Newb Swager

[wonderwolf]

I'm gonna start a new thread on this toppic and not hi jack the thread I started posting so many Q's in.

I'm thinking of swageing jacketed bullets using .45ACP cases and slugs cast from a paper patched mold I have (.446) to make .458 jacketed bullets. Harold Johnson who invented the 450 Alaskan and 50 Alaskan has done this but nothing I have read tells of his results. If any of you have the "Big Bore rifles and cartridges" book its under the chapter "450 alaskan".....(as a side note he used 50bmg bullets cut in half for the 50alaskan :drinks:

I've already done some prototype bullets with the dies I have around. But I havnt done nearly the amount of development That I KNOW some of you have. I really don't want to work on re inventing the wheel so any of you who have done this before (using cartridge cases as jackets besides .22rf) please help Some of the Q's I'll post up front...

Leave the primer in or out?

Does the rim of a case effect accuracy? Would it be wise to turn it down for a boat tail?

Annealing the cases help spring back esp around the web? Case diam on .45acp is .473-.480 and I'm gonna use a .457 lee push through die most likely for this project.


AND whats the best way as far as # of steps to go about this? I'm thinking 2 dies. The first shapes the slug and seats it into the pistol case. The 2nd die would be a lee push through die nose first type.


Some of this will just to see if it will work and possible uses....If I get really ambitious I want to try 8mm mauser berdan primed cases and try and make something that is more of a full jacketed bullet. :Fire:

[Phineas Bluster]

wonderwolf

I've given some thought to your question of using .45 ACP brass as a basis for a .458" diameter bullet. I grabbed a couple of Remington .45 ACP cases I had hanging around the bench and the verniers. A little bit of math shows that the internal volume of the .45 ACP brass barely exceeds the internal volume of a J4 .45 X .700" jacket. Perhaps the .45 ACP case may hold about 20 grains more of lead. For all the work it would take to prepare the .45 ACP brass you would be ahead using the J4 jackets.

I have made jackets from cases before. A while ago I wanted some .429" 300 grain bonded core bullets. Of course no readily available jackets are long enough to make this weight, so I found that the .30 W.C.F. case to be the closet to .429" diameter at the head. I chucked the case into the lathe and turned off the entire rim and head to the bottom of the primer pocket and then parted the cases off a 1.062" long. A piece of duct tape was used to close off the flash hole when the cores were bonded to the case. The rest of the process was just a straight forward swaging job. The solid web of the case was .417" in diameter before swaging and remained at .417" after swaging. The effect is a bit of taper at the very base of the bullet but it makes no difference for practical applications.

If I were to attempt the project you proposed I would find a case that did not exceed the .458" diameter, as reducing the head diameter if just an extra step. The 7.62 X 39 is a candidate as the head is .444" in diameter. Turn off the head to the bottom of the primer pocket and part off to the length required. I would anneal the cases before swaging as it takes less pressure to swage an annealed jacket and there is much less spring back. Once the jackets are made the swaging is the same as it would be for a commercial jacket.

[georgeld]

I'll be damned, never thought of that.
This opens up a world of new bullets.

Thank you for posting this info.

How about some target results with these now? How do they shoot? have you tried them at 200yds or more? Results??

[Buckshot]

...............wonderwolf, One of my shooting buddies ran across an old article about doing very much the same thing. In this instance they were wanting 35 Cal jacketed bullets and turned to the 30M1 carbine case for material. Since my buddy Ron had a 35 Whelen, this appealed to him. He asked if I could make up something he could use to try the idea out.

http://www.fototime.com/C6B9E744CBFE9AD/standard.jpg

I had some 1-1/8" 1018HR on hand (and he wanted off on the cheap) so I used that. It's a percussion model. If you had a hydraulic press, that would work also.

http://www.fototime.com/7E062D887B21B61/standard.jpg

The 1st die was made in 3 pieces. Base, body, and ram. This die is the core seating/expanding die. He said he was going to clean the inside of the cases so he could flux them and get the lead to stick. Kind of like Speer's Hot Core deal? You set the prepared cartridge case on the base, set the body over it and then stick the ram in on top. A few enthusiastic wallops with a hammer upsets the case and lowers the lead level in the case.

http://www.fototime.com/FF7AA2C063894DA/standard.jpg

I don't have any pictures of the nose forming die, but it was as simple as this one, and operated the same basic way. The ejector was a piece if 1/4" W-1 that was simply held in place with a setscrew while the forming cavity was being cut. This way the ejector pin formed a portion of the nose. As the ogive was formed, the lead was forced back up into the nose a bit, but the nose still had a bit of a hollow under it, and it was a rather blunt nose.

