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View Full Version : Shooting cast without lube



newton
01-20-2016, 04:18 PM
I know it sounds crazy, and I would have never thought about it, but reading some stuff at another place made me question it.

Whenever I think of cast boolits I always think of lube in some way or another, even if its a coating of some kind. Gas checks are here and there depending on the boolit and application. I know there are certain "guidelines" to go by with this sort of thing, but now my mind is wondering.

There was some talk about shooting 22 cal cast boolits without any lube. I searched and cannot find any other caliber that this has been tried with. So my question is if anyone has tried this?

I have never thought about it, for the obvious reasons. But I am half tempted to just to see if its a thing. Of course, they talked about using gas checks which I would think is a must. I just wonder if it has to do with the small diameter of them. Maybe the rifling depth is less when it comes to these kind of guns? I think it was somewhat attributed to how 22LR works.

I understand what lube does, and it does not make any sense at first to think of not having to use any, but its intriguing.

Another thing that was talked about is that too much lube on these smaller boolits might be why people have issues with accuracy. The more lube that is on the boolit, and the less that is used in the barrel, means more that is effecting its flight or at the very least how it exits the barrel.

Personally, I am going to say that a small amount would be better than none.

Wolfer
01-20-2016, 05:54 PM
I've never tried it. I've always felt it would lead the barrel. Perhaps if fit was good maybe not.
I am a firm believer that you can have too much lube.
I use LLA in rifles up to 1800 fps. Two very thin coats is accurate with no leading. Two thick coats don't lead but accuracy definitely is not as good. I've been trying to go faster with two or three heavy coats but accuracy is still not where I want it.

A person could always shoot a few for group and keep an eye out for leading. Worst case you might have to clean your gun.

aspangler
01-20-2016, 09:04 PM
Don't think I would try it. Even 22LR has lube on it.

Walter Laich
01-20-2016, 09:34 PM
Go for it...

just take a few pictures after for us to see the results :shock:

JSnover
01-20-2016, 09:44 PM
I have heard of people doing it at slow to medium velocities. One of them claimed no leading but admitted he was new and had no idea what he was doing.

Bzcraig
01-20-2016, 09:45 PM
Go for it...

just take a few pictures after for us to see the results :shock:

My thoughts as well

Retumbo
01-20-2016, 09:54 PM
At least use bacon grease...

tazman
01-20-2016, 09:55 PM
I actually tried that long ago.
I was shooting Lee 358-150-rn in a model 19 S&W. They were extremely accurate for about 12 rounds. After that I didn't know where the boolits were going to go. Leading was terrible. It wasn't all that hard to clean out since the bore in that gun was very smooth but it certainly built up quickly.
I decided not to try that again.

Scharfschuetze
01-20-2016, 10:09 PM
I guess one could argue that paper patching is shooting without lube, but the steel barrel is still protected from the soft and smearing lead.

The wrong or bad lube leads to leading most of the time. No lube? Well...

freebullet
01-20-2016, 10:10 PM
I tried it a couple years ago with a couple alloys.

With soft lead it can smear & cause unusual obturation shown in recovered boolits fired into medium that doesn't deform them much. I did that in a 38spcl with loads around 6-700fps. I switched to a harder alloy still only in the 11-12bhn range. It worked in 38 up to medium velocity loads. Did leave minor traces of leading.

Then I tried it in 9mm & the leading was worse with any load that came close to functioning an autoloader. Accuracy was not on par either. I believe it could be done to some minor extent with low pressure rounds.

I also tried a using a quick wipe of earwax and additionally forehead oils on a hot summer day. With the same boolits in 9mm it worked & furthermore removed the lead the naked boolits left behind. It also worked on some blazer 38spcl swaged bullets that were giving minor leading.

Some of my whacky experiments have shown just how little lube is required. Must be why BLL & other tl have such a following. It also showed me the easiest way to remove lead from a bore is to use lead boolit rounds that don't lead the bore. Works like a champ.

Messy bear
01-21-2016, 12:46 AM
What you said- a small amount would be better than nothing. I agree. I tried no lube in 45 colt loads with 310 gr acww and ball powder at 1200 fps. Not as bad leading as I would have thought but it was different, a!most like solder in the barrel. I'm sure it would have built up worse if i shot more rounds of it. Cleaned out with properly lubed rounds shot in it.

bangerjim
01-21-2016, 01:02 AM
Let us know how long it takes to mine all the lead out of your barrels!

If you want to get away from traditional greasy lubes, use powder coating. Thousands of us on here are doing it. I have been doing it for several years now and have not had a bit of lead in barrels after many MANY thousands of round...9 thru 45 cal. Check out the threads in the "alt' coatings" section on here.

