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Loading the 7.62x39 with other bullets?

4K views 33 replies 9 participants last post by  1biggun 
#1 · (Edited)
I didn't want to highjack HC's thread on the 9x39, but Muttman brought up a question that I have been wondering about also. How do you come up with a starting load when changing bullets and powders? There isn't jack on the 9x39 and there is some on the 7.62x39. The info that 1biggun posted in the other thread has a lot of info but only uses 2 powders in the 7.62. I have 3031 and 4064 on hand for the 308 and 30-06, so I would prefer to use that powder. The Lyman manual shows most of the loads for the 123gr using the faster burning powders, but there is one load using H-335 (30.5 starting and 34.5 max which is a compressed load). Looking at the burn rate chart H335 is almost the same as 3031, so would it be safe to start with 30.5 grains of 3031 for the standard 123gr?

Edit to add never mind on the 3031. A 7.62 case can only hold 22gr of 3031 without being a compressed load. 30gr wouldn't even fit in the case.

I'm also going to try some subsonic loads just for s&g. There is some info out there on those loads.
http://members.shaw.ca/cronhelm/762ProjectRifle.html
http://members.shaw.ca/cronhelm/762Page.html
http://members.shaw.ca/cronhelm/DevelopSubsonic.html

May have to register to view these:
http://www.silencertalk.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=103&sid=1d8ae1f4fb1d3c7e87c27a5b05eb47f0

http://www.silencertalk.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10995
 
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#2 ·
If I didnt have a computer I would find a simular round that shoots a simular weight bullet and start with the lowest load minus 10-20% and work up there. keeping in mind that a light load can be dangerous as well. I have been checking into some of the load from a disk programs were you plug in all the info and it gives you a recomended load if I get any more serious about reloading it may be the next thing I get.. in the case of the 9mmx54R wild cat there are already loads for 200 grain cast lead bulets for the 7.62x54R I would start there and work up untill primers start to flaten out and back off. my book shows a load of 20 grains of IMR4227 will push a cast 200 grain bullet at 1537 FPS this is a very light load and would likely make a good starting point that case will hold at least 52 grains of powder. I DONT KNOW ANY THING AND DO NOT TAKE MY LOADS AS FACT!!! NO ONE SHOULD USE ANY OF MY LOADS EVER!!!. If I am giving load info it is usualy out of a book and I indicate were I got it from that I will be happy to do.
Hc's loadis going to lose a fair amount of capacity with the 250 graion bullet in a standard length mag. grains of water capacity for 7.62x39 is33.98gr the 44 rem mag is 33.94 nearly identical I suspect that the loads would be pretty close. the loads for the 44 long colt might be usable as well depending on the actuall case capacity. there is also a .375 shannon that is very simular to what HC is building it has a case capacity of 32.76 it shoot a 200 grain bullet by using 22GR of 2400 powder. Im gussing that a 9x39 would be close to that (GUESSING!!)
 
#3 ·
My dad - who has reloaded longer than I've been alive - and I had a long talk about this just the other day. Obviously, I don't want to go to all this work and suffer a mechanical blowout (or worse) with too hot a load.

He goes to his reloading manuals and compares similar sized cartridges for a starting range, and always works up. He normally works up to the hottest load possible because he likes his rifles to kill on one end and cripple on the other ;)

We compared some calibers that had large bullets and small powder charges. Things like the 454 Casull, other 357 calibers etc. That gave us both a ballpark estimate on the starting loads. And everything was very close in his books to what is published in that magazine article.

I'll be putting the first few rounds through a chrono so I can instantly verify the velocity. I need to determine at what velocity 2400 should push my 250-grain bullets. I'm pretty certain that I can get a close estimate from reading the published reloading data from the powder mfr.

Another thing that you didn't mention is the needs of barrel twist. Namely, I need a fast twist for such a heavy, slow bullet on my 9x39 clone. Again, cross-referenced with other "pistol" sized calibers and platforms like the T/C.

