First cast 9mm boolits

[michael.birdsley]

Just finished doing my first cast for my ruger sr9c and it actually went preatty good. I am using a lee 356 120 tc tl mold that I bought from a member on this site. Seated the boolits to 1.110 and as cast all of my dummy boolits pass the kerplunk test. The boolits range from .3565-.358. My barrel is .3545 groove to groove. .002 over would be .3565. Should I get a .356 lee sizer or round up to .357? I know the pass the kerplunk test and chamber but, wouldn't I want them a consistent size? I think tommrow I will shoot them as cast to see what happens. The boolits came out preatty good too.

The ones on the very top of the first picture are straight wheel weight. The ones on the bottom I added some tin 50/50 solder I bought at the hardware store. I wanted to see the difference with tin. Seems like the tin ones filled out better and less rejects.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170226/1e1c3c544a49c2157f872cad7584a929.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170226/4cad9cfa00332b74333b8226daa7fa56.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170226/4e64730d5cd4c8c7d8ca2d3328076d98.jpg


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[bigolsmokebomb]

I would go .357 just to be on the safe side. I mostly run all my cast through a sizer to make them all uniform and I also powder coat my boolits so that adds a few thou to the pre sized boolit. I've shot 3 thou over bore without any issue.

[Ole Joe Clarke]

Did you put any lube on them? If not, you will be in the market for a Lewis Lead remover.

Have a blessed day,

Leon

[Shiloh]

Rare to have a bore that diameter. .356 and up seems to be the norm.

Shiloh

[bedbugbilly]

Congrats on your successful casting session!

I have the Lee 356-120 TC (not the TL like yours). I just TL them in Alox/Paste Wax and shoot them as they fall form the mold. Mine fall about .357 - .358. I had a SR9 (sold it and went to a Shield) and they all worked fine out of it. I tried sizing a batch to .357 but found that they didn't shoot any better than "as dropped".

The plunk test will tell you but shortly after I started loading 9mm, I picked up a "cartridge gauge" and it's one of the handiest things to have on your bench - for me it saves having to have a barrel handy to check randomly as I load. It will tally if your cartridge is within specs. I also got one for .380 and just got one for 45ACP that I am about to start reloading. For cartridges that headspace on the rim, I find it a very worthwhile tool to have.

Congrats again and have fun!

[runfiverun]

I hope you lubed them too :lol:
I wouldn't bother sizing them if they are under 358.

[michael.birdsley]

They are going to get tumble lubed. Ordered the sizer today
I will tumble lube the ones I have allready made to night and shoot them tomorrow morning.


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[adam_mac84]

Any plans to PC as well? I'd be interested to see how those coat and shoot. On the fence for normal lube grooves vs TL style

[dverna]

I believe there have been leading issues with that bullet in the TL design. So check the barrel after every few rounds.

The non TL bullets fare better (more bearing area?). If they lead, try a harder alloy (to grip the rifling), or power coat.

[michael.birdsley]

Any plans to PC as well? I'd be interested to see how those coat and shoot. On the fence for normal lube grooves vs TL style

I dunno we will see what happens I guess. This is my first go around casting other than my muzzle loader and fishing jigs/sinkers.


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[michael.birdsley]

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170228/557b116a876f6f4bd7c57881035ccd72.jpg

Didn't go to the range today instead I bought a ruger SR9E. So I shot that and my .30-.30 instead at the range. Probably shoot these sometime this week on my way to Saginaw to drop of my of my Pistol Sales Record form to the sherrifs dept. Tumbled lubed these last night. Loaded them today under some bullseye ranging from 3.8-4.2 grn. Using Lyman's reloading manual, Lyman's cast reloading manual and the complete reloading manual for the 9mm Luger. All passed my Lyman case gage and kerplunk test.


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[Boolseye]

Your boolits look good, but don't get discouraged if you have leading and tumbling.
That can be a problematic mold. No amount of alloy changes, tumble lubing or loading methods made much difference for mine, I had to sell it. It made beautiful boolits that dropped right around .357" and hit the target sideways. Not trying to be negative, I spent a long time with that boolit before I gave up. Every other 9mm boolit I've tried has been fine. Again, I really hope you have better luck with it! Best powders for it were AA #5 and #7.

