The rules and the game changed....

[venomballistics]

I've been using several colors on everything.
It makes load development, and various testing easier to keep track of.
Great way to keep your bullseye and unique loads manageable within the chaos of life.

 

[mikld]

So what do I do with a quart of liquid Alox, 1# of Johnson's paste wax, 1 large tube of Lucas red grease, 3# coffee can filled with "home made" bullet lube, 7# of pure bees wax, and 10# of church candle stubs? I've been making lube off this stash of stuff for 18 years and bearly put a dent in current inventory.

I don't think I'll spend another $10 on bake on bullet coatings.

I know your post is tougue-in-cheek, but Powder Coating and Hy-Teck coating are just other methods to add to the fun of do-it-yersef bullet making. It ain't gonna take over for quite a while, if ever. Sumpin' new and different that I can do at home. I have about 1 1/2 lbs. of Carnauba Red. Mebbe 2 lbs. of Speed Green (half home made, half store bought) A bunch of waxes, greases, lanolin, lube pans, and approx a pint of 45-45-10. It will get used I'm sure...

 

[bbqncigars]

I'll stick with my Star lubrisizer for most of my shooting. It's fast, and my Sharps loves the results.

 

[Collo Rosso]

I've been bullet shopping today. These prices are for 230gr. RN, quantity of 500 shipped to my door.
Lucky13 lead hard cast - $48.00
Extreme plated - $54.12
SNS coated - $60.95

I've been wanting to try coated bullets for a while now but other than the novelty of "bullets of color" I'm having a hard time justifying the price.
And no, I don't want to do it myself. I have trouble finding time to go shoot, much less painting bullets.

 

[doc540]

I've been assimilated.

Sold all my cast bullets and reload nothing but FalCoat now.

tested here: Educational Zone #172 ? Product Evaluation ? Falcon Bullet Company, FalCoated Bullets The Box O' Truth

 

[63expert]

I'm pretty much done with bare cast bullets. The coated or plated bullets work much better for me.

 

[scott1970]

I tried the shake and bake powder coat method yesterday for the very first time. Here are my 405 gr. .45-70 bullets after two coats.



My .45 acp bullets are what I got with just one coat of HF red using the method shown above by rsrocket1.



Any suggestions on how to get a better application with just one coat? Also, are the .45s usable as they are with only one coat? They are rather splotchy.

 

[rsrocket1]

Nice job Scott. Do you think your gun will self destruct if you try those 45ACP bullets and they don't work out? < tongue in cheek >

Shoot 'em and see what happens <seriously>

That's the fun of this whole thing. Experiment and see what works, how far you can push the limit and see what doesn't work. I know there are some PC'ers who insist on perfectly coated bullets and will either run a second coat or dump them back in the melting pot. I'd say shoot 'em and see what happens. You might see leading which will necessitate 45 seconds will a bore mop with Chore Boy to scrub it out. Then again, you might find out that they perform just as well as plated bullets and only require a patch soaked with Hoppes No.9 to clean out your bore (that's all I need nowadays).

The next time, you should shake those 45ACP bullets harder in your container. I've noticed with low humidity days, I can gently swirl the bullets in the container and get perfect coverage while on high humidity days, I get poorer coverage with the same swirling, but a few good shakes and some 360 degree flips of the container, the coverage gets good again

What I know about PC bullet coverage so far:

1. You only need good coverage on the driving bands. Good coverage on the nose is purely cosmetic and base coverage is not important (just like with exposed base jacketed bullets)
2. The coverage only needs to be 100% in terms of being able to fully seal off the gases. A pin-hole spot of bare lead won't hurt
3. Tiny bare spots often disappear when running the bullets through a push through sizer
4. Good coverage adds 0.002" to the diameter of the bullets. More than that and your coverage is probably too thick and will be uneven
5. Running PC bullets through a sizer will not scrape the PC off the driving bands if you baked the powder properly @ 350-400 degrees for 15-20 minutes

 

[Jaymo]

I cast most of my own boolits, so buying plated bullets makes zero financial sense to me.
That, and the reduced velocities required, compared to jacketed or coated bullets.

