As with anything with me it starts out as an idea. It was 2013 and I was reading about powder coating cast bullets. I've been casting bullets since the 80's with my own equipment. Wasn't real pressing, my traditionally cast/lubed bullets had been serving me well for +/- 30 years at that point in time. And believe me when I say I've made every mistake someone could make at least twice with casting, lubing, sizing, reloading. But it also gave me a solid base of knowledge to draw from.
Well, I was walking thru a gunshow and sitting there was a CIL T950 in 308w. The T950 is a single shot target rifle made by savage for CIL. Basically it reminded me of a winchester 52d. The bbl was shot out so I ordered a er shaw 308w bbl kit (20" 1 in 10 twist bbl, bbl wrench, go & no/go gages). Installed the bbl and put a sightron 36x target dot on it. Now I have a test platform to do head-to-head testing with pc'd VS traditionally lubed bullets,
I never pushed cast bullets over 2000fps, so I knew I had to work on an alloy that was hard enough that it wouldn't strip/slide on the lands. But had to be elastic enough that it could withstand the rotational that the bullet had to withstand. The front part of a cast bullet passes the throat/leade of the chamber and starts rotating in the lands. The back part of the bullet is expanding in the ball throat grabbing onto it. As it holds onto the ball throat the front is twisting, hence rotational torque.
Nothing fancy, put a target up @ 100yds in different area's. Then dug the bullets out of the berm.
The 2300fps bullet is a 230gr cast bullet with a 50,000spi+ load. The others shattered. The tip of the 2300fps bullet shattered but the long body stayed intact. It wasn't "stripped/slid" in the lands. I ended up using that alloy (14bhn) for hv testing later on.
Well I had a bunch of 8/9bhn bullets cast so I decided to do some head-to-head testing. Pc'd vs traditionally cast/lubed.
Lyman 311291:
I used a soft homemade lube (ben's red) + a tumble lube (45/45/10) along with a gas check. Gas checks are supposed to seal the bore making better use of the pressures exerted on it (high velocities). 10-shot group @ 50yds
Same bullet from the same casting session same yada-yada-yada. The only difference is there is no gas cheak and the bullet was pc'd.
No gas check and higher velocities without any loss in accuracy. The same scenario played out time after time after time. The pd's bullets were always faster.
Ordered a 30" bbl with a match chamber and a 1 in 14 twist in 308w and installed it on that cil t950. Made a set of bump dies to get the nose of the bullets to fit in the 1.5* leade. A casting next to a bumped bullet.
Cast up a bunch of the lee 312-160tl bullet (6-cavity mold) using that 14bhn alloy. Pc'd some and tumbled lubed others.
100yd 10-shot groups doing ladder tests. The traditionally lubed (lbt blue) bullets managed 2614fps and the groups blew out (shotgun pattern).
Same everything except the bullet was pc'd. Got 2679fps (65fps faster than the traditionally lubed bullet) while maintaining accuracy.
Thought about the traditional lubed bullets losing accuracy. Decided to add a coating of 45/45/10 to the already lubed bullet that was lubed with lbt blue. Just didn't have enough lube for the pressure/velocity of the load. Re-tested and got this.
The groups came back but velocity was still lower than the pc'd bullets.
I've tested 20+ different bullets in the 308w traditionally lubed VS pc'd. I have yet to have a traditionally lubed bullet have higher velocities then the pc'd bullet. Same cast bullet cast at the same time with the same alloy. Sized at the same time in the same sizing dies. Loaded at the same time with the same cases/primers/powder/dies. Shot in the same firearm on the same day withing 15 minutes of each other.
The same thing that happened in the 308w happens in the 9mm 3 1/2"/4"/5" bbl's) 38spl's (2"/4"/6"/10" bbl's), 357mags (2 1/2"/4"/6"/8"/10" bbl's), 44spl's (2 1/2", 6 1/2" bbl's) 44mags (4"/6"/10"/14" bbl's) 45acp (5"/10" bbl's).
The reason the pc'd bullet have higher velocities is because of the mechanics that are applied to any bullet when being shot.
With a traditionally lubed bullet:
The bullet moves forward as the pressure of the burning gunpowder/gases are exerted on it. The bullet base/bottom drive band tries to seal the gases. Some of the hot gases blow by and push the bullets lube outward and forward. The lube acts like a gasket sealing & creating a thin barrier/lube between the bullet and the bbl. This pressure is exerted on the front drive band/bands and the same thing happens. The second thing happening with the bullets base is as it pushes forward it is collapsing/compressing the bullets lube groove/grooves. This creates hydraulic pressure forcing the lube forward and outward. This is why the hard lube/soft lube thing comes into play. Then there's the bullets hardness matching the pressure of the load to be able to compress/seal/protect the bullet. When you get the man-moment-machine part right. You end up with an efficient & accurate bullet/load. Get it wrong either one or both will suffer. Several years ago I was having a conversation with another caster about the affects of a round lube groove VS square lube groove. This is a photo he sent to me. If you look closely at the recovered bullets you can see the different lube grooves in different states of compression.
