Reloading .45 ACP ammo – The ExhaustNotes Blog

Reloading .45 ACP for 1917-style revolvers

The Model 625 with a box of my reloaded ammunition. The ammo in this photo had Xtreme 230-grain roundnose bullets. I found the Missouri cast roundnose bullets to be more accurate in my revolver.

Good buddy Rick C., one of the world’s great philosophers, once told me that every time he reloads he learns something new. I think he was right. This story focuses on reloading .45 ACP ammo for the Model 625 Smith and Wesson revolver, and what I learned during a recent reloading session.

The Model 625 is a beautiful revolver. It’s a direct descendant of the Model 1917 that Smith made for the US Army in World War I. The only thing I sometimes find annoying about the 625 is that sometimes reloaded 45 ACP that chambers easily in a 1911 auto won’t chamber in the revolver. This blog focuses on that issue.

The 625 and a box of ammo. This is a sweet-shooting and accurate handgun.

A typical 6-shot, 50-ft Model 625 group with my favorite load. That ain’t bad from a 4-inch revolver.

There are two kinds of ammo for these revolvers. The first is standard .45 ACP, firing the same cartridge as the 1911. The other is .45 AutoRim. Firing .45 ACP ammo in a revolver like the Smith and Wesson 625 requires the use of either star or moon clips (the star clips hold six rounds; each moon clip holds three rounds). Individual cartridges clip into these. The clips provide proper headspace by holding the cartridges in place in the cylinder, and they allow the extractor to push the rounds out of the cylinder. They also work as speed clips because you can insert six rounds into the cylinder simultaneously. Theoretically, you could fire .45 ACP ammo in a Smith and Wesson revolver without the clips, but then you would need a probe to knock each case out of the cylinder. The .45 AutoRim cartridge is very similar to the .45 ACP round, but it has a rim. That eliminates the need for the clips.

.45 ACP ammo in 6-round star clips. The clips allow chambering .45 ACP ammunition in 1917-type revolvers. They are necessary because the .45 ACP cartridges don’t have a protruding rim to allow extraction.

Over the years, I’ve found that .45 AutoRim always chambers easily in a .45 ACP revolver. With .45 ACP reloads, however, that’s not always the case. That’s not good, as it sometimes prevents closing the cylinder. Even if you can close the cylinder with difficult-to-chamber .45 ACP reloads, the loaded cylinder will often drag on the frame, making cocking or double action fire difficult.

I recently loaded a batch of .45 ACP ammo that I intended to fire in my Model 625, and as is my normal practice when loading for the 1911, I put just enough of a flare on the empty cases to allow the bullet base to start into the case. After priming the cases, charging with propellant, and seating the bullets, I adjusted the seating die such that the brass just kissed the crimping ring in the seating die. At this point, I thought it would be a good idea to check the first 10 rounds in the 625 to see if they chambered fully, and you can probably guess where this story is going. A couple of rounds only went about two-thirds of the way into the chamber. I put a little more crimp on the cartridge; of the two that would not chamber, now one would and the other wouldn’t.

In examining the loaded rounds, I could see where the case had expanded circumferentially slightly after the bullet had been seated (it had a slight bulge at the base of the bullet. I wondered if perhaps the Missouri 230-grain roundnose bullets I was loading were just too big, so I measured them. The box told me the bullets had been sized to 0.452 inches, and that’s exactly where they were. Then I measured the case outside diameter for the loaded rounds just below the case mouth. They measured 0.475 to 0.476 inch. Then I went online to see what that dimension should be. Here’s what I found:

The drawing above is misleadingly dimensioned. The dimension we’re interested in is the 0.473 case outside diameter at the case mouth (it looks like an inside diameter on the drawing, but it’s the outside diameter. My reloaded ammo was 0.002 to 0.003 inch above this. I played around with the crimp a bit, but I couldn’t get that number to come down via crimping with my RCBS bullet seating die.

Then I had an idea. I removed the decapping pin and threaded shaft from the resizing die, and adjusted it to just kiss the loaded round a little to square up the bullet in the case and decrease the diameter at the case mouth a bit. I adjusted the depth of the seating die in the press such that I obtained a 0.473 outside case diameter result at the case mouth. The first case chambered. I then repeated the partial resize on 10 cartridges; all but one sucked right into the chamber with no circumferential play. I still had that one, though, so I played with the resizing die adjustment again until the dimension was right at 0.472, and that did the trick. It removed the flare completely, and every subsequent cartridge I loaded using this technique chambered perfectly. Basically, I was using the resizing die as a crimping tool.

