Bullet lead

[hobbesy]

If I wanted to make my own bullets what sort of lead do I need and is there any advantage over buying boxes of bullets from the local shop?

Thanks

[dromia]

Generally bought bullets are far too hard and too small, casting your own means you can tailor the bullet to your gun's freebore/groove/bore dimensions.

I like range scrap cut 50/50 with plumbers lead for a BHN of around 10-12 for velocities up to 2000 fps. 8-10 BHN is fine up to around 1500 fps, bullet fit is king.

[Dark Skies]

Not to hijack the thread, merely to expand it ...

What about casting balls for muzzle loading revolvers such as the Uberti replicas of Western guns?

I've a big box of lead from a mixture of sources old airgun pellets, pulled bullets, wheel weights, various sheet, plumbing and some really thick lead shielding scrap. Had hoped to melt the lot and use as is. On a scale of wrong from 1 to 10 with ten being the wrongiest where would that lie?

[dromia]

Melt some up and try it, there is no wrong only what works, I know plenty of people that shoot round balls cast from hard lead.

Even hard lead is softer than a copper jacket.

The only issue with hard lead is that it can be more prone to leading but a good lube and good fit can mitigate against this in ML revolver you aren't driving the ball hard, the trick to revolver success is making sure that the chamber diameter is greater than groove.

As I have said before fit is king.

[Dark Skies]

Ta.

[hobbesy]

Generally bought bullets are far too hard and too small, casting your own means you can tailor the bullet to your gun's freebore/groove/bore dimensions.

I like range scrap cut 50/50 with plumbers lead for a BHN of around 10-12 for velocities up to 2000 fps. 8-10 BHN is fine up to around 1500 fps, bullet fit is king.

What about gas checks, those little blue or red bands and/or powder coating. Worth it or not?

I shoot .357, .44, 30-30 underlever and I have a .300 blackout single shot

[Alpha1]

Forget powder coating. You use gas checks if you are driving the bullets hard. I dont use them for low loads.

[dromia]

With soft lead, decent lube and good bullet fit you should not need gas checks in those calibres for velocities up to 1800-2000 fps.

However all guns are different, my No4T for example will not shoot an non gas checked bullet at any velocity for some reason(s) I cannot fathom.

Gas checks don't check the gas what they do is resist bullet stripping as the bullet enters the lands, stripping can allow gas flow across the ragged stripped edges which can cause leading especially with hard antimony bearing alloys. Think of it as cog on the end of the bullet engaging with the rifling.

Tumble lubing with Xlox or better still 45-45-10 should be all you need lube wise for up to say 1600 fps, I have found powder coating to be a real chew on and messy as is epoxy coating with no velocity or accuracy benefits over Xlox/45-45-10.

Search for a recent thread on the subject here for my experiences.

If your bullets need sizing then I would recommend the NOE push through sizers, if you are going beyond 1500-1600 fps you will need a better lube, I use White Label 2500 for everything, if they need sizing then a lube sizer could be a good investment although if you pan lube (slow and messy relative to lube/sizing) then you can still use the push through sizers.

[hobbesy]

Thanks for the info, I was after making my own ammo to shoot in my .300 blackout and 30-30. At the moment I have 165 cast bullets from she'll house but I have found their weight to have massive discrepancies in weight.

[Alpha1]

Pm dodgyrog he supplies cast boolits.