But NO lube................I don't think so.

banger

dikman
01-21-2016, 06:10 AM
Nope, haven't tried it, nor will I. The closest I got was at the range recently. A colleague had some .38sp that he'd loaded ages ago and wanted to use them up so gave me some. I'm guessing that they were lubed,'cos he wouldn't have made them without any, but the lead that I dug out of those barrels......(2 Uberti Remington 1875's). I was still finding traces a couple of sessions later! (So was he). That alone proved to me the value of a good lube.

I'm now using Hi-Tek, much better than wax lubes :D.

Walla2
01-21-2016, 10:44 AM
I believe you are setting yourself up for a lot of time at the cleaning bench.

Maven
01-21-2016, 11:35 AM
newton, Google Ken Mollohan (Molly here)* and Cream of Wheat or COW loads for some interesting ideas on shooting CB's without lube.


*Mollohan (sadly, no longer living) was one of the founders of the Cast Bullet Association.

MSD MIke
01-21-2016, 12:05 PM
Interestingly a cheap springer air rifle can shoot soft unlubed lead pellets over 1000fps all day long without leading.

Mike

longbow
01-21-2016, 12:30 PM
I've done both ~ no lube and too much lube. Neither worked well.

I decided to try the no lube idea (as presented by Molly) in my .303 British as I use COW filler anyway. Molly (and I believe others) said that when using COW filler you don't need lube. I had noted that my bore is dead clean and dry after shooting using COW filler so no detectable lube left in the bore after each shot. I loaded up a few rounds with boolits cast from range scrap, which is what I was using successfully lubed, and loaded them unlubed over the usual COW. Within a few rounds accuracy was gone and the bore was leaded. I stopped there.

As for too much lube, I have been hot tumble lubing with a home made lube and that works quite well for me. I melt some lube in a cast iron frying pan then roll boolits in it like tumble lubing with LLA. When pan and boolits are fairly hot I get a nice thin coating of lube and the boolits shoot very well. One day I didn't have everything quite right up to temperature at first and got a thicker layer of lube on the boolits but figured I would leave then as is and try them out.

Accuracy was "normal" for a few rounds then I would get a flier. This happened several times and I could have sworn I saw some "spider wed" like strands in the air after the occasional shot. When I posted results the conclusion from the lube experts we "lube purging". Too much lube builds up in the bore until a boolit pushed the extra out the as it goes.

So, in my experience:

- no lube or maybe too little lube = leading even when using cereal filler
- too much lube = inaccuracy/fliers possibly due to lube purge or too much lube build up at least

These were all normal cast boolit loads in the 1600- 1800 FPS range and work just fine with "normal" lubing.

YMMV

Longbow

Scharfschuetze
01-21-2016, 03:12 PM
So, in my experience:

- no lube or maybe too little lube = leading even when using cereal filler
- too much lube = inaccuracy/fliers possibly due to lube purge or too much lube build up at least

These were all normal cast boolit loads in the 1600- 1800 FPS range and work just fine with "normal" lubing.

Pretty much says it all.

gwpercle
01-21-2016, 03:23 PM
Do it !
Post an in depth report on how well it works and put an end to this " need to lube " myth once and for all.

dudel
01-21-2016, 03:52 PM
Not quite ready to try it myself. However, there's no lube on jacketed/plated projectiles, and they generally go faster than lead. There's no lube on lead pellets, and they move out in the 1200+ fps range.

May have to do with the hardness of the projectile, don't know.

Give it a try, and report back. Be safe.

fredj338
01-21-2016, 03:58 PM
IT doesn't work. Even 22lr have some form of lube over the bear lead. I suppose if you could get down to pellet gun vel, like 400-500fps, you might sneak by, but at normal vel above 700fps, it's gonna get ugly quick.

newton
01-21-2016, 04:12 PM
Well, I am not going to just haphazardly go at this. I just had read about it and wanted to hear others thoughts. As far as I have read, it was only done with "success" in 22 cal.

For the record, I only use powder coating myself. Used to lube, but found powder coating served the purpose well. Only reason to not use powder coating would be to eliminate it as a variable in the accuracy department. While powder coating is/has come a long ways, it still leaves some room for making the bullet heavier on one side or another(even though it is very minimal).

If/when I try it, I'll be sure to let the results be known.

Bent Ramrod
01-21-2016, 04:34 PM
I seem to recall that Dr. Mann said that unlubricated lead bullets were the most accurate shooters in his experiments. However, he took extraordinary pains to ensure the bores of his vee-block mounted barrels with concentric actions were in the same condition for every shot. It would often take him all day to fire 5 or 10 shots.

If you are willing to do that much cleaning and bore inspection between each shot, you should be able to dispense with the lubricant too.

newton
01-21-2016, 04:37 PM
newton, Google Ken Mollohan (Molly here)* and Cream of Wheat or COW loads for some interesting ideas on shooting CB's without lube.


