What did I know?

[DPD]

The following is copied from a web site, and are not my original thoughts, but the
information is thought provoking if you are part of the cast boolit community:


The function of bullet lubes is not yet understood by the
shooting community - that is why lubricant development for bul-
lets is a empirical rather than by design. It is interesting to
note that really good lubricants, as judged by traditional engi-
neering standards, seldom make good bullet lubes. It seems that
waxes or a high level of wax makes the best bullet lubes. Be-
cause wax viscosities are so temperature dependent, a change in
ambient temperature results in, effectively, a "different" lu-
bricant, and, at least theoretically, different performance.

There is recent evidence that bullet lube may not serve any practical
purpose in at least some types of shooting. People like Ken Mollahan from
the CBA have documented experiments using dry cast bullets at 2000 fps or so
where no lube was used and no leading was experienced. This may sound like
heresy to the old timers like me, but as we learn more about what makes
non-jacketed bullets shoot well, many of the old wive's tales fall away.

My own shooting with up to magnum pistol velocities has convinced me that
lube is a waist of time, material, and money. I routinely load non-lubed
bullets (8 BHN; pretty darn soft) for all my target loads now. This does
require that the bullet fit the throat well, however.

*************************

The 1991 Jan-Feb issue of the Fouling Shot has an article by O.H.
McKagen and Dennis Marshall entitled "On Lead-Tin Solders", page
89-8 through 89-14. It is the best explanation of bullet alloys,
their hardening, softening, time dependent characteristics (no,
that bullet that you cast last week is not the same bullet that
you have on your shelf today) that I have ever read. It puts
into perspective the nature of a number of alloys used for
cast/swaged bullets, time hardening, time softening, boundary
slippage etc., in words that the layman an understand.

The resulting knowledge can be used to give the caster/swager
more control over his bullets than he might have ever dreamed was
possible. It also helps one to recognize errors that often
appear in the glossy gun magazines when the writers presume to
relate their infinite wisdom to those (us) serfs who are
unread, unwashed -- you know the rest.

[1Shirt]

Well, this is interesting! Will be most interested in seeing the threads that come in on this. Cast without lube sort of looks naked to me, but then looks don't necessarily count some times. My thought is why leading near the front of the bbl only with some boolits, and the reasoning that I have always had on that was that the boolit had run out of lube.
1Shirt!:coffee:

[jonk]

A few thoughts:

I have recovered bullets lubed with normal lube, that goes in the grooves using my RCBS lubrisizer. While some lube surely is wiped off, most is still in the groove. On the other hand, with tumble lube (I.e. Lee L. alox) the lube is wiped off the bearing surfaces. So I am unconvinced that lube does that much on one hand; on the other, and certainly don't think it is possible to 'run out' of conventional lube. Where can it go? It is sandwiched pretty well between the bullet and the barrel. But on the other hand, I've had rifles get lead fouling when using only Lee lube.

I would be tempted to say that the only way lube CAN do much of anything is if it is on the base; i.e. like a grease cookie. In this instance, it would provide lube for follow up shots, if not the original.

Food (and grease) for thought.

[44man]

Jonk, those are my results with LLA in revolvers. The lube is wiped off and I get bad leading.
Has anyone tried a dry moly spray on cast? It seems as though it would imbed in the lead and also coat the bore, unlike a grease that will wipe away. I have some and will test it someday. It might be too slick though and deter the case tension. That would not hurt in a rifle that has the boolit seated against the rifling.
It is strange that I don't have tension issues with regular lubes and I do have a lot on the outside of the boolits because I don't size.

[Uncle R.]

LLA sure gets a lot of detractors - and supporters. :roll: I can tell you that the only system I've found that gives absolutely zero leading in my .38 wadcutter loads requires fairly soft bullets and LLA. The same bullets run through a .358 sizer (which just barely kisses 'em and lubed with LBT Blue, or Thompson's, or Javelina, will still shoot great but will leave a trace of lead in the leade area. I've always suspected the LLA works better because the front driving band is coated with lube - but it may well be because the unsized bullets are a half a thousandth or so bigger in diameter. There's no doubt in my mind that LLA works for some applications.
:neutral:
Shooting naked cast bullets? Lordy - I've never actually tried it... I've spent too much time over the years scrubbing lead out of bores left by lubed bullets. Veral Smith claims that it's a three legged stool of bullet fit - hardness - and lube. He says that great strength in one area may well cover up a weakness in another. I'm inclined to think he's at least partly right - but I've learned that too hard can cause leading just as bad (or worse) than too soft. And yes, I'm convinced it's because they won't "slug up" to seal the bore. In my younger years I thought (based on what I'd read) that harder is better - that even though you could get away with softer bullets in light loads the hard stuff was the best. I believe now that the proper hardness is critical to cast performance, with heavy loads requiring hard bullets and light loads requiring softer slugs for good results. With the right hardness and the right diameter (meaning good fit in the throat and a slight swaging down to fit the bore when fired) I suspect that almost any lube would work pretty well. But NO lube? Hmmmm... Somebody oughta try that... somebody other than ME!
[smilie=1:

[Maven]

