Need Help with this statement guys

[jh45gun]

This was posted at another site. I took exception to it as with the word alloy in the comment I said that Lead alloys can be pushed faster than 2000 FPS like Lynotype for example. The guy came back and said that it only pertained to soft bullets. I said well since they used the word alloy and said it only helped marginally I had to take exception to that as I know that alloys make the bullet harder and that it helps more than marginally. Here is the statement what do you guys say?

2.) A soft lead bullet will start to "melt" at a velocity of > 2,000 fps. Adding a hardening agent (alloy) such as antimony will help reduce this process, but only marginally.

[drinks]

Tell him I am shooting wws with a trace of Arsenic, waterdropped, BHN 32, gas checked at as much as 2700fps, may be able to do more than that.Very definately a lead alloy!
He should do a bit of looking around.
He should define "marginally".

[Buckshot]

.............Lead boolits begin to melt at 2K fps? HAW! Melt where, in the barrel, on thier bases, sides, top? Or does he mean due to air friction going that fast the slug will melt?

I've shot 7mm cast lead to a bit over 2400 fps and they didn't melt. They weren't of any outstanding pedigree either, so far as nobility of alloy goes :-). Or heat treating for that matter.

BTW, several of the smaller bore muzzle loaders will shoot a pure lead (completely un-alloyed lead) patched round ball at a bit over 2K fps.

.............Buckshot

[9.3X62AL]

I wonder if the person making this statement actually shoots or casts boolits. We're not "Mythbusters" here, but we do try to debunk misconceptions whenever possible.

[andrew375]

According to the dictionary [URL="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/alloy"] an alloy is:

"A homogeneous mixture or solid solution of two or more metals, the atoms of one replacing or occupying interstitial positions between the atoms of the other."

Alloying does effect melting and solidification points, consult the phase diagram for your metals for more precise information. Hardness of an alloy, when solid, has nothing to do with the melting point.

Velocity cannot melt anything. Melting is caused by temperature and the degree of melting by the quantity of heat over time applied. For instance a match flame is hotter than the melting point of lead but you will be hard put to melt even the smallest piece of lead shot with one. Read up on "specific heat capacity".

In any case this all goes against reality, we shoot bullets with lead in them all the time at velocities over 3000fps. I shoot cast bullets at over 2300fps into sub 1moa groups and the come out the back stop looking not vastly different from when they dropped out of the mould.

That is all I am going to waste time on this. In future just refer anyone with ideas like this to the library and any book on materials technology.

[BruceB]

Velocity alone indeed doesn't melt anything...it's the heat caused by friction in the bore more than the heat generated by the powder charge. If we could drive a bullet fast enough, though, it WOULD melt just from the friction of the atmosphere.

I KNOW that some of my hyper-speed test bullets from the .220 Swift were nothing more than jacketed capsules of molten lead. It was plain to see from the swirl of lead on paper targets, as much as six inches across, surrounding a raggedy .22 bullet hole. These were light-jacketed 50-grain varmint bullets at or above 4000 fps.

I've also seen the "smoke trail" left by such loads en route downrange. Some people ascribe these trails to atmospheric conditions, but the co-relationship between seeing both the trails AND the swirl of lead on the paper is too clear for me to ignore in my personal experience. That trail is a vapor of molten lead bleeding from the jacket. Of course, the "accuracy" of such bullets was not of the best, let's say.

I tested pure-lead boolits in my .416 Rigby last year, running 365-grain projectiles at just over 2000 fps. No barrel-leading at all resulted from firing over a dozen rounds, but I found the accuracy wasn't quite up to what I normally get with the same bullet cast from wheelweight alloy, and at similar speeds. The holes in targets were identical to the ones from harder boolits, and I doubt that either melting or deformation were taking place.

Seems like the gent doesn't really have a whole lot of knowledge about cast bullets.

P.S. I will also remind y'all that two 28-round mags of .303 cast bullets in my Bren LMG on full-auto most definitely DID melt the later bullets, and it took hours to get the lead plating out of the gas system. Some of the lead was as much as eight inches away from the gas port.

[Bass Ackward]

JH,

Melted huh?

You know what? That sortta / kinda gives me an excuse when I miss something. It also makes me feel like I am shooting the POWER of the most resent version of a necked down pop bottle.

How you going argue with an expert like that? But I couldn't tell ya personally. It's cast, like cast, at cast speeds for me. :grin:

[sundog]

And all these years I was told that those none hits on paper were FLYERS. And now I find out they simply evaporated? Another myth debunked! sundog

[Maven]

I suppose if we wanted to take the time to research it, we'd go to the CBA website and look at the National Match data for 2005 (I'm not sure whether the 2006 results have been posted yet.) since they list velocity as well as alloy & lube data + lots of other stuff.

[carpetman]

A bullet will start to melt at 2000 fps???????? Is that like slightly pregnant? My real question is how was this measured? Easy fix--shoot em at 1999.9 fps and never have another worry. Need more speed? Just shoot em 4 times as speed squares energy or something like that.

[MT Gianni]

You can't argue with a closed mind. Gianni.

[felix]

It seems that only the Bren cares, right? Well, I agree with Bruce that something does indeed destroy the high-speed 22's, but I can't readily think it is heat. ... felix

[jh45gun]

He got this from a FBI fact sheet. Sounds like they do not know **** about lead bullets.

This is not neccessaraly his views but he is defending the comment made by the FBI.

He is a lawyer in DC so now he is putting a spin on it saying I do not know what I am talking about. A link:

http://www.precisionshooters.com/ibforum/index.php?showtopic=5503&hl=

[wcb_gabe]

"2.) A soft lead bullet will start to "melt" at a velocity of > 2,000 fps. Adding a hardening agent (alloy) such as antimony will help reduce this process, but only marginally."

:roll: I wasn't going to say anything at all. Which is what I'd probably do if this person was trying to talk to me after extolling such founts of knowledge and truth.


"He got this from a FBI fact sheet. Sounds like they do not know s##t about lead bullets."

Now I'm speechless. Another drone who believes everything he's told... especially by the government... By golly it must be true....

While I'm sure he's a fine fellow. When I hear these kinds of things from people I just put on my hip waders so there crap won't rub off on me. I'd be sceptical if the fellow has actually seen a lead bullet let alone cast or reloaded one.

Do what I do when confronted by this mighty einstein (when in public) point to the pink elephant in the room and try to sneak away as quick as possible before he finds it.

Oh and the above statements/opinions are only concerning his #(2) statement= vague. Possibly taken out of context.

[Char-Gar]

I can't add anything the others have not said... That guys statement is pure crap.

[Bigjohn]

I guess I had better send the chrony back for re-calibration; it's readin' 'em too fast again/still. :-D

He would also believe that they didn't walk on the moon. [smilie=1:

:castmine:

John.

P.S., Well; I done it, I've made it to two hundred postings. Yippee!