A 410 shotshell in a 44 Magnum rifle

I regularly use a 22LR pistol at close range for certain utilitarian purposes. It's convenient and in theory, it should be adequate.  Let's be realistic though.  It's always at night, and I permanently suck with a pistol.  Something with more energy and better tolerance on shot placement would be nice, but a long 20ga is the other extreme.  It's prohibitively awkward in a doorway, and at close range, it's a bit excessive.  A short 410 would be nice, but that's not what's at hand here.  I do have a Marlin 1894 in 44 Magnum.  So the wheels start turning.  

Oh, it'll fit.  Okay, maybe not a 3" load.

The Shot Capsule

Now, I know they make shotshells in pistol cartridges, but they're expensive, the payload is miniscule, and the shot size is small.  Supposedly you can even buy the caps to reload yourself, but they're also miniscule, expensive, and I have not witnessed them ever being in stock at any time I looked.  So I think it's clear that those aren't what I want, so what do I want?  I want to somehow find a simple and convenient way to load 44 SPL/MAG cartridges that will roughly duplicate a standard 410 load: 1/2 ounce of shot at 1100-1200 fps.  It has to fit in this particular rifle, and its fitness for revolvers or other rifles is irrelevant. I tend to single-load cartridges anyway, so it doesn't need to actually feed through the magazine. 

No.  Just ... no.

Now, I hope it's obvious that a half-ounce shot load won't fit into the SAAMI spec OAL for either 44 SPL/MAG.  What's the actual OAL we have to work with?  With this specific rifle, the maximum OAL which can be single-loaded into the chamber is about 2.15".  At this length, an unfired cartridge cannot be ejected, striking the ejector before the cartridge fully clears the chamber.  It needs to be manually unhooked from the extractor and tipped out of the action. At 1.75" OAL, the cartridge can be manually fed and loaded cartridges can be ejected.  The longest OAL which can be reliably fed through the magazine is about 1.63", which is close to the SAAMI spec for 44 Magnum (1.610").  The payload constraint means that magazines and revolvers are simply not an option.  The cartridge will actually have to extend well into the bore when chambered, and ejection is going to be slightly inconvenient. 

A long cartridge strikes the ejector before it clears the chamber.

The first thing that crossed my mind was to make a paper shot capsule.  While I tried several variations of this, they were consistently inconsistent.  It's a difficult balance trying to get something that will stay intact while handling, but will open up quickly, uniformly, and consistently.  Rolling too many layers, using glue or tape, or tucking the ends too tightly would often delay the capsule from opening for about 2-3 yards.  Considering that the target distance is about 3 yards, that's not acceptable.  When the paper opened earlier, it would tend to unroll instead of tearing or breaking apart, creating a strongly asymmetric pattern.  The paper patch/capsule idea still has some appeal and might be solvable.  It has its simplicity and it's potentially a very accessible option.  Who doesn't have a sheet of paper lying around?  While the paper cartridges aren't terribly robust and are prone to spilling and getting kinked, that physical flexibility is a minor advantage.  Since the paper capsule bends just a bit, you can snake a slightly longer cartridge into the chamber than you otherwise could with any rigid capsule.  That might not seem like much, but bear in mind how pressed we are for volume with that payload constraint. 
 

A paper cap in 44 SPL brass.

That brings us to the solution.  I had a small second-hand SLA 3D printer sitting on the shelf for nearly a year untouched because I didn't want to deal with figuring out the shitty OEM windows-only webapp-on-the-desktop slicer application for the poorly-documented and widely-unsupported unofficial design revision of the particular model I had (a late-model "original" AnyCubic Photon).  I've used FDM 3D printers before, but I've always seen 3D printing as a severe compromise in terms of accuracy, surface finish, and material properties. Consequently, I rarely found a good reason to bother with the printer.  While I hadn't used SLA printers before, I did expect the acrylic parts to be relatively brittle.  I had some old expired clear resin that I got with the printer, so maybe this would actually be an appropriate use for it.  After all, how else would I easily make a bunch of thin, brittle plastic cups? 

Why do you assholes have to call every product model the same thing?

Working off the dimensions gathered in earlier attempts with paper and other materials, I spent some time in OpenSCAD coming up with a cap geometry that would work.  Since we're not injection molding these parts, there are a number of features we can afford that commercial caps can't.  To ensure unifom breakup and resin drainage during printing, I slotted the parts.  The caps can also have a uniform wall thickness with reentrant features like a base taper and cannelure.  This gives us a few advantages:  The base taper makes them easier to assemble into the case and it stiffens the mouth of the cap.  The cannelure gives a bit better retention with less risk of cap breakage when crimping.  The lack of mold draft means that the cap nose is less likely to survive intact and cause a defect in the shot pattern. Other than the hassle and mess of dealing with SLA printing, I think these features make the printed caps better than the commercially available caps.  At the very least, they're available and customizable.