*Mollohan (sadly, no longer living) was one of the founders of the Cast Bullet Association.


Thanks for the information. I bet it is his work that I had read about. Looks like I have some reading to do!


One thought I just had was using polyfil. I am pretty sure the work done without lube always had a filler, and it seems it was COW(cream of wheat). But, my thought was what if polyfil would work the same way - almost like what powder coating does.

I am pretty sure that the consensus is lube acts as a liquid gas check for the small imperfections in a bore. Seeing how gas particles(namely the gas from burning powder) are small enough to bypass the voids between aluminum/copper gas checks and the bore, the lube fills these and "helps" keep the gasses from cutting.

I know that lube can be a big debate all in of itself, and probably if we knew EXACTLY what it did, we could say whether or not something else will work. However, we have partially done this with testing and proving powder coated boolits. Powder coating works, so it must work by protecting the boolit from gases.

I think there is a lot too it. I am sure if there was an easy way it would have already been mainstream.

bangerjim
01-21-2016, 05:06 PM
I have never shot a 22LR that does not have some kind of lube on the bare lead boolits! It is there, just look closely. Most all I 22LR's shoot (rarely today at these prices!!) are Cu plated/jacketed.

In real guns, there will be no "leading" with FMJ's because Cu is harder than the normal Bhn we shoot. That is why I use Powder Coating! Hard shell....no leading....in over MANY THOUSANDS of rounds over the past 3 or so years. Great stuff.

banger

Mica_Hiebert
01-21-2016, 05:20 PM
I shot some federal lead round nose factory 38s once and I've never seen leading so bad before in my life! Not sure what they use but I've never had any problems like that with alox, parifin/pj, nra or castor/soap/bees wax lube.

chutesnreloads
01-21-2016, 07:02 PM
Wondering why so many posts stating airgun pellets are unlubed.Thats just plain WRONG

MarkP
01-21-2016, 07:06 PM
RCBS made or still makes a 30 M1 Carb mold with no lube grooves.

Scharfschuetze
01-21-2016, 09:29 PM
Several moulds are being made without lube grooves now. They are intended for powder coating and thus the boolits still get lubed.

Regarding that RCBS mould... Do you have a link to it? I've used RCBS moulds since they bought out Ohaus in the early to mid 70s and I've never seen such a mould listed in any of their catalogs. I don't see it in their current catalog either. Perhaps it's new and meant for powder coating?

Here's the current RCBS line up of rifle moulds:

http://www.rcbs.com/Products/Bullet-Casting/Bullet-Moulds/Rifle.aspx

MT Gianni
01-22-2016, 08:33 PM
Interestingly a cheap springer air rifle can shoot soft unlubed lead pellets over 1000fps all day long without leading.

Mike
I was under the impression that air rifle pellets are waxed.

Super Sneaky Steve
01-22-2016, 09:10 PM
A lot of companies sell knurled lead boolits dusted with graphite. The graphite may still count as lube but it seems like the easiest way for the lazy man to do it. No dry time, no bake time. You could even sign your name with a .38 special in a pinch :D

mjwcaster
01-24-2016, 12:42 AM
I did a 'test' a while ago, posted on here some where.
45 acp, plenty of leading, piles of lead slivers laying on the ground.
Even alternating lubed and unlubed.
Leading started to show within 5 rounds, never shot more than 10 in a row.
Finished up most of them by alternating with lubed Boolits.
Still have 50 unlubed Boolits loaded up, may shoot them someday.
Also proved that shooting good bullets will clean out the leading.
After the unlubed 'test' just kept shooting my good lubed loads and the barrel ended up clean.
Now the chamber was a filthy mess from the 'over lubed' test.
Caked on crud that didn't come out with my normal quickly cleaning.
I didn't even notice how bad the chamber was until plunk testing a new batch.
Got interesting data from the mistake of a loading session with unlubed Boolits.

Wardo1974
01-24-2016, 09:22 AM
Amazing this is a topic. Bullets have been lubed since they were invented for a good reason - because you don't want leading.

Jacketed bullets have an exterior metal many times harder than lead, so no, they don't lead. There is copper fouling even with these though.

Firing unlubed lead bullets subjects them to tremendous amounts of friction as they slide down the bore, so they melt. And yes, it's exactly like soldering your bore, only with much less tin hardening your boolit than solder has.

Go ahead and load a dozen or so and shoot them. It's all you'll need. Before you hit 12, you'll be spitting lead on the grass when you fire, keyholing bullets, and be left with a fine mess to clean out afterwards. And what for? To avoid the extra small step of lubing? Scrubbing lead from a bore seems a lot more aggravating to me than dealing with a bit of lube.

