New to reloading: 9mm Luger

[deputyG23]

What's your o.a.l. with that load? I just came across a case in the basement I had forgotten about.

ETA: Mine are 122 grain

This is the same bullet I used. OAL is 1.075.
One issue I had with using the .357 sized bullets is that the G17 would experience a few failures to chamber. If I segregated my cases by head stamp and did more testing to determine which cases were more prone to this happening, I could develop a load with this bullet that would work with all my 9mm pistols. I got lazy and bought RMR 124 grain flat nose plated bullets sized .356. Cleaner and easier to load using my mixed cases.

[deputyG23]

WST is the one powder I found in 2013 when I exhausted my last bit of 231. A backwoods LGS had two four pound jugs at $79 each and I bought one. That was the last reasonably priced pistol powder I saw for years. I have about a pound left.
Like LSP 972 said, it is unobtanium in my neck of the woods.
I bought a pound of Alliant BE-86 to try out. Haven't messed with it yet. There is data available for every handgun cartridge I have with it. $22/lb is what my LGS charges for it.

[Rick_ICT]

Is anyone using Hodgdon's CFE-Pistol?

Early last year as I was purchasing supplies to gear back up for reloading, it was the first and only pistol powder I came across after much looking. The store I found it in had at least two full cases worth of one pound bottles on the shelf. I about danced a jig at the sight of it. I snatched up the single one pound container I was "allowed". I didn't know anything about it, but when I got home I did some research and saw several positive reviews on various reloading forums. It was apparently just introduced in 2014, although I've read speculation that it is simply a reformulation of another powder with their "copper fouling eliminator" added. I purchased a second pound when I had the opportunity, and just recently acquired more. It seems to be more consistently available, even when most other pistol powders were next to impossible to find around here.

I've been using 5.3 grains under a Berry's 124gr RNHB TP bullet w/ a CCI 500 spp @ 1.150" OAL. The Hodgdon reloading site lists this as a warm but not hot load with this bullet (5.5gr listed as max), and I've seen no pressure signs. The load seems pretty consistent and shoots to the same POI as the Speer Lawman I had been buying. The powder has virtually no flash that I've been able to see shooting on an indoor range and produces practically no lingering smoke. It also cleans up easily, it's a little sooty but it wipes off readily. And as the name would imply, I rarely see much if any copper residue in the barrel. It does have an odd smell to it when burnt, one that doesn't bother me but some might find unpleasant.

Unfortunately I do not yet a chronometer to measure the velocity, although that is next on my list as the weather warms up enough to make shooting outdoors enjoyable again. Going by the velocities on the Hodgdon site, I would guess around 1080fps, but I've seen several remarks on reloading forums by people with chronos who think Hodgdon's velocity numbers are a little fishy. Hopefully, I'll find out for myself soon enough.

If anyone is using CFE-Pistol I'd love to see pet loads, or thoughts/comments/derisions regarding the powder. And if anyone has any chrono data, that would be awesome as well.

[Rick_ICT]

^^^ Replace "chronometer" with "chronograph". As soon as I typed it, I stared at it thinking to myself "That isn't the word you're after...", but I convinced myself I was wrong and hit send anyway. Today I was researching them and saw chronograph and said "Yep, that was the word you meant to use yesterday".