[pakmc]

I also have that lee mold. the bullets work great in a .38/357 revolver but for me, not in a 9mm auto. to get the action to work the bullets will keyhold. and are not accurate.(thats in a CZ champion, CZ 75B, Star model 30, Bersa thunder9 and a Tanfolio all 9mm. I had to go to a much heaver bullet(161gr.) to get accuracy and work the action. see my notes in an earier part of the site.

[michael.birdsley]

Any body who has this mold tried unique in it. I also have that on hand. I'm home after a 12 hr shift and it's raining out. I'm Leary on the charges at 3.8-3.9 because Jacket bullets won't cycle my sr9c that low. I only work ten hrs tomorrow so I think I'll try it than.


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[fredj338]

The bullets look good! I am not a fan of the TL designs, & seating them out that far leaves the lube groove exposed to dirt which you will be sending down your bore. I like to size all my cast so that they are uniform. I used mixed brass & getting an occasional fatty will cause issue in some of my pistols. I am now sizing 0.357" for everything, seems to give best accuracy.
If a lead bullet won't shoot with Unique, it probably wont shoot.

[fredj338]

Any plans to PC as well? I'd be interested to see how those coat and shoot. On the fence for normal lube grooves vs TL style
Go normal IMO. It gives you options that TL will not. Plus I have heard many complain about accuracy issues with some TL designs, especially when sizing, never with traditional groove designs.

[pakmc]

also seat the bullets down in the case.Where the edge of the bullet is even with the front edge of the case. as the bullet will(may)scrape the side of the chamber and leave a ring of lead in front of the case. the second case will jam on the lead ring. that's one of the biggest problems I'm having with shooting lead bullets in 9mm. so far, I've found that the heavier bullets work better in 9mm,(like 150gr to my latest is a round nose at 165gr.)(it's lee 357/158 round nose, 6 holer)

[MT Chambers]

I'm wondering if they will feed at all with that bullet out of the case so far, most of my semi's wouldn't chamber that.

[Cherokee]

Your SR9C must have a long transition from the chamber to the rifling. I can not seat the 356120 TC(not TL) @ 356 size any longer than 1.058 and pass the plunk test in all my 9mm's. You initial casting results look good, lets hope the bullets shoot well for you.

[michael.birdsley]

Your SR9C must have a long transition from the chamber to the rifling. I can not seat the 356120 TC(not TL) @ 356 size any longer than 1.058 and pass the plunk test in all my 9mm's. You initial casting results look good, lets hope the bullets shoot well for you.

With 5 dummy rounds they all chambered. I had some issues around the 1.120 mark. I didn't want to shove them down into the case with out first working up the loads. I may have to. But, the 5 dummy rounds all chambered. For jacketed bullets I usually seat 1.145 -1.150


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[JeffG]

Any body who has this mold tried unique in it. I also have that on hand. I'm home after a 12 hr shift and it's raining out. I'm Leary on the charges at 3.8-3.9 because Jacket bullets won't cycle my sr9c that low. I only work ten hrs tomorrow so I think I'll try it than.


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Yes, I have and use that mold with Unique. Typical use 4.3-4.5 grains. I have seated mine at 1.145 too and always work fine.

[michael.birdsley]

Well I'm at the range we speak and they tumbled like a big dog into the target some don't but, the majority do. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170306/0c7af791f0b5e85679200edf19d21d66.jpg.

Guess it's back to the drawing board and reading the Lyman cast manual. Probably going to order some of the hi-tek powder coat and see if it makes a difference. Maybe different mold what are lee molds that people generally have a high success rate with?


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[Jal5]

I use lee 358125 RF in my 9mm Shield.

[gwpercle]

Any body who has this mold tried unique in it. I also have that on hand. I'm home after a 12 hr shift and it's raining out. I'm Leary on the charges at 3.8-3.9 because Jacket bullets won't cycle my sr9c that low. I only work ten hrs tomorrow so I think I'll try it than.