After a lot of trial and error, I had something that could be assembled, handled, and chambered with little risk of breakage, but would still reliably break up and pattern uniformly -- or at least as uniformly as you can expect from a shot pattern coming out of a fully-rifled bore. The design file is parametric, so features and geometry can be configured for calibers and applications other than my own.  The nose geometry can be adjusted, whether you need a taper for easier insertion at max OAL, or whether you want a square nose for maximum capacity in a revolver. The zipper slots can be configured depending on how stiff you want the cap to be, though they do serve a purpose as drain vents during printing, and they aid in nose breakup, so it's probably not a good idea to eliminate them.  The SCAD file optionally generates the parts on a raft.  This helps with removing the fragile uncured parts from the build plate, and the attached label tag aids in incremental design refinement. The parts can be snipped off the raft with a pair of fine nippers.
 

Rafted parts and nippers

Different size caps

 
A word on the resin.  Unlike nearly every other application, this is one case where we actually want our resin prints to be brittle.  As time goes by, even the cheap resins will likely have improved toughness, so bear that in mind.  It's preferable to stick with cheap, standard clear SLA resins.  I'm currently using SUNLU standard clear green, though the original bottle I started with was a much older ERYONE standard clear that expired around 2019.  There seem to be fairly wide margins on how tough the material can be before it causes breakup problems, but I'd stick with clear resins and thoroughly overcure them.

I should note that these clear resins can be dyed in a heated bath, so if you want to color-code your shotcaps (e.g. to denote the shot size or loading), you don't necessarily need multiple resins.  I used my stock of old RIT dyes, though modern reformulated RIT will probably not work.  You should be able to use iDye Poly without much issue.
 

Dyed caps

Can these caps be printed with an FDM printer?  Maybe, but I wouldn't bother.  The design is more or less a nightmare stringing test for an FDM printer.  You're trying to print a series of tall cylindrical and conical arc segments that are approximately one nozzle-width thick, with tiny gaps that are even smaller. Maintaining dimensional accuracy and stripping heat are going to be challenges.  You could easily configure the SCAD file to produce a slotless cap and print it with a single wall.  That might be easier, but it might not break up like we want.  In the end, you'll get a part that's probably tougher than what you really want, and will likely smear and coat the bore due to friction and the relatively low melting temperature.  The desire to make a brittle cap suggests that we should use something like PLA.  You're free to try it, but I'm not interested in trying to find out how to remove a thin coating of solvent-resistant plastic from a rifle bore.  Maybe there are exotic filaments that would work, but that's out of my capabilities.  The acrylic resins are surprisingly resistant to heat, so SLA printed caps don't seem to be at significant risk. 

The Wads

Now I haven't mentioned what goes under the shot column.  That's because the wad is where everything starts becoming less ... satisfying.  When I was originally playing around with paper caps, I was using something that I've used several times before -- starch packing peanuts.  Not styrofoam peanuts, but the water-soluble packing peanuts.  They compress into a tough, heat-resistant wad that will conform to the cartridge and bore with little issue.  I have found them to be surprisingly effective for doing dumbass weird shit like this.  That said, they're tedious to install and compress, they need to be fairly thick to work, they're limited in the amount of heat and pressure they can take, and they're inherently inconsistent.  With a rigid cap, the maximum allowable powder+wad stack height demands a dense powder and a short wad. While moderate for the rifle, the developed pressures are still too much to reliably withstand at an appropriately short wad thickness. 
 

Fired peanut wads

I thought about printing plastic wads, but considering the brittleness of the material, and the fact that I didn't want a bunch of significant chunks of plastic trash all over the place, I didn't pursue the idea.  I also wasn't really too keen on having powder stored in contact with questionably-cured SLA resin and potentially turning all sweaty and weird. The long-term compatibility of powder and resin is something I'd want to test experimentally before I'd use it, and that would take a long time to test.

Instead, I just made a primitive punch and die out of scrap from the trash pile, just to see if paper wads would work or not -- a proof of concept.  I'm using 0.058" thick card stock (some used presentation boards).  Call that 500lb cardstock or a 60pt mat board.  Translating that into the conventional ill-standard "ply" units is pure guesswork, so good luck shopping.  With a die diameter of 0.425" and a concave punch face, the wads come out around 0.429-0.430", which is a nice snug fit in sized brass.  For most loads, I use 3 cards for a wad height of 0.175".  With this heavy card stock, I can get by with 2-card wads, but I wouldn't try to replicate such a thin wad with more layers of thinner stock.
 

