Reloading For the Smith and Wesson 329PD

We all reload for different reasons; a lot of obsolete cartridges and guns are still very relevant and fun to shoot but the only way to enjoy them is to make the ammunition for them. Another reason and one we will discuss today is that it allows the ability to tailor the ammo to suit our needs or purpose. 

I have a very long history with the .44 Remington Magnum (.44 Mag). While I wouldn’t recommend it for beginners, it made up the bulk of my early shooting experience. I should have the world’s worst flinch but somehow, I escaped that problem and came to learn that it is truly a versatile and powerful cartridge. 

The main hero, or depending on how you view it, the main villain of this article, is the Smith and Wesson 329PD or “Personal Defense”. The 329 was introduced sometime around 2003. It is one of their mixed metal guns offering a Scandium alloy frame with a Titanium cylinder based on the Smith and Wesson N frame. Unloaded it weighs a little over 26oz and if you have never handled one it honestly feels like a toy or a movie prop gun. These guns have many drawbacks, but they have a few unique advantages. I acquired my first one sometime in the spring of 03.

It seemed to fit a niche better than anything else available at the time. Namely a lightweight revolver, chambered in the powerful .44 Mag, that is resistant to rust and corrosion and easily carried in the field. I don’t believe the engineers at Smith & Wesson ever envisioned these guns being shot a lot. The gun is ideal for field carry and even uses a fiber optic front sight with a V notch rear that is more common on a fast-handling African rifle than a handgun. If you are outdoors and spend any time in areas where things may have teeth and bad attitudes this is a great choice if you are willing to understand it and put in the work to tame its rude ways.

Over the years much has been written about these guns, so we won’t spend a lot of time rehashing old tales. I have owned several throughout the years, always swapping between them and my beloved 629 mountain gun. The ease of carry and corrosion resistance always wins out and the mountain gun ends up in the safe.  I have experienced all the common issues the guns have including complete frame replacements. Smith & Wesson customer service has varied from above and beyond, to satisfactory, however they have always repaired my guns without question. 

Unique Construction, Unique Issues

Flame Cutting of Frame

If you’re someone who actually puts significant rounds through your 329PD a good bit you will deal with three major issues. The first and the most serious of the three is flame cutting of the frame.

Smith uses a blast shield to protect the frame from flame cutting. While I doubt it was never designed to be sacrificial, it certainly is. I have had them last 900 to 1000 rounds and one only made a couple of hundred before it was compromised. It’s going to happen so the best thing to do is inspect it after every shooting session.

If you catch it before it cuts completely through and damages the frame it is a quick fix and typically Smith will get your gun repaired and back to you quickly, you also save the hassle of having to do the paperwork for a new serial number. 

An N frame in stainless or blue steel will never suffer from these issues but the alloys in the 329PD require a special coating and while very durable once they are damaged the material underneath is subject to damage more easily.

Speaking of frame issues unique to the 329PD…

Pictured above are the results of the frame flexing under recoil. This allows the cylinder pin to disengage, the cylinder drops down and contacts the frame. This also widens the frame to cylinder gap allowing a tremendous amount of gas and in this instance molten lead to escape and flow onto the front of the cylinder. This gun required a complete frame replacement.

Lightweight guns, while great for carry, have their own problems. Personally, for me it’s worth the trade off, but I understand if it’s not everyone’s cup of tea.

Sticky Extraction

The second issue is sticky or hard extraction. This can vary from “kind of sticky” to needing a “tapper” of some type to strike the extractor rod. Neither one of these are good scenarios and can damage the gun. If you’ve been handloading for awhile you might think this is a sign of a “hot load”, however it’s not, it’s a neat quirk of the 329PD.

The reason this happens is quite interesting. Each time you fire your gun every part of that assembly expands ever so slightly, while it can be unsettling to think about, it happens. The titanium the cylinder is made of has the properties to expand and contract quickly, much faster than the brass case inside the cylinder. When fired they both expand and upon returning to their original state the cylinder walls actually “out run” the case and grip on to it creating the difficult extraction. 

You gotta have all the neck tension…

Proper bullet crimp and neck tension are critical features for ammunition that is fired in any hard recoiling gun.  The 329PD’s lightweight construction paired with the .44 Magnum cartridge makes this firearm the poster child for “snappy” recoil. This “snappy” recoil, a.k.a recoil impulse” causes bullets to physically move forward in the case increasing cartridge overall length. To put it simply, this gun will pull cartridges apart using the exact same principle as a “inertia bullet puller”.  A bullet that has “jumped the crimp” can bind up a gun and make it inoperable at a very inconvenient time.