Just a couple of thoughts. I've read Ken Mollohan's article, but have to question the entire idea of shooting unlubed bullets. I.e., if it's such a good idea, why do virtually all entrants in the CBA postal and national matches still use bullet lubes? Second, the question raised was about bullet lubes in general, not Lee's Liquid Alox in particular. Let's just say that LLA works better in some applications than others. Lastly, for another point of view take a look at this article:

http://www.lasc.us/FryxellLubeCastBullet.htm

[DPD]

Uncle R.,
You may have nailed down the crux of the whole argument regarding the relationship between boolit alloy hardness, boolit to bore fit, and load power factor. Slugging up to fit the bore is critical according to Kotzar, and hard undersized boolits may fail to do so. His contention (with some evidence) is that
leading comes from gas cutting alone, not the base of the slug.
I'm not saying I agree with everything said regarding lubes. I've used many
different ones since the old days of 50/50 alox-beeswax, and changing lubes can
certainly have an effect on accuracy with a particular load. I've even had hollow base wadcutters at target velocities lead the bore, and surely they slug up.
Here's some more food for thought from the same article:



#Lead is soft and it melts at high temperature.

It melts at 620 F.

#Softer bullets tend to have lower melting points and are more prone to
#leading.

Softer bullets contain more lead than harder bullets and melt at somewhat
higher temperatures than harder ones. For instance, linotype, about the
hardest bullet alloy commonly used by casters melts at 474 F. Most other
alloy mixes are somewhere in between that and 620 F.

#Currently the Oregon Trail stuff leaves behind the least amount of lead.
#The heat of the burning powder can melt lead and cause some to be left in
#bore, usually at the breach end.

From available evidence, the above cannot be demonstrated. Examination of
unprotected bullet bases after firing nearly always shows powder peening but
no evidence of melting, nor even significant softening. The heat is in
contact with the bullet base for about 3 milliseconds during a typical
launching scenario and the heat transfer characteristics of lead/lead alloy
bullets simply do not allow enough heat transfer to accomplish melting
during this brief encounter.

Lead deposited in the breach end is principally from gas cutting. Due to a
poor gas seal, the gases jet past an undersized bullet, especially along the
trailing edges of the lands. This gas cutting can be virtually eliminated
by proper bullet fit. No matter how hard the alloy, an undersized bullet
will lead the bore.

Contrary to conventional knowledge, leading can often be minimized or
eliminated by using a SOFTER, rather than a harder bullet. This is very
often the case when hard but undersized bullets cause leading. The softer
alloy offers the advantage of, upon ignition, bumping up to fit the throat,
thus providing the very important gas seal.

[DPD]

" My thought is why leading near the front of the bbl only with some boolits, and the reasoning that I have always had on that was that the boolit had run out of lube.
1Shirt! "

Just speculation on my part, but could it be that the pressure curve that is steaidly
building on the base of the slug, especially at the circumfrence of the base against
the bore finally breaks down the seal enough to allow some gas cutting near the
end of the bbl ? I'm guessing that area around the circumfrence of the base is
the weakest and most subject to gas cutting, therefore the success of gas checks.

[Bullshop]

To me the thought of shooting boolits without lube is right up there with scraping fingernails on a black board , running a file or hack saw in both directions and such the likes, I HATE IT !!!
This week I had a chance to do a little test. I picked up about 3000lbs of scrap and a part of that purchase was about 150lbs of 185gn 45 cal swagged hollow points. These are unlubed soft lead bullets/boolits. I have not tested the actual hardness with a tester but can say with certanty with the thumbnail test that they are not pure lead. These were fired in three different guns, a 4" bbl Taurus Malinia, a 7.5" Ruger Black Hawk. and also from one of the Enfield conversions with loads of 6gn to 6.3gn of old unique.
The Ruger and the Enfield showed no sign of abnormal leading while the Taurus was badly leaded. The entire barrel was streaked with lead and there was visibal peaces on the driving edg of the lands.
The shooting was then repeated after the boolits had been run through a .452" sizer and lube applied, in this case Speed Green lube.
Results of the second shooting test were somewhat different. Again the Ruger and the Enfield had no abnormal leading. I say abnormal because from the first test some light streaking could be seen but is or can be normal.
From the second test there was no visable streaking and the bores looked clean and shiney. The big differance was with the Taurus. There was no visable leading and the barrel was clean and shiney.
I also noticed a differance in the recoverd boolits. The ones that were lubed still had the knerling plainly visable but the ones that were not lubed had the knerling wipped away.
There was not an actual lube groove on these just a knerald caniler, but this caniler did hold a substancial ammount of lube. Also these are a bevel base and the bevel also held a small ring of lube.
One stupid test by a couple idiots stumbled through haphazerdly with no professionalism what ever, SURE!!! But I tell you what, this idiot wont be shooting anymore boolits without lube no matter what any number of professional experts proove about it. Ya know I can be real stubbern and just plain hard headed about things that way.
BIC/BS

[DPD]

BULLSHOP,
Like I said, I'm not venturesome enough to try shooting unlubed boolits, but if I
read your post correctly, two out of three firearms did not lead significantly with those unlubed rounds. Is that what you found? That does surprise me.
Don