The guy that did the 35x39 load from that magazine article I scanned said in the article that he used the RCBS .LOAD softare to compute the starting points. He discovered the original powder he used (355 I think?) was too hot. I assume he meant the velocity was too high, or it kicked too hard, but I don't know for certain.

I'll be following Mr. Mason's 1993 example and use 2400, which is a slower magnum pistol powder. My dad thinks that is probably the best for what I need, even if the capacity is a little higher than his version.






My dad knows a bit about wildcats - he has a necked-down .44 magnum cartridge called the 357-44 Bane & Davis (I think) which is named after the wildcatters who made it. It is his favorite wheel gun round and I think he's going hunting with it this year. I'll try to see if he can snap some pics and give me some info about it, because I have no idea what he did to work up a load for the necked-down .44 mag.
 
#4 ·
The 48th Lyman shows a load for the 7.62x39 using IMR4227 powder for the 123gr at 20.0 start and 22.0 max. Knowing that the case capacity is almost the same as the 44 magnum the Lyman shows IMR4227 for the 180gr at 24.2 starting and 27.0 max. This goes against the heavier bullet=less powder rule for reloading which is why I asked.
 
#6 ·
My dad knows a bit about wildcats - he has a necked-down .44 magnum cartridge called the 357-44 Bane & Davis
strangely enough I was looking at that round today when thinking about starting loads. I was thinking it would make a good autoloader round if it was rebated.
I just read the 35x39 artical on your sight very interesting. I disagree with the larger bore causing more bolt thrust and they had the CUP pressure for the 7.62x39 wrong (I think). I was suprised at the higer than expected velocitys with the 15o &180 grain bullets as well. is the 35x39 reamer the same as the one you bought?? this would make a pretty simple rebarrel.
 
#8 ·
railbuggy

I would personlly not consider Bullseye for use in the 7.62x39 for any standard bullet or load. The only possibility would be for a light cast bullet and that is a very slim maybe. Bullseye is one of the fastest powders and generates high pressure very rapidly. That is a recipe for booms on the wrong end of the rifle.

I have had the best luck with AA1680 in the 7.62x39.
 
#9 ·
While picking up some reloading stuff I noticed that they had a Loadbook USA on the 7.62x39. It has a lot of loads with .308 and .311 from 100gr plinkers to 150gr.

So I have some standard Speer 123gr .310 soft points, Speer 150gr spitzer .311 soft points, Hornady 174gr .3105 FMJ BT, and some 110gr V-Max .308 just to try. Testing will start in a week or two.
 
#11 ·
I finally had some alone time to get some rounds loaded. Winchester brass, AA1680, and CCI primers.

First test was the 123gr .310 Speer SP. I'm not going to list the load as some sites are real picky about posting X grains of whatever. If you have the Loadbook I used the starting load for that bullet and 1680. It cycled the action fine, but the cases were dented bad. The mouths were D shaped instead of O. Next was .5 grain higher and the cases look fine....as well as can be expected from an AK. No more dents. So this will be my starting load to work up from.

Then I loaded a couple of the 150gr .311 Speer SP. I started a little higher than the starting load listed in the book for that bullet and 1680, but well below the max load. Again it cycled the action, but the cases have a very sharp little V shape in the case mouth. So it looks like I will need to work with this one to get a starting load that doesn't destroy the case.

I dug one of each of the bullets out and found that the lead had detached from the copper on the 123gr. It had peeled the jacket back to the cannelure. The 150gr remained intact and had a nice mushroom.

Of course this is with my rifle and yours might not act the same, mileage may vary, etc......
 
