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I began reloading “back in the day” with a Lee Loader: simple, slow, one at a time. Components were available and cheap from several store fronts where I lived at the time. How times have changed. Things were still pretty good until 2008. Then, backdoor gun control started making it difficult and expensive to obtain reloading components, especially primers. To this day, they are scarce as hens teeth and when you CAN find them, prices have shot (no pun intended) through the roof.
All this to say, that during this period I became resourceful in my searches and researches. I discovered Shooters World powders at a much lower price and AVAILABLE from Midsouth Shooters in Clarksville, TN. I bought some, tried it, loved it. When the big name-brands couldn’t be found, Shooters World and Midsouth Shooters came through. To this day, although prices and availability have eased somewhat, I still use their powders for various calibers. Primers are still almost unobtainium. I like Longshot and the Shooters World equivalent. Never an issue or complaint.
(FYI…when I was desperate for powder, I actually broke down shotshells and used the powder from them!)
What’s your choice and experience? Let us know.
Until later / hasta luego,
Jd
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Well when I started down the 10mm “Rabbit Hole” at the start of 1990 local 10mm ammo was easy to find.
Therefore, being a seasoned handloader it was an easy step to load my own 10mm ammo even though data wasn’t published yet and internet was not what it is today. Having used Hercules Blue Dot for years, I started developing loads to feed my S&W 1006. I was packing 10.5 grains under the Hornady 200 XTP’s back then which had a more Truncated Cone (TC) profile. With my cast from COWW the RCBS 175 grain TC/SWC and Lyman 175 TC I used my most accurate 10.4 grain Blue Dot loadings.
Ast time marched on I used Accurate Arms #7 and #9, Power Pistol to add to the mix. Then as I learned more about other powders like Hodgdon LongShot, IMR 800X which were producing some extreme velocities for the serious ballistic potential.
Powders like Winchester Action Pistol produced good results but it was discontinued, then this powder became available again under Ramshot as what we know as Silhouette using the exact same loading charge weighs as the Action Pistol.
More recently I have added Hodgdon CFE Pistol, Winchester AutoComp but my favorite new powder is the Alliant BE-86 for excellent results.A few years back Rocky Mountain Reloaders (RMR) had some 40 caliber 200grain pulled bullets that they were selling. “Mr. Wilcox said he only had 9000 for sale (in all is years this is the first he had ever ran across) & they came from ATK an expired lot they never sold in .40 Cal. the Speer expert said they were never release for production only a few thousand was sold out of 50,000 produced.”
These were from a contract run of Law Enforcment 40S&W ammunition by Speer.
Here is what I found out about that contract ammo:
SPEER® LE GOLD DOT® DUTY AMMUNITION 40 S&W
Designed to deliver the high performance today’s law enforcement officers demand. Each Speer® LE Gold Dot® bullet is individually engineered to provide shot-to-shot uniformity and ensure optimum performance when fired through a variety of barriers. The result is a cartridge that provides officers the ultimate defense in lethal force confrontations.
Specifications:
Part Number: 53883
Bullet Style: GDHP
Caliber: 40 S&W
Test Barrel Length in Inches: 4
Bullet Weight (Grains/Grams): 200 / 12.96
Ballistic Coefficient: 0.21
Muzzle Velocity: 915 FPS
Muzzle Energy: 372 FT LBSLong story but myself and others were able to precure some of these bulled bullets at great prices back then! I secured 1200 of these 200 grain GDHP’s. I loaded my run of these with LongShot powder.
Tested Jan/1/2014 one of the Speer 200 grain Gold Dots I had previously loaded to 1265 fps using 9.4 grains of LongShot.
Projectile penetrated 4 gallon water jugs but was stuck in the partial hole in the back of fourth gallon jug. One petal was in the third jug but the rest was in the 4th jug. These were pushing the extremes but were hard hitters. However I decided to decrease the charge weight slightly as shown here:
SPEER 200 grain Gold Dot-HP
9.2 grains LongShot
CCI 350 Large Pistol Primers
Velocity 1230 fps COAL 1.2550”Well I begged SPEER ever since then to produce a Gold Dot 200 grain offering over the years. This eventually led to them selling 10mm ammo with their new SPEER Personal Protection 200 grain Gold Dot Hollow Point ammunition #54000. As we saw from the Documented pull-down Speer was loading these with NEW Alliant BE-86 powder as follows:
BE-86 7.2 grains, C.O.A.L.: 1.2520”
Muzzle Velocity: 1150 fps (Actual velocity 1010 fps)
Muzzle Energy: 587 ft. lbsI never gave up and continued to beg to make these a handloader’s component as well. To everyone’s surprise they eventually did produce the 200gr GDHP projectile for handloading consumers. Sad story is the political climate changed things drastically and everything related to our hobby of handloading components has gone through dried up with no supplies, to some supplies at very costly prices!