I stupidly fired a 330 grain hollowpoint 30-1 bullet from my .45-70 once that I'd polished clean of lube and it smeared lead nearly end to end. The same boolit works absolutely fine with your traditional lubes slapped on it.

After that moment of idiocy, I had no more interest in attempting unlubed boolits.

newton
01-24-2016, 09:24 PM
I do think lube serves a purpose, but just like we have found out with powder coating, it can be substituted.

Ive never heard of friction causing leading, interesting take on it.

Motor
01-24-2016, 09:54 PM
[QUOTE=newton;3518815]I do think lube serves a purpose, but just like we have found out with powder coating, it can be substituted.

Ive never heard of friction causing leading, interesting take on it.[/QUOTE

You must have not put too much thought into your last sentence. Surly you have heard of lead fouling in the muzzle end of the bore caused by either poor lube or not enough lube.

I would think that a self lubricating alloy would have been developed by now but the lubricant probably prevents the alloy from holding together. At least the way we have to use it as in pouring it into a mold cavity.

Motor

Bullwolf
01-25-2016, 02:13 AM
I would think that a self lubricating alloy would have been developed by now but the lubricant probably prevents the alloy from holding together. At least the way we have to use it as in pouring it into a mold cavity.

Motor


Not to be contrary Motor, but Zinc projectiles have been around for a while, and they are actually self lubricating.

Unfortunately most of us - myself included - Don't really want to use Zinc for a multitude of reasons. Such as the ridiculous hardness of Zinc, lower retained weight, damage to aluminum casting equipment, and drastically higher casting temps. Along with the negative casting effects of higher amounts of zinc, when mixed in with Lead/Tin alloys.

If you happen to recover and re-use (Lead) range scrap, substantial quantities of Zinc (say around 3%-4% or higher) in the mix will easily contaminate your range scrap alloy, making for some casting headaches.


- Bullwolf

newton
01-25-2016, 09:39 AM
[QUOTE=newton;3518815]I do think lube serves a purpose, but just like we have found out with powder coating, it can be substituted.

Ive never heard of friction causing leading, interesting take on it.[/QUOTE

You must have not put too much thought into your last sentence. Surly you have heard of lead fouling in the muzzle end of the bore caused by either poor lube or not enough lube.

I would think that a self lubricating alloy would have been developed by now but the lubricant probably prevents the alloy from holding together. At least the way we have to use it as in pouring it into a mold cavity.

Motor


No, I put a lot of thought into most things I post. I think logically about things, not historically/traditionally.

I have never heard of "Friction" being what causes lead to be separated from the boolit and deposited into the bore. Gas cutting and gas melting I have heard of, but not friction between boolit and bore.

I was simply stating that I had never head of friction causing leading.

I personally only believe that gas cutting is what separates lead from the boolit. I think that if you can find a way to keep all the gases behind the boolit then you could eliminate the need for lube. As stated before, some have accomplished this to an extent with the use of fillers. So if friction was the cause of leading, then fillers would have no effect on leading - unless they migrate up around the sides of the boolit.

MT Gianni
01-26-2016, 10:30 AM
Not to be contrary Motor, but Zinc projectiles have been around for a while, and they are actually self lubricating.

Unfortunately most of us - myself included - Don't really want to use Zinc for a multitude of reasons. Such as the ridiculous hardness of Zinc, lower retained weight, damage to aluminum casting equipment, and drastically higher casting temps. Along with the negative casting effects of higher amounts of zinc, when mixed in with Lead/Tin alloys.


- Bullwolf

I believe that zinc does not lube but resists leading because of hardness, just as jacketed leaves a copper deposit but not copper chunks large enough to see with the naked eye. Galvanized metal leaves a slime but zinc in ingots does not.
When you start to experiment with lubes and accuracy you soon find that all are not the same and as Veral tells in his little blue book pressure can take a huge jump or drop with different lubes. Loads safe when worked up with one lube nay not be with another. If your goal is to have a load that shoots all the way through the paper and backing bang away. If it is to have all ten rounds touching, you will need a consistency that a lube fouled barrel gives you, or a copper fouled gives with jacketed.

leeggen
01-26-2016, 07:19 PM
Few years ago Molly started a thread labeled If you think so, try this. Very interesting to read
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?116741-If-you-think-so-try-this&highlight=Molly%27s+challenge

This is the url.
CD

Ricochet
01-27-2016, 01:31 PM
As for self lubing alloys, I have read about but never seen or tried "Sinterfire" frangible bullets. They sound something like the sintered bronze, oil impregnated bushings long used in autos and power equipment.

Ricochet
01-27-2016, 03:25 PM
Double post, sorry.