9mm Montana Gold CMJ - unburnt powder?

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Hi all. I get what looks like a tiny bit of partially burnt powder ejected from my Glock 17 with the loads listed below. No other issues with the loads, except that the 3.7gr is a little weak locking the slide back on the last round. My groupings are tight and the gun cycles fine. I only noticed it because I was shooting bench wrest through the chrony, and I got a few little flecks of black on my notes sitting to the right of the gun. Doesn't happen all the time, though.

124gr CMJ
Titegroup
COL 1.135
Mixed head stamp, once fired
Load 1: 3.7gr ~1030 fps
Load 2: 3.8gr ~1040 fps
Load 3: 3.9gr ~1050 fps

The COL numbers online are all over the map for 9mm. Titegroup says 1.150 max. My remington factory rounds are 1.113, noticeably shorter. I'm pretty sure my crimp is tight enough, so I was going to shorten the COL to increase the burn time. I tried firing up close on paper, and I didn't see any telltale circular burn marks.

Thoughts? Anyone else noticed this?
 
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124 gr?

I noticed lots of unburned powder with 115 gr plated bullets at 4 gr TG. TG definitely burns dirty at low charges.

Try bumping up the charge.
 
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Titegroup does that. Pretty common.

Yeah I use to get all kinds of fouling on my hands and arms when shooting lighter loads with 115 gr bullets. But then I switched to 124 gr bullets and used ~4 gr, most of the dirtiness disappeared. TG isn't the cleanest burning powder but not the dirtiest either (Unique for example).
 
I was using 125gr JHP and conicals at 1.115 with 3.8gr titegroup. They were right at 1000 fps. I now switched to 147gr JHP with 3.3gr N320 , I don't have my notes with me but they are at 130 PF for competition. My son loved shooting them recently in my (his) G34.
 
Why do anything if they shoot fine?

Exactly!

The velocities you are getting with the 3.8/3.9grs are good, they function fine, and you say they are accurate, why mess around with them?

As far as OAL goes, it really depends on the bullet you are using, not necessarily what they give you in the load data.

In determining the OAL with a new bullet, I like going by the "plunk" test. Remove the barrel from the pistol. Load a dummy round a bit long, and try to let it just drop into your barrels chamber, using gravity alone. Keep shortening the OAL until the cartridge drops completely in with no resistance. You will hear the difference when the cartridge headspaces correctly - it will make a distinct "plunking" sound when it does. Once this OAL is reached, I like to shorten it just a tad more (maybe .01") to guarantee that all loaded rounds will headspace correctly.

I've never had an issue when determining OAL using this method. They should easily fit in the mag., and you already know they will chamber. Try a few to make sure they cycle in your particular gun and you are getting the accuracy you are content with. If all these criteria are met, be done with it! No point in messing with things just for the sake of messing with them.

Not my video, but as they say a picture is worth 1,000 words, and sometimes seeing something makes it easier to understand the explanation.

 
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If they shoot fine, who cares about a little dirty.... I use 4.5gr. of TG for my 40 with Winchester small rifle primers and 180gr Xtreme RNFP bullets at 1.170" COL and that does approx 950fps which makes major power factor for USPSA. I get some unburnt powder/residue, but then I just clean my gun and there's no issues... If it ain't broke, don't fix it
 
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