What types of powder, primers, and bullets?

glock.40 · Jan 9, 2012

Hey all,
New to reloading, and am starting to reload 9mm for my 2 Glocks. Just wondering what kind of power you use (specifics would be nice, I know nothing), what primers, and what bullets you like. I'm gonna load just for practice and competing, so I don't need nice bullets. Thanks.

Edit. Powder, not power.

ripcity · Jan 9, 2012

I use Winchester wsf powder tula primers (tula is good for plinkers) but cci if I want something more reliable. And precision delta 124 grain bullet. The bullet is the best bang for you buck because it's jacketed. I prefer to shoot jacketed rather than plated. They are about the same price as any plated bullet on the market. I've messed around with AA7 but it seems to be a bit on the dirty side. Hope this helps.

Nwcid · Jan 9, 2012

Start with the book ABC's of reloading. It will be the best money you ever spend on reloading. You can look up info online about powders from each company if you want. A proper reloading book will run you about $35 and will have lots of good information in it. I use this one, Speer Bullets - Reloading Manual but mine is #13 and like it a lot.

With all that said I prefer CCI primers. I find Tightgroup powder to be very clean and cost effective. I had to go though several powders when I started loading for my silencers. There are many good bullet out there but short of sale prices these are a good deal, plated pistol bullets

XSubSailor · Jan 9, 2012

ripcity said:
I use Winchester wsf powder tula primers (tula is good for plinkers) but cci if I want something more reliable. And precision delta 124 grain bullet. The bullet is the best bang for you buck because it's jacketed. I prefer to shoot jacketed rather than plated. They are about the same price as any plated bullet on the market. I've messed around with AA7 but it seems to be a bit on the dirty side. Hope this helps.

I concur. I use WSF for 124g 9mm bullets too. Precision Delta has the best price for jacketed bullets. Best price on primers I've seen lately is about $17/1000 for Wolf SP at Widener's. Wolf's are fairly hard primers and not incredibly reliable for striker fired-pistols in my experience. I've not tried Tulas before.

ABC's of Reloading is a great reference, as is Lyman's.

Jammer Six · Jan 10, 2012

ABC's is mandatory. Dude with no hands, and he learned his lesson.

I'm in the Titegroup camp, and I've recently decided that plated bullets are not as accurate as true jacketed, and I've spent some change on Hornady C/Ts. So now I'm working my loads back up and having a grand time.

I like Federal primers, I've had a problem with Winchester WLPs not igniting.

My brass is the stuff I scrounged after shooting all the cases of Armscor I bought, so I have a lot of AP brass.

My bullets, like I said, are now Hornady C/Ts.

I gaze at the Hornady manual, and that led me to experiment with Unique, 231, HS-6 and Bullseye, but I keep coming back to Titegroup.

Have fun!

t.huynh · Jan 10, 2012

Right now I'm using CCI primers, Berry's MFG plated bullets, and titegroup.

deadshot2 · Jan 10, 2012

My choice for 9mm for the last several years has been Power Pistol for powder, Tula/Wolf primers (not a single one of the many thousands I've loaded has failed), and Montana Gold Bullets, 124gr JHP's. I buy several 4# jugs of powder, a couple "sleeves" of primers (5,000 ea), and a couple cases of bullets each year and by buying in bulk I keep my costs to a minimum for a JHP round. They shoot exactly like my SD round so they're great for practice.

XSubSailor · Jan 10, 2012

For powders in 9mm, I've tried the following:
-Unique
-Bullseye
-W231
-Power Pistol
-Titegroup
-WSF

For jacketed bullets, they all work well. Unique is hard to beat as a possible "all-in-one" powder; however, some powder measures are not very good at metering flake powders, so WSF (which is a ball powder) is an equivalent powder, meters well and burns cleanly above mid-range loads. Bulls-eye is very economical but is very dirty IMO...I don't use it for anything anymore. Titegroup is economical too, but burns very hot...OK for jacketed bullets, but not good with lead bullets. The other criticism with Titegroup is that it uses such a small charge, that it's more likely that a double-charge would not be detected by a visual inspection of powder level. My other criticism of Titegroup is that the pressure curve is not linear at all and small changes in charge cause very large changes in pressure. Make sure you have an accurate and precise powder measure, or measure each charge individually is my advice if you use Titegroup.

W231 is a good all-around powder for autoloading calibers and meters well, as is Power Pistol; however, Power Pistol has a lot of muzzle flash...I use it exclusively in .40S&W and .357Sig because it's the most accurate powder I've used in those calibers.

As for 9mm, my favorite powder is WSF. It meters well, is accurate, has a linear pressure curve like Unique does, and is the cleanest burning powder I've used when charges are above mid-range. I load cast lead bullets most of the time (I use bullets from Dardas and Missouri Bullet Company most of the time), and I appreciate that I don't have to use solvent to clean out powder residue in my pistols after use.