It bothered me that I had to go .001 below the 0.473 inch spec to get the ammo to chamber 100% of the time in my revolver, and I was a little worried about what this might be doing to the bullet diameter. I wondered what factory ammo measures, and then I realized I had some. So I pulled it out of the ammo locker and measured it. The factory ammo measured 0.470 inch at that dimension (0.003 under the 0.473 specification), which explains why factory .45 ACP ammo always chambers so easily in this revolver. I also checked the drawing for the .45 AutoRim cartridge. It shows the case outside diameter at the business end to be 0.472, which is coincidentally exactly what I found to work perfectly for my reloaded .45 ACP ammo in the revolver.

I was a little bit worried that in running the cartridges part way into the resizing die I might be swaging the bullets to something below .451 inch (the minimum bullet diameter for this cartridge). To check on this, I measured the case wall thickness. On my Winchester .45 ACP brass (which has a wall thickness perceptibly greater than other brass I sometimes use) the wall thickness is exactly 0.010. Since my ammo measured 0.472 at the mouth after my post-load resizing/crimping operation, that should leave the bullet at exactly 0.452 inch (or 0.472 – 2*0.010). That’s exactly where it should be. The cases hold that wall thickness for some distance into the case, too. I think what the operation is doing is aligning and straightening the bullet in the case.

I’m not using any lube for my secondary resizing operation. I have carbide dies, and they do not require it.

The proof on all of this was how the rounds grouped, and folks, they grouped well. It was a little windy when I fired these groups at the West End Gun Club, but the gun and the ammo did what they are supposed to do.

Four groups of 6 shots each with the Model 625. 5.6 grains of Unique with a 230 cast roundnose bullet has always performed well for me in both revolvers and 1911 semi-automatics.

I like this modified approach (resize/decap, clean, prime, bellmouth, charge, seat, remove the FLRS decapper, and then crimp the ammo to 0.472 with the resizing die). It works well, it produces an accurate load, and every round chambers easily in the Model 625.

My shooting buddies Rick and Robby tell me that the Lee factory crimp die does the same thing as what I’ve described above. I ordered one for the .45 ACP and I’ll reload ammo using it, but that’s a topic for a subsequent blog.

Like what you read above? More Tales of the Gun stories are here.

Reloading Part IV: Wrapping It Up

This post wraps up our tutorial on reloading .45 ACP ammunition, although from time to time we’ll be posting favored .45 loads as we continue to add Tales of the Gun blog posts featuring this fine old cartridge. If you’d like to catch up by reading the first three parts of this series, here they are:

Reloading Part I
Reloading Part II
Reloading Part III

So, on to Part IV.

We’re in the home stretch now, folks, with the last steps in creating our custom-crafted .45 ACP ammunition. The tools and components we’ll use in these remaining reloading steps are the propellant, the powder dispenser, our previously prepped-and-primed .45 ACP brass cases, bullets, the third reloading die, a reloading scale, a caliper to measure cartridge overall length, and boxes and labels to hold and identify the ammo we’ve created.

That’s the powder dispenser on the left, and Unique propellant on the right. I use an RCBS dispenser. Several reloading equipment companies offer these.

My preferred propellants for .45 ACP ammo are Unique or Bullseye, and of the two, I prefer Unique. Some folks prefer Bullseye. Others may use different propellants. One of the more enjoyable aspects of the reloading process is you can try different recommended propellants (and different charges of these propellants) to find the secret sauce that works best for you.

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What does that mean? For a revolver, it usually means the load that is the most accurate. For a semi-automatic handgun (like the 1911), accuracy is not the only requirement. You also need to have a load with enough energy to cycle the action. Usually, the loads shown in a reloading manual are powerful enough to cycle the action. You should never go above the maximum propellant charge listed in any reloading manual, and you should only approach that by testing loads at the lower end first, and then working up to a higher level if you feel a need to for accuracy or functionality reasons (but never go above the max load).

Adding Unique propellant to the powder dispenser.