The recoil impulse of the 329PD is much higher than that of any steel revolver. If you are going to load for this, or any similar firearm, you need to know how to effectively apply a proper crimp, and how to size cases to maximize neck tension. 

Neck tension refers to the friction created when the case walls grip the bullet tightly, this force alone can be quite high generating most of the tension.  Bullet crimp is the mechanical lock created from rolling over, tapering or physically compressing the case mouth into the jacket. Bullet Crimp and Neck Tension; work together to hold the projectile in place under recoil.

We can increase neck tension by sizing the brass so that the case neck only needs to expand about .001 to .002 inches to accept the bullet. If your bullet measures .429in then you want the ID (Inner Diameter) of the brass case after sizing to measure around .427in. This keeps the brass within its elastic range; meaning it stretches just enough to grip the bullet tightly without yielding. If the brass is forced to expand too much, it begins to deform plastically, reducing its ability to ‘spring back’ and weakening neck tension. Virgin brass usually holds bullets well right out of the box, but after multiple loadings, brass work hardens and loses some of this elasticity. That’s where annealing comes in: it softens the brass and restores the spring-like properties needed for good neck tension.

By the way, neck tension, or the lack thereof, is not a problem that is unique to handloads, factory ammo can suffer the same fate. Which is why it’s wise to test factory loads before you commit to carrying them.

 All these issues can be mitigated with careful handloading

This gun can handle a reasonable amount of full house .44 Mag ammo. The real question becomes are you capable of training with full house loads and not developing a flinch, and are full house loads even necessary to achieve the desired results. 

To feel confident with a firearm of any type one must practice regularly, this is especially true of the guns we depend on to keep us safe from predators no matter how many legs they may have. Anything that dissuades you from practicing with your firearm is to your detriment. A hard recoiling revolver shooting heavy magnum loads will make even the most experienced shooter grimace when thinking about a 25-round course of fire.

How to shoot big bore, hard recoiling, revolvers, in a way that isn’t painful is a topic all its own, it deserves a separate article, so keep your eyes out for something soon.  In short, some people are more recoil sensitive than others but with proper training and proper load selection this gun is manageable, once you learn a couple of tricks it is faster for a follow up shot than an all-steel gun.

The aforementioned issues can be solved or greatly minimized by lowering the pressure of the cartridge, and thus the velocity of the bullet. Some may say, “Why go through all this trouble of developing your own handloads when this could be achieved by using .44 Special ammunition.”

This is an option I do not utilize in many of my magnum handguns including this one. 

The .44 Special case is shorter than the .44 Magnum and after many firings you will develop a carbon ring in the cylinder, right where the .44 Special case mouth sits, that makes it difficult to fully seat a magnum cartridge. Now this is not really an issue with a steel cylinder, a little judicious scrubbing and no worries, good as new.

The titanium cylinder of the 329PD has a special coating to protect it from wear and corrosion. Sure, it is plenty durable, but I choose not to create more “scrubbing” work, no need to introduce any added wear to the coating. Especially when I can use .44 Magnum brass that allows me to achieve whatever velocity I need for the intended task.

Some careful load selection will let us take advantage of all this gun has to offer without dealing with its quirks, or trying to track down .44 Special ammo. A .429 diameter bullet weighing between 240 and 270 grains traveling from 900fps to 1200fps is very formidable. With proper bullet construction it will handle anything that one might reasonably encounter in the lower 48. A big grizzly bear notwithstanding.

In my opinion hard cast bullets with abrupt cutting edges are superior for anything that might want to chew on you. Bullet design and construction have come a long way and any of the bonded or solid copper hollow point bullets are good choices, the Hornady XTP in particular has a great track record in field use. 

By taming this load and keeping the velocity down below 1200fps, this gun will still have stiff recoil, but with a little practice, it is quite manageable. This helps to eliminate that “sore and tired” wrist that might otherwise come from a 50 round practice session at the range.  

How to prevent “bullet Jump”

The best tool for this job is the LEE Factory Crimp Die. This collet style crimping die is actuated by the shell holder and will produce a consistent crimp regardless of case length.  Use it in combination with a cartridge checker to make sure you don’t accidentally bulge the case from applying too much crimp, which will prevent the cartridge from fitting in the chamber.

As a handloader for the 329PD, you should always check for bullet movement with your loads or any factory ammo you intend to use, before counting your life on it. Do this by loading all six rounds into the cylinder, measure the sixth round and fire five shots. Then remove and measure the sixth. If your cylinder locks up before you can fire five shots, you obviously have a problem. If you get all five shots down range, then measure that sixth round, generally, more than about .025in of movement may indicate a problem. 