Using the lathe tailstock as a simple screw press

Wads, wad insertion tool

The cardstock wads work well, though I dislike the fact that the wads or punch aren't something that can be easily obtained.  They aren't a standard size, so you're not going to be able to buy a tool set or precut wads.  Even the rudimentary die set I made required a lathe to make.  A press-mounted punch would be more complicated, and like most practical problems, it's well out of the capabilities of pedestrian 3D printing, so maybe it's not as accessible as I would have liked.

EDIT: In recent efforts, I have actually found that there are appropriate card wads available for 38/44/45 applications. In 44, I'm using a 0.175" wad stack, but a single 0.125" nitro card should be totally adequate. The wad thickness difference can be compensated for with a simple change in the SCAD file.
Ballistic Products
Track Of The Wolf

The Powder

I also haven't mentioned what powder I used.  Well, that's where things are even less ideal -- at least for me.  It's fair to say that this entire project is not something you're going to find load data on in any book, but we could always look at the nearest neighbors.  I use Herco for 44 SPL plinking loads: 240gr @ ~1030 fps with 7.0gr, or 1125 fps with 7.5gr.  That's not too far off-target, considering that 1/2oz is roughly 220gr.  Surely the slightly lighter payload would push us a bit higher in the velocity?  There's a couple problems with thinking that these pistol powder loads are going to be comparable or usable.  First off, Unique and Herco are just too bulky to be viable.  Second, there's no tight crimp, neck tension, or engraving force, so early pressures are low and the actual powder efficiency is low.  The same charge that gets over 1100 fps out of a 240gr bullet barely makes over 900 fps with a lighter payload, leaving behind lots of sticky unburned residue.

What else is on the shelf?  Circa 15gr of H110 might be appropriate for an actual 410 load, so what's wrong with that?  It's really the same story.  That large charge of H110 eats up the available stack height really fast, and is still on the borderline of being underpressured.  It seems that 410 loads are probably at the lower end of the pressures that H110 likes to burn properly.  The shift to a slightly larger bore diameter is probably just enough to push us close to the hairy edge of having occasional poppers and barrels full of yellow unburned powder grains.  H110 is simply inappropriate for lighter (i.e. SAAMI spec-length) loads, though perhaps those could work with the pistol powders.

I don't have a lot of powders on hand, and my LGS hasn't had much of any powder (or anything) on the shelf in the last three years.  I'm sure there's something that's more dense than Herco, while being able to perform at relatively low chamber pressures.  I could throw a dart at a burn rate chart and try something blindly, but I hate gambling on components if I know I don't have an alternative application for whatever I'm buying.  Besides, I do have this ancient can of Alcan AL-7. 
 

Sketchy? Pff. It'll be fiiine. That rust is just part of the aesthetic.

With 12.0gr of AL-7, 2 card wads, I can barely fit everything within 2.15" OAL.  The result is 220gr of shot at 1215 fps.  A 10gr charge puts us just under 1100 fps, which at 3-5 yards isn't really that much of a loss, but it gives us more wiggle room on stack height.  I've settled on 10.5gr and 3 card wads.  That's a bit on the low end of what I'd call a 410-equivalent load, but considering how severely the rifling limits the effective range, there really isn't much point in pushing the velocity too far anyway.

So AL-7 works great.  It's dense enough and tolerates the low pressures just fine, but nobody will be able to use this load data because AL-7 hasn't been on the shelves in 40 years.  It's going to really suck when I run out of AL-7, but maybe if you're more familiar with powders in this part of the spectrum, you'll be able to use this suggestion as a data point in finding a suitable replacement. 

Conclusion 

Obligatory glamour shots

 

So in the end, I have what I think is about all I really need from the cartridge.  It's roughly equivalent to a moderate 2-1/2" 410 load, but I can use it in a short, handy rifle that's also usable for other things.  They sound good, feel good, and I'm getting fond of the smell of AL-7.  They produce about a 6" pattern at 3 yards, and the cap breakup is uniform.  Setback dictates that the nose of the cap is never really subjected to any hoop stress as the shot column is upset, so the largest cap fragments tend to be from the nose.  Since the cap is slotted, those fragments are never large enough to disturb the patterning (at least not with the #6 shot I'm using). 
 

Cap fragments captured in a deep box of loose paper

While the loaded cartridges are durable enough to handle or put in a pocket, they aren't a 410 hull.  If you drop them on concrete, they'll likely break and spill.  It's easy enough to pick the rest of the cap out of the case mouth, expand the neck, and install a new shotcap without wasting the other components.  I don't know if that's even practical with commercial caps, since they use a snap-in plastic base wad.