Here’s another important point: Whichever powder you choose to use, never have any propellant other than the one you are using on your reloading bench. You don’t want to get the propellants mixed up, or mistake one for another.

After you’ve added propellant to the powder dispenser, tap the dispensing handle against the lower stop several times to settle the powder. What we’re going to do next is to adjust the throw weight (the weight of powder dispensed) by adjusting the dispenser with the threaded adjustor shown in the photo below.

The dispenser’s adjustor. You can screw it in to dispense less powder, or out to dispense more powder. Once it dispenses the correct amount, lock it in place with the locknut.

What we do at this point is get our reloading scale, set it to zero grains, and make sure the indicator (the balance arm) is in a neutral position (as indicated on the left side of the balance arm against the graduations on the scale markings on the left of the scale. Once the scale is zeroed, use the sliding and turning adjustors for the weight of propellant you wish to use. After years of accuracy testing and shooting, I’ve settled on 5.8 grains of Unique as the load I use with a 230-grain cast roundnose bullet.

My RCBS reloading scale set to 5.8 grains.

Note in the photo above that the sliding weight is at zero grains, and further note in the photo below that the rotating adjustor wheel is set to 5.8 grains. For anything under 10 grains, you leave the sliding weight at zero and set the weight with the rotating barrel as shown below. For most .45 ACP loads, we use the rotating barrel only.

The rotating barrel adjusting wheel is set to 5.8 grains.

After adjusting the powder dispenser’s adjustor and checking the weight with the scale, we now have the dispenser releasing 5.8 grains of Unique propellant every time the dispenser is actuated. I’ll throw several charges to make sure the dispenser is dispensing consistently, and once I’m satisfied it is, we’re now ready to dispense 5.8 grains of propellant in each of the prepped and primed cases we prepared in Part III of of our .45 ACP reloading series.

There are 5.8 grains of Unique in each primed case. Note that the propellant levels are approximately equal in all cases, and no cases have been missed.

When you dispense powder, it’s important to be consistent. I don’t like to stop until I’ve done the entire tray of prepped and primed cases, and I don’t like to be interrupted while I’m doing this. After you’ve dispensed the propellant in each cartridge case, visually inspect the tray to make sure every case is charged with propellant, and all propellant heights are approximately equal. We’re looking for missed cases here (if that happens, the primer will push the bullet into the barrel just a bit, which requires disassembling the firearm to hammer the bullet back out with a rod, and that’s basically the end of your shooting session that day). We’re also looking for any cases that are double-charged (i.e., cases that have two charges of powder in a single case). A double charge is real serious and dangerous business, as it will most likely blow up the gun, injure you, or worse. You have to pay attention to what you’re doing here. Like I just said, this is serious business.

So, after we’ve charged the cases with propellant, we now ready to move on to the next step, which is seating the bullets.

.45 ACP 230-grain cast roundnose bullets. I like this bullet design and weight. It’s accurate, and it feeds reliably in just about any .45 auto.

We’ll now use the seating die, the last of the three dies in our die set. This part of the operation requires a bit of adjusting and a bit of finessing on our part. We’re actually doing two things with this third and final die. We’re seating the bullet to the correct depth in the cartridge case (to meet the cartridge overall length requirement, which is found in your reloading manual), and we’re removing the cartridge case bellmouth that allowed the bullet to enter the case.

The business end of the seating die. The red arrow points to the part of the die that interfaces with and pushes the bullet into the case.

In order to make both adjustments, we’ll work with how far we thread the entire die into the reloading press (this affects both bullet seating depth and crimp), and we’ll also work with the bullet seating adjustor. These two parts of the die are shown by the red arrows in the photo below.

The bullet seating die in the reloading press. The upper threaded adjustor (denoted by the upper red arrow) adjusts bullet seating depth. The crimp or bellmouth removal adjustment is made by how far the entire die is threaded into the press (denoted by the lower red arrow), Once the crimp (or bellmouth removal for the .45 ACP cartridge) is set and the cartridge meets the desired overall length, lock both the die and the bullet seating adjustor in place with the two locknuts.