A pc'd bullet:
It has none of the issues to deal with that the traditionally lubes bullet has. The coating is already everywhere it needs to be sealing/protecting where the bullet touches the bbl. This makes a pc'd bullet highly efficient.
Well, I was walking thru a gunshow and sitting there was a CIL T950 in 308w. The T950 is a single shot target rifle made by savage for CIL. Basically it reminded me of a winchester 52d. The bbl was shot out so I ordered a er shaw 308w bbl kit (20" 1 in 10 twist bbl, bbl wrench, go & no/go gages). Installed the bbl and put a sightron 36x target dot on it. Now I have a test platform to do head-to-head testing with pc'd VS traditionally lubed bullets,
I never pushed cast bullets over 2000fps, so I knew I had to work on an alloy that was hard enough that it wouldn't strip/slide on the lands. But had to be elastic enough that it could withstand the rotational that the bullet had to withstand. The front part of a cast bullet passes the throat/leade of the chamber and starts rotating in the lands. The back part of the bullet is expanding in the ball throat grabbing onto it. As it holds onto the ball throat the front is twisting, hence rotational torque.
Nothing fancy, put a target up @ 100yds in different area's. Then dug the bullets out of the berm.
The 2300fps bullet is a 230gr cast bullet with a 50,000spi+ load. The others shattered. The tip of the 2300fps bullet shattered but the long body stayed intact. It wasn't "stripped/slid" in the lands. I ended up using that alloy (14bhn) for hv testing later on.
Well I had a bunch of 8/9bhn bullets cast so I decided to do some head-to-head testing. Pc'd vs traditionally cast/lubed.
Lyman 311291:
I used a soft homemade lube (ben's red) + a tumble lube (45/45/10) along with a gas check. Gas checks are supposed to seal the bore making better use of the pressures exerted on it (high velocities). 10-shot group @ 50yds
Same bullet from the same casting session same yada-yada-yada. The only difference is there is no gas cheak and the bullet was pc'd.
No gas check and higher velocities without any loss in accuracy. The same scenario played out time after time after time. The pd's bullets were always faster.
Ordered a 30" bbl with a match chamber and a 1 in 14 twist in 308w and installed it on that cil t950. Made a set of bump dies to get the nose of the bullets to fit in the 1.5* leade. A casting next to a bumped bullet.
Cast up a bunch of the lee 312-160tl bullet (6-cavity mold) using that 14bhn alloy. Pc'd some and tumbled lubed others.
100yd 10-shot groups doing ladder tests. The traditionally lubed (lbt blue) bullets managed 2614fps and the groups blew out (shotgun pattern).
Same everything except the bullet was pc'd. Got 2679fps (65fps faster than the traditionally lubed bullet) while maintaining accuracy.
Thought about the traditional lubed bullets losing accuracy. Decided to add a coating of 45/45/10 to the already lubed bullet that was lubed with lbt blue. Just didn't have enough lube for the pressure/velocity of the load. Re-tested and got this.
The groups came back but velocity was still lower than the pc'd bullets.
I've tested 20+ different bullets in the 308w traditionally lubed VS pc'd. I have yet to have a traditionally lubed bullet have higher velocities then the pc'd bullet. Same cast bullet cast at the same time with the same alloy. Sized at the same time in the same sizing dies. Loaded at the same time with the same cases/primers/powder/dies. Shot in the same firearm on the same day withing 15 minutes of each other.
The same thing that happened in the 308w happens in the 9mm 3 1/2"/4"/5" bbl's) 38spl's (2"/4"/6"/10" bbl's), 357mags (2 1/2"/4"/6"/8"/10" bbl's), 44spl's (2 1/2", 6 1/2" bbl's) 44mags (4"/6"/10"/14" bbl's) 45acp (5"/10" bbl's).
The reason the pc'd bullet have higher velocities is because of the mechanics that are applied to any bullet when being shot.
With a traditionally lubed bullet:
The bullet moves forward as the pressure of the burning gunpowder/gases are exerted on it. The bullet base/bottom drive band tries to seal the gases. Some of the hot gases blow by and push the bullets lube outward and forward. The lube acts like a gasket sealing & creating a thin barrier/lube between the bullet and the bbl. This pressure is exerted on the front drive band/bands and the same thing happens. The second thing happening with the bullets base is as it pushes forward it is collapsing/compressing the bullets lube groove/grooves. This creates hydraulic pressure forcing the lube forward and outward. This is why the hard lube/soft lube thing comes into play. Then there's the bullets hardness matching the pressure of the load to be able to compress/seal/protect the bullet. When you get the man-moment-machine part right. You end up with an efficient & accurate bullet/load. Get it wrong either one or both will suffer. Several years ago I was having a conversation with another caster about the affects of a round lube groove VS square lube groove. This is a photo he sent to me. If you look closely at the recovered bullets you can see the different lube grooves in different states of compression.
A pc'd bullet:
It has none of the issues to deal with that the traditionally lubes bullet has. The coating is already everywhere it needs to be sealing/protecting where the bullet touches the bbl. This makes a pc'd bullet highly efficient.
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