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I have the regular , not tumble lube , version Lee 356-120-TC , sized .357 over 5.0 grains Unique , the book says it should be about 1125 fps. Feeds, fires and ejects reliably, not excessive. Actually Unique is a good powder in the 9mm , hard to double charge 5.0 grains in one and the pressure is right for a clean burn. Accuracy is just fine too.
I hate to say this but the tumble lube 9mm design sometimes is not that accurate in some guns...try the regular lube groove design and see if that helps.
Gary

[Thumbcocker]

+1 on 125 rnfp

[DSRichert]

I shoot a lot these powder coated sized .358 1.10 oal 3.9 tite group

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[michael.birdsley]

Who is the member on here who sells powder coat? I casted about 75 more of these this last weekend. Maybe I will load them with unique after powder coating.


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[JBinMN]

I believe the member you are wanting is "Smoke4320". He is a Vendor here.

His Topic where he lists his goods is at this link: http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?252509-Hi-Quality-Powdercoating-Powder-For-sale

His Vendor forum is at this link:http://castboolits.gunloads.com/forumdisplay.php?205-Smoke-4320-s-Corner

G'Luck!
:)

[michael.birdsley]

I have a lot of pro tech and Jann's net craft powder coat paint from painting jigs will this work to get started? I think that smoke guy is the better deal obviously


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[JBinMN]

I use the Pro tech powders for my jigs & I considered this, but have not tried it so am unable to answer ya. I am not yet powder coating boolits since I am still doing research on whether or not to try PCing them at all. I slightly heat the jigs one at a time, dip in the jar, then I reheat with a torch to bake the finish on. I only do about 10 of each color ( 6-7 colors) & then move on to anther color. I have not "baked them in an oven like the boolits & I sure am not gonna do the boolits one at a time. So, I have not yet decided to try.

Please post up if ya do try those coatings. I dont see why they would not work, but for maybe there is a difference in the chemical makeup or something..??

G'Luck! & There is prolly someone here who has tried them & can answer your question.
:)

BTW, I think the Protech is a lot more expensive than the stuff most of these PC folks are using. Those lil jars are expensive to me. ;)

[copdills]

Boolits look Great welcome to the club , you'll never be the same from here on out lol, stock up on some lead if you can find some

[michael.birdsley]

Way more expensive I have three days off this weekend though, I might just go to harbor freight Thursday. When I was doing a lot of jigs depending on the jig size I would heat them up with a lighter ( while holding onto them with pliers ) after so many seconds dunk them in the paint and tap of excess. Get a convection oven full, hang upside down andthan I think baked at 350 for like 20 minutes. Finish would be rock hard and nothing was chipping it

. I might just throw a bunch of boolits in heat up to 150 and throw in some shake excess off and than harden them.


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[Denver]

Glad I saw this post. I'm shopping for a mold for my new SA Range Officer compact. Was considering this mold but I'll look elsewhere.

[JBinMN]

Way more expensive I have three days off this weekend though, I might just go to harbor freight Thursday. When I was doing a lot of jigs depending on the jig size I would heat them up with a lighter ( while holding onto them with pliers ) after so many seconds dunk them in the paint and tap of excess. Get a convection oven full, hang upside down andthan I think baked at 350 for like 20 minutes. Finish would be rock hard and nothing was chipping it

. I might just throw a bunch of boolits in heat up to 150 and throw in some shake excess off and than harden them.


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Along with the expense. That "rock hard" finish would not do well in sizing, or running down a bore, I would think. Another reason I did not try Pro tech stuff yet. ;)

G'Luck with your Harbor freight paint project. Likely be better, but if ya do throw some in from using pro tech, I'd like to read about that too.

:)

[michael.birdsley]

In the morning after work and get done with coffee at the conservation club I am going to give the pro-tech a whirl with some airsoft bbs. I did message smoke about buying some of his powder coat


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[JBinMN]

Cool! :)

Please post up your doings. I will be looking forward to hearing about your results!
:)

[michael.birdsley]