Here’s how I do this. I first screw the bullet seating adjustment all the way into the die, and then I’ll use this to seat the bullet to the right depth by threading the entire die into the reloading press, a little at a time. With each adjustment, I’ll run the charged case (with a bullet on top) into the die with the press. I keep doing this until the cartridge overall length is where I want it to be. For a 230-grain roundnose bullet, I adjust the seating depth such that the cartridge overall length is 1.250 inches, as specified by my reloading manual. That cartridge overall length is good, as it allows the cartridge to feed into the chamber, and it allows the cartridge to fit into the magazine.

Once I have the bullet seated to a depth that provides the correct cartridge overall length, I then back the bullet seating adjustor all the way out. Then I’ll start the crimping adjustment process by threading the entire die deeper into the press, a little bit at a time, running the cartridge into the press with each incremental downward die adjustment. The reason I ran the bullet seating adjust all the way out is that I don’t want it to push the bullet in any further while I adjust the crimp.

Here’s what going on here. Remember that I said the seating die does two things: It seats the bullet to the correct depth, and it crimps the cartridge. In the case of the .45 ACP, we’re not really crimping the bullet into the case. We just want to remove the brass case bellmouth that we previously added to allow the bullet to start into the case. The inside of the seating die has a reduced circumference step. Our purpose in making this adjustment is to thread the die into the press just enough to have the case make contact with the inner die step. That will remove the bellmouth. We’re not crimping here; we’re just removing the bellmouth so that the brass case becomes a straightwall case around the bullet.

Once I have adjusted the die body by screwing it into the press enough to remove the case bellmouth (and with the press ram raised to position the cartridge all the way up in the die), I then run the bullet seating adjustor all the way down, such that it contacts the top of the bullet. This will position the die such that it removes the case bellmouth, and simultaneously seat the bullet to the correct cartridge overall length. At this point, I can lock everything in position with the two locknuts (one for the die body in the press, the other for the bullet seating adjustor in the die) while the ram is in the raised position with a cartridge in the die. At this point, I’m ready to finish the rest of the cartridges.

A case with the bellmouth removed, and the bullet seated to the correct depth. The cartridge overall length is 1.250 inches. Life is good. I can hit a gnat in the ass at 25 meters with this cartridge.

At this point, what I do is put a bullet on each charged case, and then I start running each cartridge, with a bullet on top, thr0ugh the reloading press.

Charged cases topped with bullets, ready for the bullet seating operation.

With each run up the press, I’ll create a reloaded cartridge. Here are three reloaded rounds…

Reloaded .45 ACP ammo. It’s good looking ammo, and I know it will provide superior accuracy and reliability in my 1911. It will perform way better than factory ammo, and that’s what this reloading game is all about.

As I produce each round, I place it in one of the plastic boxes I use for my ammo.

Once the above steps are done, I then take the propellent remaining in the powder dispenser and return it to the propellant container (in this case, the Unique bottle). That’s one of the reasons it’s important to only have one bottle of propellant on the reloading bench. You don’t want to dump the leftover powder into the wrong propellant container. If that happens, you can’t use the container of propellant you just emptied the leftover powder into because now it contains a mix of two different propellants. The only thing you can do is throw it away. It’s just to risky to use it. And yeah, I’ve had to do that before.

Reloaded .45 ACP ammo, ready for the range. It looks good, doesn’t it?

There’s one more step, and that’s labeling each box of reloaded ammo with cartridge, bullet weight and type, cartridge overall length, propellant type and charge, primer type, brass type, brass trim length, and the date I manufactured the ammo.

At this point, I’m good to go. It’s off to the range…

So there you have it. Reloaded .45 ACP ammo, as good as or better than what you can buy anywhere. I just returned from the range a few minutes ago, where I shot some of the ammo you see in the photo above, and yeah, it functioned flawlessly and hit the target every time.

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Reloading Part III: Expanding and priming

In our prior two blogs on reloading .45 ACP ammunition, we discussed the equipment and components needed, and the first steps (cleaning the brass, case resizing, and depriming). If you’d like to catch up on those two steps, you can do so on our Tales of the Gun page. In this blog, we’re going to continue the reloading process.

So here we are, with 150 cleaned, resized, and deprimed .45 ACP cases neatly arranged in three reloading trays…

We’re now going to use the second die in our three-die .45 ACP set. It’s the die in the middle of the photo below…

The center die is the one we’ll be using this time.

The die is the expander die. It has an insert that opens the case mouth to the required diameter. It also flares (or bellmouths) the forward rim of the case to accept the .45 bullet.