Again, the slightly lower pressure loads we are using helps to lessen the magnitude of the recoil impulse. It still may feel snappy but it won’t be quite as curt. You might say it learns a little bit of manners. As a result, the bullets are far less likely to “jump the crimp”

Smooth Extraction 50% of the Time Every Time

I have found that velocities below 1200fps, will also typically solve the sticky extraction issue. It’s not the velocity that is solving the issue; it is more the pressure generated. Velocity is just the measurement that we, the handloader, can measure to get a sense of what pressure the loads might be generated. 

1200fps with a modern bullet, will still be devastating on all varieties of predators, while maximizing the service life of the pistol and making quick reloads less troublesome. Keep in mind this still well exceeds the performance of the .44 Special. A 300gr Hornady XTP can be loaded with a lighter charge of H110, to produce roughly 25kPSI (36kPSI is .44 Mag Service Pressure) and still achieve a muzzle velocity of 900+ feet per second developing 550+ ft-lbs of energy. A comparable max load in .44 Special will net 725fps, and 375+ft-lbs.

It’s up to you to determine if fast reloads, faster follow up shots, and a steadier hand, are better than raw power, impossible reloads and a nasty flinch.

Live Longer, and Prosper

While 99% of magnum revolvers are never shot enough to see any effect, Flame cutting is an annoying reality of magnum revolvers. Every shot you take with a full house magnum load, brings the pistol one shot closer to damage. This phenomenon is made worse by lightweight construction and exotic materials. This necessitates the use of a “blast shield”. Once this blast shield is compromised, gas cutting goes from a slow erosion of metal to serious damage quite rapidly.  Steel frame revolvers have the same issue, just the wear is constant as the material of the frame is similar hardness and density all the way through.

We can mitigate this by shooting loads with a lower pressure. Lower pressure typically means less gas, cooler gas, and lower gas velocity. All three of these things mean you are going to increase the service life of your pistol. Even still, if you shoot enough, the 329PD will eventually wear through the blast shield and it will need replacement. Take this as a badge of honor, you are shooting a good bit and getting the most out of your investment.

There have been many discussions about powder selection and the erosion of the blast shield and forcing cone. At the end of the day, it boils down to this: 

More pressure = Faster blast shield erosion = Shorter Service Life

Less pressure= Slower blast shield erosion = Longer Service Life

Some Powders to Consider

Generally, I like powders that maintain a high load density, a fancy word for how much of the case is occupied by the powder. The main benefit of this is that a high load density promotes a more even ignition of the powder.  We are looking at making reduced loads, so some of the faster powders we may normally consider are not going to be good choices as down loading them is going to produce load densities below 80%.

 We have a great resource here at The Ballistic Assistant in the form of our burn rate chart. This is a wonderful resource to help choose a powder for any project you may be working on.  Listed below are some of the powders I have used successfully in the 329PD.

At the End of the Day…

The Smith and Wesson 329PD is a gun designed to pack a magnum size wallop while keeping the weight down to something that isn’t tiresome to carry. It is light, and handy, it is unmatched in its intended application. After all, an easy to carry gun is much more likely to be with you when you need it most. It is not designed to be an endurance gun shooting tens of thousands of rounds without scratching the paint. However, this article is not about trying to sell you the virtues of the 329PD, and if you come away “do or do not buy that gun” then you have missed the point.

The ability to make our own ammunition perfectly tailored for this firearm is what makes it so usable. Having to rely on store bought ammo would make this gun a difficult proposition to regularly shoot enough to be proficient with. It would be a race to see which one wore out faster, you from the recoil, or the 329 frame.

This is one of the true values of reloading. You can craft your ammunition to the firearm and this idea is not limited to the 329PD. Many antique firearms that otherwise would be lost to history can be shot with carefully tailored loads.  Either commercially available ammunition is scarce, or the ammunition has changed so that it is no longer safe for use in your old “war horse” of a rifle. You can take it so far as crafting your own brass from commonly available cartridges and “resurrect” a cartridge to use in a gun that would otherwise be relegated as a wall hanger. 

Reducing loads, like what we discussed for the 329PD, can also make shooting more accessible to those folks who might be recoil sensitive.  It makes the shooting experience more enjoyable for spouses, or for buddies who just want to get a feel for the gun, not necessarily the whole ride. Tailoring a load to a firearm can be an especially neat experience as you are literally “tuning” the load to match the vibrations that oscillate down the barrel with the moment the bullet is released. This results in tighter groups, often tighter than what can be achieved with factory ammunition alone.

I challenge you to pick a firearm and develop a load to improve something other than just velocity or accuracy. Maybe reduce muzzle flip on your favorite handgun or find a load that keeps the muzzle cleaner. Whatever you choose, there’s no telling what you’ll learn.

Marc