Ok so powder coated my boolits today. I used Jann's net craft blue and some air soft bbs I bought a duhnhams came out pretty good but, I think I used to much powder coat so I will need to size them. Poured bbs in and shook for three minutes and than put them in my convection oven for 15 minutes @ around 400 degrees. Covered pretty well except for where I picked them up at. Decided to use blue because I knew from jig making it covers good (almost used junebug flake) The one boolit I sacrificed to the cast boolits gods passed the smash test. I have a day off tommrow starting at 9 am so either tommrow or Friday I'll shoot them. I did order a sample pack from smoke as his is way cheaper than what I am useing. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170308/9b0c6483c7a92e5b9c6aa34303650346.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170308/37261a9f3b23d9caf2d55e744456db2d.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170308/813b53cb2c0091369dc0006c61df5b4f.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170308/61527433dc067d08e00c809f6efe9e39.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170308/2cad462ae5b3ad4c54b564feb6662da4.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170308/9387a4c793eab66021769152d9ccb295.jpg


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[JBinMN]

Cool!
:)

I have a few questions that would be great if ya answered them...

Did ya size them before coating or are they "as cast"?

If you are going to size them before loading, and after this painting process, please post up those results.

When you load them into the cartridges, does the paint shave off from the fit?

Part of why I asked about the sizing above.

How much powder did you use to coat the bullets from that lil jar? ( 1 teaspoon, 1 tablespoon,etc.??)

I am guessing about 40-50 boolits from the pics, but not sure about the powder amount.

How many more do ya think you could shake up & coat, using the amount left in the tub, or... How many bullets do ya think a jar would coat?

I am trying to figure out if you do shoot them with no adverse effect on their accuracy, if paint holds up in barrel, etc., Would it be better to use a different paint type, simply due to cost of the paint. AS ya know the lure paint is pricey as compared to the bags of paint.



Thanks if ya can help out with the answers. I am tempted to try out this in the next day or so , since I have those jars of jig paint handy. I scrounged up a lil stove already. If this doesn't work well, to use the other paints, I would have to order online or drive an hour one way to get powder & I don't like to do that without having more things to get to make the trip. I usually consolidate things into a monthly trip to a big city, & shipping online stuff kills my wallet with the costs, usually.


G'luck with the shooting test!
:)

[HeavyMetal]

I have been following this thread since the first post and haven't said a word until now: don't think the PC will work but hope it does.

Please go to the Pic's you posted in the original post: please note the second and third photo's: second shows you holding a boolit and it has one hanging bad burr on the bottom of it and looks to cover most of the base, same in photo 3 last boolit on the right shows the same type burr and rounded base's on the casting.

In my opinion these are causing your tumbling problem when the exit the barrel, they are not exiting cleanly and propellent gas's are pushing your boolits "sideways" as the exit.

Making then hit the paper in the same manner!

Before you PC I suggest you run a batch of these under a strong magnifying glass and pick out as many with perfect base's as you can find.

Any imperfection in the base will cause accuracy issues!

If this was mine, and the base issue was as bad as it looks I'd do one of two things send it back the Lee or see a local machine shop and convert that puppy to a flat base mold! once you get a nice sharp base / edge area this tumbling issue will go away.

will continue to follow the thread to see your results.

HM

[michael.birdsley]

I have been following this thread since the first post and haven't said a word until now: don't think the PC will work but hope it does.

Please go to the Pic's you posted in the original post: please note the second and third photo's: second shows you holding a boolit and it has one hanging bad burr on the bottom of it and looks to cover most of the base, same in photo 3 last boolit on the right shows the same type burr and rounded base's on the casting.

In my opinion these are causing your tumbling problem when the exit the barrel, they are not exiting cleanly and propellent gas's are pushing your boolits "sideways" as the exit.

Making then hit the paper in the same manner!

Before you PC I suggest you run a batch of these under a strong magnifying glass and pick out as many with perfect base's as you can find.

Any imperfection in the base will cause accuracy issues!

If this was mine, and the base issue was as bad as it looks I'd do one of two things send it back the Lee or see a local machine shop and convert that puppy to a flat base mold! once you get a nice sharp base / edge area this tumbling issue will go away.

will continue to follow the thread to see your results.

HM
I was wondering if that was normal I was not sure. Not all the boolits do that so many it is just certain holes in the mold. I don't know if I'm not holding the mold tight enough or what. I did size this last batch after powder coat to .357. I will look and sort them out tomorrow. Excuse my ignorance but, is the mold not a flat base one?