I'm a convert. PC boolits are great for segregating different loads.

Reloading, like shooting and casting, is a hobby for me.
I'm old enough and married enough to not be interested in chasing skirts, so I spend my spare time and play money on casting, loading, and shooting.

 

[jmitch42]

Any suggestions on how to get a better application with just one coat? Also, are the .45s usable as they are with only one coat? They are rather splotchy.

my brother in law uses his lyman tumbler to coat them. they aren't perfect usually after one coat, but it does keep it fairly even.

 

[venomballistics]

Nice job Scott. Do you think your gun will self destruct if you try those 45ACP bullets and they don't work out? < tongue in cheek >

Shoot 'em and see what happens <seriously>

That's the fun of this whole thing. Experiment and see what works, how far you can push the limit and see what doesn't work. I know there are some PC'ers who insist on perfectly coated bullets and will either run a second coat or dump them back in the melting pot. I'd say shoot 'em and see what happens. You might see leading which will necessitate 45 seconds will a bore mop with Chore Boy to scrub it out. Then again, you might find out that they perform just as well as plated bullets and only require a patch soaked with Hoppes No.9 to clean out your bore (that's all I need nowadays).

The next time, you should shake those 45ACP bullets harder in your container. I've noticed with low humidity days, I can gently swirl the bullets in the container and get perfect coverage while on high humidity days, I get poorer coverage with the same swirling, but a few good shakes and some 360 degree flips of the container, the coverage gets good again

What I know about PC bullet coverage so far:

1. You only need good coverage on the driving bands. Good coverage on the nose is purely cosmetic and base coverage is not important (just like with exposed base jacketed bullets)
2. The coverage only needs to be 100% in terms of being able to fully seal off the gases. A pin-hole spot of bare lead won't hurt
3. Tiny bare spots often disappear when running the bullets through a push through sizer
4. Good coverage adds 0.002" to the diameter of the bullets. More than that and your coverage is probably too thick and will be uneven
5. Running PC bullets through a sizer will not scrape the PC off the driving bands if you baked the powder properly @ 350-400 degrees for 15-20 minutes

I'll gladly add to the list.
Not all powders are created equal.
Harbor Fright coatings are adequate for practically any pistol bullet.
Their matte black is the worst, but still good enough for any pistol.
When coating for rifles, getting a little more spendy can get you a few hundred feet per second.

Coatings can and do fail when you push things above 2500.
subsequent leading will appear in the corners of the rifling, where the edges cut through the coat.
The rest of the bore remains protected.

Not all powders are 50 state legal.
Teflon powder is available, and at a price far more reasonable than you think. Check the laws where you stand.

of the 50 state legal coatings, Artic Cat green, as sold by all powder paints may be one of the toughest coatings I have encountered.
However, the result is zombie bullet green that some may be disgusted with.
Their cobalt Blue is nearly as tough and bakes at 350.
Teflon, ac green and cobalt Blue all enjoy a reduced bake time of 10 minutes.

 

[venomballistics]

I tried the shake and bake powder coat method yesterday for the very first time. Here are my 405 gr. .45-70 bullets after two coats.



My .45 acp bullets are what I got with just one coat of HF red using the method shown above by rsrocket1.



Any suggestions on how to get a better application with just one coat? Also, are the .45s usable as they are with only one coat? They are rather splotchy.

if you intend to keep with it, nothing tops an electrostatic spray gun and a small air compressor.
It's a one shot and done kinda deal.

 

[Moonman]

Collo Rosso,

The 230 grain X-tremes are $54.12 per 500
with FREE SHIPPING for a $150 order the month of Aug.
So if you purchased 500, the $54.12 is not your true cost.

 

[rsrocket1]

venom, you are absolutely correct about powders. I think it was random chance that HF red is marginally their only color that works with ASBBDT. Their other colors are only good for ESPC. Other company's powders tend to be much finer and more likely to work (with a correspondingly higher price of >$10/pound). The $60 cost of an ESPC gun is insignificant (unless you also need to buy a compressor), but the increased labor and reduced throughput is more of a hindrance when you compare PC'ing with tumble lubing or lubrisizing if you already have a full setup.