Note the expander plug inside this second die.

The drill here is to thread the die into the press.

The expander die body threads into the press, and the expander plug threads into the die. The trick is to put a resized and deprimed .45 case into the shellholder, lift the press ram all the way up, and adjust both the die and the plug so that the case mouth is very slightly flared. You’ll have to lower and raise the press ram several times, tweaking the die and expander plug position each time, to get the proper amount of flare.

You’ll need to grab a bullet to assess this adjustment for the amount of case mouth flare. Once the die is adjusted so that the bullet just enters the flared case mouth, lock the die and the expander plug into position with the locknuts shown in the photo above.

Here’s a .45 bullet on top of a case that has not yet been expanded and flared. Note that it will not enter the case.

This next photo shows a .45 ACP case that has been expanded and flared.

Note the very slight flare on the case mouth.

As you can see in the photo below, the slight case mouth flare now allows the bullet to start into the case.

A properly-flared case mouth. The trick here is not to overdo the flaring operation. You want to open the case mouth just enough to allow the bullet to start entering the case. The idea is to prevent the case mouth from shaving bullet material in the reloading step that pushes the bullet into the case.

Once the flare is acceptable, we lock both die locknuts and run all of our cases through the press. This concept of doing one step on all of the cases at the same time is an important part of the reloading process. We want to do each step on all of the cases in one run to assure consistency from case to case. It’s this consistency that leads to enhanced accuracy.

Once all of our cases have been through the above operation, we can now move on to priming, and at this point, it’s time to introduce another optional equipment item. Most reloading presses come with a priming arm, which is a feature that allows inserting a new primer on the press downstroke. I don’t use this feature any more, as it never performed consistently enough for me. Instead, I purchased a separate priming tool made by Lee. It’s what you see in the photo below.

The Lee priming tool. This is an older one. The newer design looks a little different; we’ll see it when we do our series on reloading .300 Weatherby rifle ammunition. The operating principal is the same.

And we’ll need primers. There are two or three primer sources. I use whatever I have available, and for now, that’s Winchester. CCI and Remington also offer primers, and maybe a few other companies. I buy whatever the store has available. I’ve not found that primer brand makes any difference in accuracy.

A case of Winchester large pistol primers.

The box you see above holds 1,000 primers. There are 10 trays of 100 primers each…

A tray of 100 primers. The priming tool cover has been removed in this photo.

The next step is to add primers to the primer tool. We have to remove the priming tool cover (you do so by rotating it a few degrees), and then adding the primers to the priming tool…

When you drop the primers into the reloading tool, take care not to spill any outside the tray. They’ll be facing up, down, and some will be on their sides, as you see in the photo above. See those little concentric striations in the priming tray? They serve a purpose. The trick here is to jiggle the priming tool slightly from left to right, and it will make all of the primers orient in the face up position, like you see below. Don’t shake the priming tool too hard, or primers will go flying out. Jiggle it just enough to get them all facing up.

100 primers, face up. Note that there’s also a shell holder in the priming tool. Different shell holders are required for different cartridge calibers. When you buy the Lee tool, it comes with a collection of shell holders that covers most cartridges.

Once all of the primers are face up, reinstall the priming tool tray cover.

The priming tool cover, back in place over the primer tray.

At this point, jiggle the priming tool again to feed a primer into position.

A primer, ready to be pressed into the empty case. Note the No. 2 shell holder. It’s the one used for the .45 ACP cartridge. This shell holder also works for the .30 06, .308, 7.65 Belgian Mauser, 7×57, and several other cases that share a common base.

We can now insert a .45 ACP case into the shell holder, squeeze the priming tool handle, and a primer will be seated into the case.

Squeezing the priming tool lever to seat the primer.

A new primer, seated in the .45 ACP case.

And there you have it. We’re going to repeat this operation to prime all 150 cases. That, my friends, is enough for today.

We’ll complete the reloading process in our next and final .45 ACP reloading blog.

Me? I’m headed out to the range this morning, where I’ll be firing reloaded .45 ACP ammo prepared just like I described here. I’ll grab a photo or two show you, too.

Stay tuned!

Want to read more about reloading and our other cool gun stories? It’s all right here on our Tales of the Gun page!