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[HeavyMetal]

the 9mm mold you have is a bevel base mold, kinda has a chamfer on the edge of the boolit base. A flat base boolit would have a sharp edge with no chamfer on it.

Theory is the BB boolits load easier but if the case is prep'd right it shouldn't make a difference in loading. Now it is easier to spot a bad base fellout with a flat based boolit.

I could go on a small rant here about my dislike of the whole TL system but I won't, you need to figure out what the problem is with the sprue plate on this particular mold, it maybe loose, it may be to tight or it may be bent can't tell without seeing it.

By the way two cavity or six??

HM

[michael.birdsley]

It is a six cavity mold. I am guessing it is way to loose. I figured out what the spruce lube was for real quick after loading up the 6 cavities and destroying the end of the 2X4 to get the plate to cut the sprues. With remaining boolits I have could I take my pocket knife and remove the flashing?


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[HeavyMetal]

the problem here is I really can't see them well enough to tell, the base edge should be on an angle not rounded.

If the base has a round look to it nothing you do will fix it other than putting them back in the pot and starting over.

If you do that I will suggest you get a hot plate set it to just under medium and warm up your mold while your lead pot is coming up to temp as well.

you'll need to put something on top of the coil to protect the mold, an old saw blade will work just fine, do not buy a hot plate that does not have an exposed coil to set your blade on they do not get hot enough!

In the perfect world the mold should be hot enough when you start casting that the sprue plate does not require a lot of effort to open, done right the sprue plate will open easily and with little effort pending your alloy strength.

When you start casting and you open your sprue plate look closely at the boolit base's before you open the mold and drop the castings out: the base should be fully filled out with no air gap of any kind around the circumference of the boolit base and no casting flash either!

once you get this part down your casting should run about 90 to 95 % perfect, again inspect when your done and sort **** out and remelt it.

Only perfect boolits shoot perfectly everything else goes down hill from their, you are your own QC director you must decide what you can live with.

you have managed to pick the hardest cartridge to cast and reload for bar none!!

so my suggestions are:

Fix your mold, remelt your alloy, heat your mold on a hot plate and cast slowly and steadily, your looking for perfect boolits not a mountain of scrap!
As you gather skill that mountain of boolits will come to you and so will the joy of mastering the 9mm!!

HM

[michael.birdsley]

the problem here is I really can't see them well enough to tell, the base edge should be on an angle not rounded.

If the base has a round look to it nothing you do will fix it other than putting them back in the pot and starting over.

If you do that I will suggest you get a hot plate set it to just under medium and warm up your mold while your lead pot is coming up to temp as well.

you'll need to put something on top of the coil to protect the mold, an old saw blade will work just fine, do not buy a hot plate that does not have an exposed coil to set your blade on they do not get hot enough!

In the perfect world the mold should be hot enough when you start casting that the sprue plate does not require a lot of effort to open, done right the sprue plate will open easily and with little effort pending your alloy strength.

When you start casting and you open your sprue plate look closely at the boolit base's before you open the mold and drop the castings out: the base should be fully filled out with no air gap of any kind around the circumference of the boolit base and no casting flash either!

once you get this part down your casting should run about 90 to 95 % perfect, again inspect when your done and sort **** out and remelt it.

Only perfect boolits shoot perfectly everything else goes down hill from their, you are your own QC director you must decide what you can live with.

you have managed to pick the hardest cartridge to cast and reload for bar none!!

so my suggestions are:

Fix your mold, remelt your alloy, heat your mold on a hot plate and cast slowly and steadily, your looking for perfect boolits not a mountain of scrap!
As you gather skill that mountain of boolits will come to you and so will the joy of mastering the 9mm!!

HM

The boolits are filling out nice and they have nice sharp edges. Some have what I call flashing around where the mold halves join while being held in the closed position and around the bottom of some but, not all. I pre heat my mold on my kerosene heater that I use to heat up my garage. I just set it up top while I wait for my alloy to melt. I know it's the hardest to cast for but, like my high school football coach told us, if it was easy everybody would be doing it. I am learning stuff as this process goes on.


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[michael.birdsley]

Some success powder coated boolits with Janns net craft paint. I sized them to .357 after powder coating. I picked a mid range load of unique of 4.8 grains oal of 1.100. Still a some leading. I only loaded 20 up just to see if this was worth it. Maybe playing around with the powder charge I can get rid of the bit of leading?