I PC for 9/40 but still tumble lube for 357 and 45ACP because I get no leading with 45/45/10 in those guns and I can TL 500 bullets in about 5 minutes with an overnight dry time.

 

[scott1970]

What is everyone's preferred method for removing the bullets from the container, and I use BBs, and onto the baking pan?


This, for me, is the horribly slow part that bogs down the entire process.

 

[Collo Rosso]

Collo Rosso,

The 230 grain X-tremes are $54.12 per 500
with FREE SHIPPING for a $150 order the month of Aug.
So if you purchased 500, the $54.12 is not your true cost.

Thank you! I didn't catch that.
I used extreme (X-treme?) but RMR does have 230gr. blems for $55 shipped. Like beef the price of bullets has crept up!

 

[venomballistics]

What is everyone's preferred method for removing the bullets from the container, and I use BBs, and onto the baking pan?


This, for me, is the horribly slow part that bogs down the entire process.

for those that powder coat, I advise you to get the electrostatic gun and a small air compressor.

lay a sheet of parchment on the sheet, spray the bullets on that.
straight to the oven.
its one shot and done.

the shake and bake method just gets you started.
the proper tools get you serious

 

[venomballistics]

venom, you are absolutely correct about powders. I think it was random chance that HF red is marginally their only color that works with ASBBDT. Their other colors are only good for ESPC. Other company's powders tend to be much finer and more likely to work (with a correspondingly higher price of >$10/pound). The $60 cost of an ESPC gun is insignificant (unless you also need to buy a compressor), but the increased labor and reduced throughput is more of a hindrance when you compare PC'ing with tumble lubing or lubrisizing if you already have a full setup.

I PC for 9/40 but still tumble lube for 357 and 45ACP because I get no leading with 45/45/10 in those guns and I can TL 500 bullets in about 5 minutes with an overnight dry time.

yes the handling is a hurdle.
but consider factory loaded ammo operations for a moment.
you open a box of factory ammo and all the bullets are pointed the same way, as we'd expect them to be.

I doubt that they have someone placing them all base down in a rack.
It must be automated.

we don't need a scale of a million per day, but automating orientation of the bullets to be coated cannot be that hard.
its 1890's technology at the latest. surely it can be rendered into a practical domestic dwelling friendly device by now.

add that to a means of placing them on a rack for coating at baking and yours becomes an invalid argument.

we should work to those ends.
coated, is just better in every way.
make it more practical

 

[mikld]

for those that powder coat, I advise you to get the electrostatic gun and a small air compressor.

lay a sheet of parchment on the sheet, spray the bullets on that.
straight to the oven.
its one shot and done.

the shake and bake method just gets you started.
the proper tools get you serious

I believe the parchment paper would insulate the bullets from the needed ground; powder is positive charge, bullets negative charge, powder sticks = electrostatic process. Otherwise anything that would spray powder would work.

I have used large, 8" tweezers, hemostats, and long nose pliers to remove bullets from the tub, and tried with less success nitrile gloves.

 

[MWC2068]

What is everyone's preferred method for removing the bullets from the container, and I use BBs, and onto the baking pan?


This, for me, is the horribly slow part that bogs down the entire process.

I dry tumble coat with the black bb's also, I dump the tumbled bb's and boolits in a colander to separate the powder back into a 5 gal. bucket, and then pour remaining boolits and bb's threw 3/8 expanded metal or hardware cloth. The bb's go threw the boolits stay then I pour the boolits on to some 1/4 hardware cloth trays that I made to fit my toaster oven and bake. Boolits may be laying down and standing up, but I have found it doesn't make any differance there may be a few marks on the boolits but big deal, I'm not making art, I'm making boolits to shoot and they seem to be doing fine for that purpose, that's just my take on the matter which may not suit any or all others.