.40 S&W loads

Short story I came across an STI Trojan in .40 that was too good a deal to pass up.  Slide/barrel are tight and trigger is nice.  Took it apart and it has a KKM barrel in it. Shooting it's pretty accurate using some of my 15 year old reloads using Star 180gr jacketed flat nose and 165 JHP over VV 3N37 and W231.  Only have a few more boxes of Star bullets left and looking for suggestions on bullets and powder to start with.  Have a lot of N310, N340, Bullseye, and W231.  Unfortunately no one local stocks Zero so will have to get Roze to send me a few in .40 with next order to measure/try.  Looking for accurate loads not gamer power factor stuff.  Don't have a range close that allows chrony's so working up loads isn't as easy as it used to be.

I haven't done a lot of accuracy/velocity load testing for the 40, but i shoot between 3.7 and 4 grains of titegroup group. Out of my 6" sti 2011 (my build) with kart barrel, it shoots arround 0.6" ransom rest groups at 50 FEET, (not yards). Bullet is Lee 180 truncated cone at about 12 Hardness and powdercoated. Casting technique was NOT bullseye quality, it was USPSA quality. 

I have shot this load from other 2011 sti builds and it shoots pretty good in all of them. The last one was a KKM barrel. When I first tested that gun with customers ammo, it shot over 1 inch (what the heck???) Tried my trusty old "garbage" loads, and it was right back to 0.6-0.7. He was shooting 165 cast and coated S&S bullets and the barrel didn't like them at all.

I shot my STI 40 in centerfire once. The 6" barrell really helps with sight radius, and the full length, heavy dust cover dampens recoil pretty effectivly, but the weight of the gun got me pretty tired pretty quick. I believe I shot an 810 or so which was about where I was shooting the 45 at the time.

I tried a lot of 40 loads in my Kimber Gold Match II. I found some that actually shot pretty good. The Nosler 135gr JHP was the best. Also did okay with the 150gr XTP. Both those loads were fine for the long line for me. For the short line I went with 135gr LSWC or 180 gr LTC. I worked up a fairly soft load that would keep the pistol functioning. I tried, I did, I tested then I put a 38 Super barrel in the pistol and put all the 40 ammo away in containers. I still have a M&P and a XDM in 40 so I should get them shot up someday..  



I kept this target from those days to show what happened when I changed magazines one time.

Lenv, looks like you used Bullseye, Power Pistol, 231, but can't read the 150/180 powder

A couple guys in our club have 40s. They load 175gr cast swc with 3.0-3.3gr bullseye.

The ones you can't read were Universal loads. I also have a good load for the 150gr using 7.5gr of CFE Pistol.