Preferred:
Remington LP primers
10.5gr AL-7
3 card wad (0.175")
one 215L cap full of shot (approx 220-230gr)
a bit over 1100 fps

Full power:
Remington LP primers
12gr AL-7
2 card wad (0.117")
one 215L cap full of shot (approx 220-230gr)
a bit over 1200 fps 

Size and prime, expand the mouth if desired, charge the cases, and ram the wads.  Fill a shot cap like a cup and gently press the loaded case on top.  Crimping just requires the removal of the bullet seater (if you use a seat+crimp die).  Contrary to what I've read about the blue caps, I don't ever have issues with breakage during crimping, only during seating.  Work over a pan, because you'll probably break a few caps along the way.  Shot spilled in a pan is a lot less of a mess than shot spilled in the press.

If you want to play around with different powders, you might need to adjust the cannelure position or cap length as necessary for your stack height.  For perspective, 10.5gr AL-7 is approximately the same compressed volume as 9.0gr of Unique or 8.3gr of 700x.  All of these loads will work with the same wad stack and shot cap, so if you want to play around with unsuitable pistol powders, that's one place to start.  For what it's worth, both of those charges do work.  The Unique load runs about 1100+ fps, but burns poorly.  I forget the velocity for the 700x load, but it's hard on wads and the shot column, so expect pattern degradation.  On the bright side, at least there's plenty of margin on max pressure when working in 44 magnum.

The SCAD files are up on Thingiverse.

EDIT: I've come to discover the existence of early pre-410 cartridges such as the 44XL. The 44XL was basically a 44-40 with a paper cap and an overspec ~2" OAL. So I basically reinvented a cartridge concept that died out a century ago. I suppose if anyone wants to load 44XL, these caps would work great for that as well.

I also see bastard 45LC/410 chamberings in things like the Taurus Judge and Rossi Brawler and I have to cringe at the notion. I haven't seen a dimensioned chamber drawing, but I imagine it's the worst of both worlds. You get to shoot 45LC with a bunch of freebore for maximum leading, and you get to shoot 410 out of a grossly oversize rifled bore for terrible powder efficiency and patterning -- all because garbage laws force us into these compromises. That said, if you want to get more payload into a Brawler, an oversize cap in 45LC brass should at least be able to get more lead into the pattern. That's probably going to be way more effective than wasting money on 410 in such a pistol.

All of these shot caps will fit on top of the same powder+wad stack.

Addressing the Minimum COL Limit for the Marlin 1894 Action

As is typical of the remainder of this blog, I am writing this following an experience with a problem about which I found frustratingly little clear information online.  That is not to say that I found little information; rather, I found a great wealth of conflicting, inaccurate, or at least confusing information obfuscating simple, but perhaps nonobvious truths. 

Let's start where the experience starts -- a rifle owner buys some new boxes of 44 Special (240gr LSWC) ammunition to use in his ca. 1971 Marlin 1894 chambered for 44 magnum.  While the first few rounds worked, the rims eventually start jamming between the lifter and the mouth of the magazine tube.  This was unexpected; all the prior boxes of old 246gr LRN 44 Special ammunition worked fine, and still do.  Why is the rifle jamming with the new ammunition?  My eyes see an obvious suspect, but let's get a second opinion.

HSM 44SPL (240gr LSWC), Winchester 44SPL (246gr LRN), Winchester 44MAG (240gr JSP)

If one immediately googles a relevant query, forums across the web will authoritatively dispense the answer with certainty. It's the "dreaded Marlin Jam", which is variously described as:

• not a thing
• very much a thing
• being caused by nothing other than short-stroking or holding the phone rifle wrong
• being caused by nothing other than extreme wear or abuse
• being caused by certain ammunition/gun combinations
• all Marlin's fault and they should have fixed this a hundred years ago

There are grains of truth spread nonuniformly throughout those discussions, but there are also a lot of misunderstandings and conflations going on as well.  It's easy to see how that happens.  The 1894 action is definitely susceptible to feeding problems, whether it is a consequence of the lack of controlled feed or the weaknesses of the simple mechanical logic going on inside.  It's also frustratingly difficult to visualize what exactly is going on inside.  There isn't a good way to see or measure the part clearances and timing as the action cycles, and the critical limits of those hidden details are fairly subtle.  It's easy to presume the causes incorrectly.