I managed to obtain some of the newer ones and tested them using Alliant BE-86 powder for clean burning “LOW FLASH” being a flash suppressed powder. Tested from the S&W 1006 5”BBL 1.2525”
Speer 200 gr GDHP. new Starline brass BE-86 8.4 grains 1231 & 1227 fpsSent some of these SPEER 200Gr GDHP’s to MrRevolverGuy for him to load and test to see how he like them. He loaded them to the data above and got similar results for his pistol. However, his KRISS VECTOR 10mm had issue with the casings splitting around the area near where the bullet was seated and left the upper ring of brass inside the chamber. It appeared to be a chamber issue with the way the KRISS VECTOR cycles.
Anyway the stash of the NEW SPEER 200 grain GDHP’s I was able to get are loaded as follows:
SPEER 200 grain Gold Dot-HP
8.3 grains BE-86
CCI 300 Large Pistol Primers
Velocity 1220 fps COAL 1.2550”In the picture below you will see the OLD pulled GDHP on the left and the NEW GDHP on the right
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Shadow, great response with good information! Thank you. I too, have used CFE pistol and Alliant BE-86 with great results. I tend to use what’s available at low cost. I do use the chrono for comparison, especially for SD comparisons. But I’m not anal about one reliable powder over another unless its SD is too high. Overall, Longshot is my go-to, followed by CFE Pistol and the Shooters World equivalent. I have been disappointed zero times so far. In my business, I succeed with what I load. The dead don’t complain.
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TXShooter, one thing I have seen with Blue Dot was higher SD’s but despite the SD’s it was very accurate in everything I have used it in. Keep in mind I actually take the time to hand weight each and every charge on my balance beam scale.
Some say that this isn’t necessary with pistol loadings, however I beg differ. Many loadings I work very near the upper and maximum performance so I know each load is exactly what is suppose to be with no second guessing anything. -
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Tony’s original post was hidden but he writes
“I don’t really have a favorite, but I do have a lot of powders. Here’s a pic of a few cans.
For 10mm, I use VV N-105.Tony”
Tony Rumore I edited the picture you tried to post…Man that’s a great selection of powders. But knowing the work you do it is much needed for your projects
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AA7 for anything 10mm. I’ve loaded thousands of rounds with it and it delivers. It meters accurately and you get great accuracy out of it. Around 9.5 grains will get you a nice overall load. It cycles everything I shoot at about 1.5 grain less than #9 with similar velocities. Everybody has their favorite and #7 is mine.
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I’ve been reloading since 1977. Started with .38Spl, .357Mag, .44Spl and 45ACP, then around 1989 I added 40S&W then I took a 10 year hiatus when I didn’t reload much of anything. I started back up in 2012 with .357Sig and in 2015 .44Mag. The powders that I used have been Bullseye, Unique, BlueDot, 2400 and A#9. Most recently in March 2023 I added a Glock 20 Gen5 in 10mm and have added A#5 and CFEPistol to the mix. I am very much enjoying my re-immersion into reloading after my retirement in 2019.
As far as a favorite powder, I believe that I would have to pick A#5 or CFEPistol because I find that they can be used from mild to almost maximum velocities in all of the cartridges I reload. I rarely load absolute maximum reloads anymore, I find the 90% of max to be the most accurate. -
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Thanks Wade, before Speer / Vista Outdoor started offering the 200gr Gold Dots as a reloading component, the marketing guy at Vista Outdoor sent me a bunch of the 200gr GD, which in turn I sent some to MrRevolverGuy as well. Over the last few years, I think many of us have learned a great deal regarding these bullets, I know I have in regards to using them with BE-86, which has become my favorite 10mm powder.
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I started loading in 1976 right after I got married and moved into an apartment. I used one of those little Lee Loaders where you beat everything together, loading for my .41 mag Blackhawk.
I am not an experimenter, I found Longshot works well in my 10MM’s and I stayed with it. I load mostly Hornady 180 gr XTP or HAP and never had any problems with it.
I went through a pound of Blue Dot and it was fine too but I never tried anything else. -
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