- Feb 4, 2013
- 28,175
I load for accuracy and have no interest in rouding from the best load. Question doesn’t make sense to me. Zero 200gn L-SWC does best with 4.9gn 231/HP38, and PD 200gn L-SWC does best with 4.8 gn 231/HP38.
My question is why was 148 gn (9.6 g) selected for .38 wadcutter and 147 gn (9.5 g) for 9mm. Again, 147gn makes sense for metric, and I doubt 148gn was more accurate than 147 or even 150gn, so who selected it?
Why 158gn (10.2g) instead of 160gn (10.4g), from a country on the imperial system.
I can see 124gn for 9mm as that is just slightly over 8g, so why 115 instead of 116 gn (7.5 g)
It seems that OCD is not a driving force in shooting.
So, any historians, was this due to actual opmizing or just random?
Because a grain or two or three either way doesn't make a lot of difference. You cannot measure the difference in performance between a 147 gr and 148 grain bullet.
They design a bullet to be a certain weight range, and take what they get. It is not worth the time and effort to redesign it for a couple of grains finished weight. Historically, they designed a bullet. Shot it. If it worked well, they used it. Whatever the weight.
Are you REALLY so OCD that your charges must be even whole grains and your bullets even 10 grains???????
If so, you better get a lab balance so you can make sure your loads are 6.0000 grains and not 6.02 grains.
But then don't actually weigh your bullets, as you will find they don't actually weigh exactly 148.00 grains.
Oh, and BTW, a 9 mm is actually 9.01 mm diameter. And .308 bullets are actually .309 inches. And .38 Special bullets are .358 inches. And the German 8 mm round is also called the 7.92x57, but shoots an 8.22 mm bullet.
And then there are case lengths. .308 is also known as 7.62x51. Maybe they should have shortened it to be 7.62x50. And 9 mm should be lengthened to be 9x20 instead of 9x19.