#12 ·
WHAT IS CAUSING THE DENTS?? AND WHY IS GOING UP A LITTLE ON THE POWDER STOPING IT??? I am getting dents on my 223 varmit build and it needs to be rectifed or it is going to get $$$$ to feed it. IT the dent from the carrier coming back on it or some thing? I am loading to about the max. s(started piercing primers droped back a grain) so going up is not a option. I havent had time to investigate it much. but I have aprox 500 rounds that are dented in the middel of the shell. probably ok to resize and shoot but I doubt the accuracy will be as good
 
#13 ·
I was surprised that changing the charge by .5 grain made a difference in the case mouth dent. From looking at the slo-mo AK footage I posted at the other place, it looks like the case is flipped into the carrier or carrier handle. I guess it is causing the case to hit in a different spot. I did notice that the .5 grain hotter load did have a scraped looking spot a little below the shoulder that the starting loads did not. Maybe going hotter will change the scrape into a dent in the side of the case. All of the test rounds were throwing brass 15-20 feet just like an AK should.

That Winchester brass seems to be pretty soft stuff.





You can just barely make out the case with it's mouth facing up and back in the pic below.
 
#14 ·
VERY VERY INTERESTING. I have the minimum useable gas port diamiter. I wonder if inlarging the port would have the same effect as increasing the powder charge?? I do know that my starting loads will not always eject. HMM HMM. My 7.62x39 loads dont seem to have any problems(only the 223) with brass and the PMC factory ammo has been OK as well. Thanks for the picks. It does look like the case is fliping back into the carrier and causing the dent.
 
#15 ·
If you have a load and rifle that works well for you, then I wouldn't change anything. I really do not know if there is any way to stop the case from flipping into the carrier and still have the action cycle. I guess you could fire form the cases to remove the dent, but that would add another firing to the case count.
 
#16 ·
the problem is that when you are shooting 400+ yards or more even the slightest change in the case will make a differance. I wonder if the saiga 223 and WASR,s 223 do the same thing. I need to be able to reload or it is not worth using an AK for what I do. the yearly cost of ammo far excedes the cost of the gun, so the price of brass is a major factor.
I have had very good luck with the 7.62 x 39 loads in the LYMAN book using the winchester powder at just under the Max load with hornady soft points. .75"-1.5" groups with a 12" barrel
 
#18 ·
Your not alone. I tried to get on it said I wasn't registered when I was there the day before. After registering again they said that they have had a problem with spambots, so a lot of accounts had been purged. Here's what they have on the site:

"I switched to manually activating people. Even though over 100 spam-bots have been blocked since yesterday, about 10 were still able to register some how.

Also sorry, I blocked some free email domains such as hotmail, yahoo, gmail. This was not an easy decision to make, but after looking at the 100+ spambots that were blocked, I saw a pattern in what email addresses they use and blocked some of the ones that were used over and over. I apologize for real people who don't want to use their work email and only have hotmail or something at home. What you can do is register with a non-slum email and then change it later after you get activated."
 
#19 ·
Personally, I don't get wrapped around the axle for dented cases since so many have answered that the cases don't affect functionality.

That said, I haven't tried precision long-range shooting my Saiga. Yet. I simply don't have a long range to try it out. Now of course, my 9x39 brass will be something I'm very interested in preserving.



A few thoughts to avoid dents. The impact to the top cover is what makes the dents in the first place. Here are a few ways I can think of to avoid this impact:



- Valmets have a buffer that fits on the edge of the top cover. A VERY EXPENSIVE factory part (around $45 from RobertRTG.com), but perhaps a good investment for this application. I think it was Rhino that posted you can use a piece of rubber weather stripping or tubing to fit along the impact area and get the same results for just a few pennies.



- Remove the top cover... use a brass catcher? I have been thinking about a brass catcher. I don't like the snap-on styles because they restrict operation too much to be effective. I've been toying with the idea of buying a spare top cover and cutting out the ejection area enough to have a wire frame permanently attached to the cover - probably silver soldered or spot welded - and attaching a net-style basket to the wire frame. It would be ugly, but it would work.



- Reshape the ejector. Most ejectors send the brass to the approximate 4 o'clock position. You *could* MIG weld a big bead onto the ejector and dremel it to a different shape to make the brass eject in a different direction. Note that you WILL impart enough heat onto the ejector that you may discolor the paint and/or bluing on the receiver. Which may be a big deterent unless you don't mind the potential need to refinish the receiver.