To narrow the subject, I am not talking about misfeeds caused by holding the rifle at an extreme angle or on its side, resulting in jams involving the bolt, breech, or ejector.  Those are a consequence of gravity and the uncontrolled feed.  I'm not talking about double-feeds caused by short-stroking or similar incomplete cycling motions. That's just a consequence of the fact that magazine interruption mechanism is reversible, while the feeding of the current round is not.  What I am talking about is the minimum reliable cartridge length for the 1894 action and jams caused by short cartridges in otherwise unworn rifles.

The Existence and Specifics of the Minimum COL Limit

But wait, the lifter automatically acts as a magazine interrupter.  Does the 1894 even have a minimum COL limitation?  Well, if you ask around, you will amusingly find people who will tell you that the design of the mechanism cleverly ensures it does not.  This is incorrect.  There most definitely is a minimum COL limitation. If you would like a quick proof that a lower bound exists, load a full magazine with empty cases (easier said than done) and see if you can get the action to lift a round without jamming on the next.

What that length is depends on the cartridge.  While the lessons of this study should also apply to other chamberings, 44 Remington magnum provides an illustrative complication as its chamber can also accept 44 S&W special. The SAAMI COL spec for 44 Magnum is 1.535-1.610 inches. On the other hand, the spec for 44 special is 1.415-1.615 inches. It's conceivable that a firearm designed around the magnum cartridge spec might not accomodate the wider spectrum of 44 special cartridge lengths.  Certainly, the first page of the manual for the Marlin 1894 states the acceptable range of cartridge OAL echoing the SAAMI spec for 44 magnum.  The case with 357 magnum and 38 special is similar.  These new boxes of ammunition are approximately 1.475" long -- well outside the limits recommended by the manual.

While the spec on paper is merely an assertion, it is the design of the mechanism and the particulars of its geometry which ultimately determine the actual practical range of cartridge lengths. When the lever is closed, the current round is captured at an angle between the loading gate, the right-hand face of the lever arm, and the next round in the magazine.  As the lever is opened, its arm clears the rim of the current round, allowing it to slip off the front edge of the loading gate.  At this point, the cartridge is captured between the forward face of the lever arm and the subsequent cartridge.  The cam surface on the lever begins to raise the lifter, shearing the stack of cartridges as they follow the motion of the lever rearward. In order to function correctly, the lifter must rise high enough to block the next cartridge before its rim clears the mouth of the magazine tube.  If the cam-lifter timing is retarded by some defect, or if the cartridges are too short, the lifter will not be in a position to fully block the next round before its rim clears the magazine mouth and a jam will occur.  It is this geometry of the lever arm and cam surfaces, as well as the lifter and magazine mouth which determine minimum cartridge length. 

Lever closed; cartridge offset and held on loading gate

Lever open; cartridges following lever arm

Magazine interrupted; cartridge uncontrolled

You should now be experiencing a creeping doubt regarding the invariability of the effective minimum COL requirement.  Not only is it an issue of timing between moving surfaces, the mechanical advantage of the cam/lifter system means that feed reliability is going to be significantly sensitive to small geometry changes caused by wear or receiver alignment.  There's enough tolerance in the screw holes that reassembling the rifle in a slightly different manner may significantly change its reliability with marginal-length ammunition.  If the receiver halves are tightly-fitted, the front screw may not pull them together completely with reasonable torque; a few taps with a hammer may be necessary to seat them completely. It's easy to think it's assembled correctly, and still have a 0.005" change in alignment make the reliability go from 95% down to 10%.  The same can happen if there are burrs or any debris between the receiver halves near the front screw.  The "Marlin jam" fixes addressing seemingly miniscule lifter peening should now start to make sense.

Very short COL resulting in jam on cartridge body

Marginal COL resulting in jam on rim

The form of the jam may vary depending on the scenario, leading people to mistakenly assume that the causes are necessarily different, perhaps misattributing them to other causes which produce identical end-conditions.  In the case of a very short cartridge, the next round is entirely trapped between the magazine mouth and the top face of the lifter.  In the case of a marginally-short cartridge, the rim of the next round may protrude only far enough to hook edge of the magazine mouth, becoming wedged against the front face of the lifter nose.  Bear in mind that the front edge of the lifter is not always close to the magazine mouth; neither is it moving in a straight line.  It moves in an arc, and presents a considerable gap when it is only beginning to interrupt the magazine. The exact contouring of the front edge of the lifter nose, caused by wear or intent otherwise, may further contribute to inconsistent behavior in marginal conditions.

Of course, this is just my insight from having spent a few hours trying to get a single rifle to run with two boxes of a specific brand and loading of cartridge.  I don't own 50 Marlin rifles.  I haven't fired 1E5 rounds of every kind of ammunition ever made without a single jam.  I haven't shot Marlins professionally for the last 90 years, uphill both ways in the snow.  I don't even hang out on the forums with all the people who assuredly did, so what do I know?

