
 
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