I have reshaped the ejector on my Yugo and it ejects the brass forward to about the 2 o'clock position. So when it DOES cycle (which is still not 100%), the Yugo spits the brass forward enough that I have to go hunt for the brass in front of the table (when the range is cold). I have watched this PPC shooter set up a mosquito net blind around his shooting station and the brass is caught in the net every time. He also uses a milk crate on its side, which is a very simple and effective method to keep from hunting down brass.



- Trim the top cover & repaint it. I wouldn't really do this unless I was at my wits end, because it just wouldn't look good no matter what. And since the factory cover has a bead rolled on the edge, you would probably cut your hand quite often unless you rolled a new bead. And who has a bead roller???

I trimmed the top cover on my 308 build because the brass was too long for a standard x39 top cover. I may actually do this on my 9x39 build and try to bend a bead onto the new edge by repeated heating and bending.



That's all I can think of right now. Personally I think reshaping the ejector is the most elegant way to redirect the brass.
 
#20 ·
Pookie,


I would not run W/O a top cover just for your protection "just in case" some thing were to go wrong. I used to have a 22 bolt gun that with one brand of ammo always spit little chuncks into my cheek. This was something that I noticed hunting tree rats. I finished out thte box with safety glasses on. Just want to see ya on the board till we're all old an grey!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Gunter thanks for the heads up on the site!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
#21 ·
I was thinking that some padding or grinding/cutting may be in order. I will defenatlly have a shell catcher by next praire dog season. im thking of some thing that vecros on to the scope that can be removed in seconds. I just threw a towel over it last year and it worked pretty good for shoting in a prone position of a mat.
 
#22 ·
Well, I tried a few more today with the chrono.

Had the 150gr zipping along at 2100 with no pressure signs. I did have one round that went 2669? I used the scale to measure the powder for each load and checked the crimp on each one. Don't know what happened with that one.

The 174gr FMJ was going 1625fps with the starting load. It was very consistent with not more than 31fps in the extreme spread.
 
#24 · (Edited)
As far as I could tell the case looked like the others. It didn't mike out any different than the others and no flattened primer. Might have just been the chrono or the only other thing is that the bullet might have moved in the case.

The 174 feed just fine, but you have to seat the bullet with the cannelure below the mouth. If you seat it at the cannelure it is too long to fit in the mag. I don't know how much powder it can hold before it becomes a compressed charge, need to figure it out.

I need to get a scope mounted and then start trying to see what these can do.



123gr left, 150gr middle, 174gr right.

The 150 seated leaves about 26 grains of space which is way more than the max load even with the 95% load density rule. I'll have to measure the 174gr.
 
#25 ·
For what it's worth, I've played around with some reloading the M43 round. I've experimented with subsonic loads.

I used some bullets that I had swaged for me; 237 grains FMJ and they were partitioned. I used an accurate arms powder 12 grains would get proper function of the rifle but velocity was hovering around 1180-1200fps.
I started out with 6 grains and planned on adding ½ grain increments. 6 grains and the bullet was stuck in the muzzle! I jumped to 9 grains and the bolt wouldn’t open far enough to eject.

That big bullet had some pretty impressive results. I fired into a muddy bank at a range of 50 yards. It left a hole that was 15” across and almost a foot deep. The round impacted 6” low at that range.

I understand that the Soviets use a 9.2mm X 39mm round for their suppressed rifles. I think I’ll stick to the 30 caliber and keep working on it.
 
#26 · (Edited)
Thanks for the info!

It's been too cold and too windy to get out in the shop and load. One of these days I'll get back at it.

I did try one subsonic load and it was WAY too hot. Sticky bolt even on an AK, brass flow, etc. That case has been put aside never to be loaded again.

ETA: Where did you find those bullets? Cast or jacketed?
 
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