Ron said it worked 'pretty well'. He had moved to Prescott, AZ in the meantime so I never got to see any shooting results. He isn't an avid hunter especially since his son went off to college, so I don't know as he's never said if he'd tried them on anything other then paper.

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

[wonderwolf]

Did some work on my lathe while I was home for the weekend.

I was just messing around with bad/old cases to see what I can and can't do on the lathe with them. I seemed to be having way too much fun as I ended up with a nice pile of experimental jackets to mess with when I go back to my place.

I've read a little about core bonding but I have not come to the conclusion if thats a step I will need or not. I'm fairly new at machining Only been doing it for about a year as a side hobby to everything shooting. But with some of the odd calibers I'm getting into and the ease of using the little southbend with collets I can get a good handful of cases done in 30 minutes : ). Dies should be next :mrgreen:

I got a lee .457 push through to mess around with as part of the project.

[georgeld]

Do believe I'm gonna make up some of these kind of dies.
Have a NEF set of three barrels coming before long. mailed the check Friday.
Be a cheap gun to 'wreck' messing with these things for testing without taking a chance
on ruining a good rifle.

Buck: Had a friend on another board thread a foot of 7/8x14 O1 just for dies, Havent' touched it yet. Should be perfect for this type dies. I've got a bunch of half inch and smaller stock. and lots of inch round in short pcs.

Amazing what come's out of others minds when you 'set down' and start bsing ain't it?

.30 carbine brass is too important to me as I use it for the blackhawk. but, do have 2000 more coming.

Thank you gentlemen,

[wonderwolf]

I didn't have time to heat treat the cases before I came back to my apt. And now I see just how hard its gonna be to do it with out the heat treat.

I'm brainstorming on just doing a total O.D. profile on the case while its in the lathe....Much shale be learned this month

[georgeld]

Don't you have a cooking oven in that apt???

Scatter them on cookie sheets and bake them to 250-275 for half hour or so.
It's completely opposite of steel I guess. With brass when they're hot, pour 'em into a bucket of water. IF you'd do that to steel, it would harden them.

For steel, to soften it by annealing. You heat it, then just let it cool to room temp on it's own, either in, or out of the oven. Brass you quench it from what I've read.

Just be careful you don't get the brass too hot or it'll be dead soft and useless for cases. Imagine dead soft would be ideal for bullet jackets though.
Buckshot, swagerman, what about that??

[wonderwolf]

Don't you have a cooking oven in that apt???

Scatter them on cookie sheets and bake them to 250-275 for half hour or so.
It's completely opposite of steel I guess. With brass when they're hot, pour 'em into a bucket of water. IF you'd do that to steel, it would harden them.

For steel, to soften it by annealing. You heat it, then just let it cool to room temp on it's own, either in, or out of the oven. Brass you quench it from what I've read.

Just be careful you don't get the brass too hot or it'll be dead soft and useless for cases. Imagine dead soft would be ideal for bullet jackets though.
Buckshot, swagerman, what about that??

Thats what I started thinking, I'll try it tonight when I get home from class. I'm so used to torch and flame I guess. The bases have been turned off of them So I know that these can no longer be used for cases only jackets and college room experiments (evil laugh). To be honest this was my thought early on

after swaging everything together put it in the oven to heat treat like you usually would and when you dump them in the water the lead would get harder and the brass softer.... But I fear the cases would seperate from the core....I might try this sometime I guess

[Phineas Bluster]

georgeld

Sorry to say I don't have any targets nor can I provide any information on 200 yard performance. The 300 grain project was really just an exercise to prove the concept of using cartridge cases to produce a jacket. Less than a handfull were made and loaded. The amount of work to produce the jackets was not worth the effort compared with the time and effort expended to produce a 275 grainer in a .700" long commercial jacket. In the .444 Marlin the extra 25 grains of bullet really makes no difference to me. However the knowledge that a usable jacket can be had should commercial sources be unavailable make the experiment worthwhile.