Toward a Remedy

While this particular case is an issue of short ammunition, the effect is the same as the lifter wear with which other owners contend.  As mentioned, I'm not the first person to try solving the problem; there are plenty of proposed fixes.  The bottom surface of the lifter which mates with the cam may be built up by welding or using an epoxy-bonded shim.  The lifter itself could be bent slightly. Generally, these solutions amount to a timing advance to shift the range of allowable COL down.  I don't know whether it's possible to effectively reduce the maximum COL by doing this; that limitation may be determined elsewhere in the mechanism (distance from magazine to cartridge stop surface) or loading cycle (chance of stumping on the breech face).  I'm not worried about overly-long cartridges at the moment.

The cam surface on this lifter is different than that of other (newer?) rifles I've seen.  Its curvature precludes the easy use of spring steel shims.  I simply elected to shape a brass shim from 0.015" shim stock and adhere it with JB-Weld.  This may prove to have a relatively short longevity, but it is more than adequate for this application.  With only a 0.015" shim, the lifter nose is advanced roughly 0.030", and the interruption occurs about 0.150" earlier (depending on where you assume the cartridge contacts the lever arm at that moment).  Again, the point is that small changes in the cam interface cause a large change in the effective minimum COL.

For my own purposes, I am content with the potentially temporary shim.  I don't want to weld or bend anything permanent; the shim can easily be removed without harm.  All it needs to do is allow the rifle to function with this particular lot of ammunition -- which it does excellently.  Once they are consumed, the rifle can simply be fed with a more appropriate choice of ammunition.  The long-term solution is merely an applied understanding of the mechanical nuance -- and/or perhaps some handloading.

Afterthoughts and a Helpful Gesture

It might just be me, but these 240gr SWC bullets almost look more at home in 44 magnum brass.  They would produce a good COL in that combination.  It might simply be an issue of the difference in demand between the cartridges and a desire to consolidate production components.  If everyone likes their Keith-style SWC's in the magnum cartridge, why not just stick the same bullets in the 44 special offerings too?  After all, 1.475" is well within the SAAMI spec for 44 special, and it's probably a fair assumption that most of them wind up in revolvers anyway. 

As for those who want to run lighter loads in their 44 magnum 1894's without dealing with tweaking the rifle, there are probably some factory loads available with more appropriate COL.  Of course, nobody states that metric on the box or the web.  I guess you can always bring your calipers to the store or do some approximation from image analysis.  The alternative is to handload.  Again, SWC bullets with high cannelures seem to be the most popular.  It may simply be easiest to use those with magnum brass to get a more reliable COL, loading down to 44 special ballistics.  At least at Brownell's, the price is identical for magnum or special brass -- for both Starline and Winchester.  That's probably of little comfort if you're sitting on a pile of special brass.  I suppose if casting is desired or acceptable, the Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook linked below lists the COL for cartridges assembled with various bullets from Lyman molds.  For example, a comfortable 1.571" COL can be achieved with a 245gr bullet from the #429421 mold.  There are always plenty of other recommendations around the web.

Toward that end, these pdfs may be useful.  Sometimes the older books are actually favorable if you have stock of discontinued powders, or if you want pressure data for legacy loads as a reference for comparison.  If you want newer editions, just hit up Amazon or AbeBooks, or the relevant manufacturer's site. 

Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook - 3rd Edition - 1980
Lyman Reloading Handbook - 48th Edition - 2002
Modern Reloading - Richard Lee - First Edition - 2000
Hornady Handbook of Cartridge Reloading - 3rd Edition - 1980
Hornady Handbook of Cartridge Reloading - 4th Edition - Part 1 - 1996
Hornady Handbook of Cartridge Reloading - 4th Edition - Part 2 - 1996
Cartridges of the World - Barnes - 8th Edition - 1997
ABC's of Reloading - RCBS - Dean Grennell - 1985
The Gun Digest Book of Handgun Reloading - Dean A Grennell - 1987
Gun Digest - Shooter's Guide to Reloading - Philip P. Massaro - 2014
Precision Handloading - John Withers - 1985
Introduction to BPCR Loading - Chuck Raithel 2001
A Cast Bullet Guide for Handgunners - Fryxell - Applegate
The American Rifle - Whelen - 1918
Complete Guide to Handloading - Sharpe - 1937
Handloaders Manual - Earl Naramore - 1943
Alliant Reloaders Guide - 2009
Hodgdon Basic Reloading Manual - 2015
Winchester Reloaders Manual - 15th Edition - 1997
Western Load Guide - 6.0 - 2016
Powder Bulk Density Chart - 2007

Resolving Tanfoglio Witness Magazine Issues

This post is in regards to my own observations and my particular model pistol, a Tanfoglio Witness P-S imported by EAA circa 2012.  If you're reading this because you're troubleshooting or looking for magazines or a review, consider that we might be thinking about vastly different pistols.  Let's take a moment to paint a more appropriately muddied picture.

