can you really ever go to big

[pearcetopher]

Hi guys,
after dealing with an in accurate caliper I finally bought a micrometer and I see my lee molds drop large bullets that I was not sizing because I thought they were at bore diameter, I have to seat them quite deep to allow for the wider bullet.

I see that my 355 drops at .358 and my 309 drops at 311 429 drops at 431 and 401 drops at 402

other than the obvious chambering problems with such a wide round will having a bullet 3 thou larger than bore diameter cause any problems or accuracy issues or pressure spikes?

should I buy sizers that are exactly 1 thou over bore diameter to aid in reliability ?

[Bzcraig]

How have these boolits worked for you so far?

[swheeler]

You mean GROOVE diameter

[Cherokee]

If everything has worked for ya so far, why change ? Always good to have accurate measurements but performance is what counts. If performance is lacking, then measurents can point to why.

[mpmarty]

All my cast boolits are sized by the firearm when fired.

[MtGun44]

"accurate caliper"....:bigsmyl2:

Glad you finally got a mic and found out what the dimensions REALLY are.

To answer your question, yes/sorta/maybe - for pistols. As a fairly general rule, plan on .001 to .002
over groove diameter for most pistol cartridges. For .45 ACP and .38/.357 I use .001 over groove,
but for 9mm, I normally use .358 and the guns run .356 to .358 - and somehow manage to
work in all. Too big is only a problem if you have chambering issues, not as far as fitting the
barrel is concerned. I was worried about the .358 groove and .358 boolits, but they were
about the biggest I had available - and worked fine.

For rifle, it seems that .002 to .003 over groove diam usually works best.


Bill

[Wayne Smith]

Even the hardest lead is remarkably ductile compared to the barrel steel. If you can chamber it you can shoot it.

[mdi]

The dimensions you quote seem nearly perfect to me. Most of my sized bullets run the same diameter as your molds...

[Larry Gibson]

the first 3 numbers of a mould designation usually indicate the diameter the bullet may be sized to and is usually referred to as the "nominal diameter" of the bullet mould. Actual "as cast" diameter is usually larger if cast with the alloy the bullet design was made for as it is intended that the bullets be slightly "sized" to nominal diameter.

If cast of another alloy the bullet may be larger or smaller than the nominal diameter. Your bullets are obviously a bit larger than nominal diameter and that is good. Many complain of "undersized" moulds these days but the fact is they simply use an alloy (usually straight COWWs) other than what the mould was designed for.

To answer the original question, "can you ever go to big", the answer is yes you can. If the bullet is too large in diameter to allow a loaded cartridge to chamber it is "to big". Additionally if accuracy suffers from over sized bullets not being sized correctly for the throat/groove diameter then one can consider them "to big".

Larry Gibson

[captaint]

I was gonna say - sounds to me like your molds are dropping boolits at just the correct diameter. I would be happy with them all. I have 3 9mm molds and they all drop boolits smaller than .358. Gets frustrating. I've tried more tin, more ww alloy, hotter, cooler. Had to Beagle them all. Mike

[DeanWinchester]

With cast lead, I have yet to see anything that will chamber that won't shoot safely. I suppose anything is possible but its darn difficult to get a big enough cast boolit in a chamber to hurt anything.

Now something I did notice on a rifle I recently sold. I tried .309, .310 & .311 in it. None of which leaded at all. BUT, the .311 boolits would get the barrel hotter, faster with the same powder load. (50) rounds at .309 over the course of 20-30 minutes wouldn't get near as hot as (50) rounds at .311. Which would make sense because pressures would be a little higher. Ymmv.