These both are full-size polymer-frame EAA/Tanfoglio Witness pistols in 9mm

It is a rather common occurrence there may be many different unique products associated with an overarching product family name.  Figuring out which specific model you actually have and searching for parts is made difficult by the reluctance of manufacturers, marketers, and retailers to make differentiating information (i.e. unique model numbers or names) prominently available.  Just as "Motorola Razr" might be a smart phone or a flip phone, a "Tanfoglio Witness 9mm" might be one of several different things.  The Witness family covers steel frame and polymer frame pistols in different frame sizes depending on caliber and manufacture date.  They're also subdivided into compact and full-size variants within that distinction.  While most of the Witness models are based on the CZ-75 design, there are also M1911 clones under the same name. As far as magazines go, EAA does provide a serial number lookup tool to help owners identify their model and the requsite magazine.  Adhering to time-honored tradition, this tool only works on some browsers.  Bear in mind though, if a large fraction of retailers don't provide any compatibility information more specific than a model family, confidently searching for parts might still be difficult even if you know the specifics of your product and the desired part. 

Walking back toward those specifics, my pistol is a post-2005 full-size polymer frame variant (SKU: 999044).  This is described as "New Frame Special", which appears to be a variant of what is more often simply referred to as the "small frame" pistol.  This seems to make sense, as it is a Witness P-S (polymer, small frame) as opposed to a Witness P, which is (to my knowledge) an earlier larger frame model.  To be appropriately confusing to the incautious, the frame is marked "Witness P-S", while the slide is marked "Witness P".  Again, this information is useless since almost every retailer uses "Witness P" and "Witness P-S" interchangably if they mention it at all.  The magazines which are compatible with my pistol are #101900 (16 round), #101920 (10 round blocked), #101921 (25 round).  The magazine which shipped with mine is #101900. 

Original Magazine #101900

I have had this pistol for several years and have put 300-400 rounds through it.  While I'm comfortable with it and generally satisfied with its performance in comparison to what it replaced, it has always had a tendency to occasionally misfeed within the first few rounds out of a full magazine.  With round nose FMJ, the issue is rare, but with flat-nose or JHP ammunition, this tendency can be frustrating.  The misfeeds take various forms depending on the bullet geometry and cartridge OAL.  Flat-nose and JHP rounds may get stumped against the bottom edge of the feed ramp.  Round-nose ammunition may do complete nosedives if the OAL is short.  When the problem manifests, it will tend to persist for the next 3-4 rounds before disappearing. Until recently, I had never used anything other than round-nose FMJ.  At the time, I simply attributed this very occasional fault to either my loading of the magazine or perhaps the need for some break-in.

Hornady JHP with short OAL stumped into feedramp

Complete nosedive with Remington UMC round-nose FMJ

In response to a partial-feed issue which arose when changing ammunition, I used Cratex and a wool buff to ease and polish the edge and bottom corner of the extractor to keep it from biting into case rims.  I polished the feed ramp, breech face and the side of the breech opposite the extractor.  In all, this reduces the amount of force required for a round to slide under the extractor.  This solved the particular ammo-sensitivity I was having, and I wondered if I had just solved the more longstanding misfeed issue at the same time.  On the second magazine after my polishing work, I wound up with a handful of complete nosedives using both Remington UMC and PMC Bronze 115gr FMJ.  It seems I had solved one of two unrelated faults contributing to the misfeeding tendency; the prime suspect was now the magazine.

With a bit of fiddling and observation, I had a handle on what was happening.  The problem seems to be an issue of magazine geometry more than anything else.  With only a few rounds in the magazine, the rounds in the tapered section seem to be well constrained and will reliably stack against each other with the top round tightly against the feed lips.  When there are >10 rounds or so in the magazine, the rounds in the tapered section of the magazine may not stack uniformly.  They tend to pivot around the wrong side of the ribs, allowing the top several rounds to fan out vertically.  One way to induce this mis-stacking is to push down on the nose of the top round.  You may feel the stack shift as you depress, and when you let go, the top round will be held only by its rim.  The front of the case will be unsupported and ready to nosedive when stripped.  The placement of the retention dimples in the feed lips seems to exacerbate the problem by giving the round something to pivot against. 

Tight stacking with only 3 rounds

Splayed stacking with 13 rounds

Unsupported round will easily pivot down when stripped

While I'm sure someone would suggest that this is all caused by a collapsed spring, I doubt that for three reasons: The problem has been manifest since the magazine was new.  The misfeeds never occur at the end of a magazine.  Adding a filler block inside the magazine to increase the spring force does not change the behavior, and manually applying an excess of force to the follower with the floorplate and spring removed will not prevent or remedy an irregular stacking condition either.

How big of a problem is this though? While it can be intentionally induced as described, the condition also seems to arise naturally during loading and handling.  The fact that the slide keeps the stack depressed while closed means it can occasionally recur even if the magazine was stacked tightly when it was first inserted into the pistol.  A magazine which is sluggish either due to fouling or a weak spring will probably be more prone to this mis-stacking when the slide opens.  Sometimes this mis-stacking can be cured by slapping the magazine on its side, though it often can't.  A small tool or pocket knife can be used through the magazine catch slots to push the stack back into alignment, but that's hardly a practical solution. I think it's big enough of an issue that I am willing to write off this magazine as having a flawed design. The best fix is replacement with something different.

MEC-GAR MGWIT9SFAFC

As I mentioned, it's hard to confidently find parts when retailers don't know what they're selling or don't care to communicate any amount of unambiguous identifying information.  As far as I know, if you want a different magazine to replace a #101900, your only option is a Mec-Gar MGWIT9SFAFC.  This is listed (and stamped) as a 17-round magazine, and it fits well.  The feed lip and transition geometry do significantly differ from the original magazine.  The follower is different primarily in that it matches the narrower transition geometry; this also means they aren't interchangeable.  The spring is significantly longer and has more turns.  The end result is a magazine which reliably stacks perfectly every time.  The aforementioned method of inducing mis-stacking does not work on the Mec-Gar magazine.


So far this sounds like a perfect fix.  I ran several dry-cycle drills without fault, trying to induce misfeeds with flat-nose rounds all the while.  I eagerly loaded up a magazine with said problematic flat-nose FMJ and spent it on steel plates.  I was a bit distracted by the satisfaction of getting the ammo to finally feed that I lost count and was a bit confused when the hammer finally dropped on an empty chamber; the slide didn't lock open when the mag was empty.  I depressed the mag release, and the magazine happily stayed put.  Only after a bit of wiggling would the mag come out.

Follower rounded over on Mec-Gar magazine

The plastic follower barely catches slide lock on its edge, and after only a few dry-cycle drills and a single mag in live-fire, it had rounded off and wedged against the side of the slide lock instead of lifting it.  Now it would no longer reliably catch the slide lock.  Okay, I guess a LRHO is kind of a convenience, but now the mag won't drop because it wedges against the slide lock.  So even though it solved the misfeeding issue brilliantly, the Mec-Gar magazine introduces a new inconvenience.  Granted, I only have one magazine to base this on, but at an overall cost of $33 each, I'm not exactly going to buy enough magazines to do a statistical analysis of this failure mode.  At this point, I see two options: cut off the corner of the follower so that it neither lifts the slide lock nor wedges against it.   This defeats the LRHO, but it's the easiest to do.  Alternatively, one could repair and reinforce the edge of the follower where it engages the slide lock.  That is what I opted to attempt.


My first attempt was simply to cut a piece of spring steel strip to match the profile of the follower edge and epoxy it in place.  After some final dressing, this looked fine and worked perfectly when tested manually.  I loaded a single round in the magazine, shot a steel plate, and was rewarded with an open slide.  I removed the magazine, and the steel reinforcement fell out on the floor.  The epoxy didn't bond at all to the follower.  Based on appearance and toughness, I had assumed this was glass-filled nylon, but perhaps it has a lubricant additive. After a few other attempts, I resigned to the fact that bond strength was going to be very limited. 


I changed plans and came up with a reinforcement which relied more on mechanical support than the adhesive bonding.  I drilled a small hole in the follower to retain a section of 3/32" steel rod.  The hole is deep enough to reach the centerline of the follower, ensuring that the end of the rod is fully captured.  I used ScotchWeld 2216, as this relatively flexible epoxy tends to have good adhesion to troublesome plastics. The bond strength is still relatively weak, but it's the best I had.  At this point, the LRHO works correctly and the follower edge is resistant against deformation. 

I have no idea if the problems I've experienced are common or even repeatable.  I do not know if there are other alternatives beyond the two magazines I've described.  If you found any of this information useful, then I suppose that's a good thing.