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170309/8871a6eee59d3511a06aa7cc6a254027.jpg


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[HeavyHev]

Interesting you are getting leading. I used a softer alloy early on and my rounds tumbled like yours. I maintained the same size and hardened the alloy and all tumbling stopped. I wonder if that will help you out? also I never had any leading with PC. I also have 360 coverage so that might be the difference? Are your bases sufficiently coated after standing them up like that?

[michael.birdsley]

Interesting you are getting leading. I used a softer alloy early on and my rounds tumbled like yours. I maintained the same size and hardened the alloy and all tumbling stopped. I wonder if that will help you out? also I never had any leading with PC. I also have 360 coverage so that might be the difference? Are your bases sufficiently coated after standing them up like that?

Yes they are covered on the bottom. I do have some 50/50 solder I could throw in or maybe water quench them?


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[HeavyHev]

You'd have to try and water quench after the PC process because baking at 400 will undo everything the quenching did after casting. 50/50 will only get you so far, you need some antimony. If you are willing to invest into it, Rotometals has an alloy called superhard which is about 70/30 lead/antimony. Put a 1/4 of a bar into your pot and your BNH will vastly improve. I personally use their Foundry Alloy which is 12% tin 23% antimony and the rest is lead. I put in a half bar (2.5lbs) into a pot with 12.5lbs of range scrap lead making a 15lb pot of estimated 16-18 BNH. Since then, I have had 0 key-holing. Like I mentioned, I haven't had any leading problems and I am sized .001 over bore. A cheaper alternative is to run a full pot clip on wheel weights, that should be hard enough for a semiauto handgun.

[michael.birdsley]

Yes I'm willing to order some might have to wait untill next week


Edit never mind just looked at the alloy calculator I'll just order the hard ball stuff


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[HeavyHev]

I haven't used solder so I can only be pretty sure, but I think the mix is tin and lead. Tin's hardening properties are minuscule. Also too much tin can have negative effects on the physical properties of the projectile. Some rough guidelines for hardening are as follows:
Basic Rules for Hardening Lead-
For every 1% additional tin, Brinell hardness increases 0.3.
For every 1% additional antimony, Brinell hardness increases 0.9.
For a simple equation,
Brinell = 8.60 (pure lead) + ( 0.29 * Tin ) + ( 0.92 * Antimony )

Superhard is about $19/5lbs https://rotometals.com/super-hard-alloy-ingot-30-antimony-70-lead/ and Foundry is about $20/5lbs https://rotometals.com/foundry-type-alloy-64-5-lead-23-antimony-12-5-tin/
orders of $99 get free shipping and I swear I am not sponsored by them :)

*For my alloy, range scrap (mostly jacketed bullets) averages 1-3% antimony (I'm guessing 2%). Adding in a half bar of Foundry (2.5lbs) gives me an estimated 2.22% Tin, 5.50% Antimony and 92.3% Lead which is me trying to get close to RotoMetals alloy called Hardball (2% tin, 6% antimony, 92% lead)

[michael.birdsley]

I haven't used solder so I can only be pretty sure, but I think the mix is tin and lead. Tin's hardening properties are minuscule. Some rough guidelines for hardening are as follows:
Basic Rules for Hardening Lead-
For every 1% additional tin, Brinell hardness increases 0.3.
For every 1% additional antimony, Brinell hardness increases 0.9.
For a simple equation,
Brinell = 8.60 (pure lead) + ( 0.29 * Tin ) + ( 0.92 * Antimony )

Superhard is about $19/5lbs https://rotometals.com/super-hard-alloy-ingot-30-antimony-70-lead/ and Foundry is about $20/5lbs https://rotometals.com/foundry-type-alloy-64-5-lead-23-antimony-12-5-tin/
orders of $99 get free shipping and I swear I am not sponsored by them :)

*For my alloy, range scrap (mostly jacketed bullets) averages 1-3% antimony. Adding in a half bar of Foundry (2.5lbs) gives me an estimated 2.22% Tin, 4.67% Antimony and 93.1% Lead which is me trying to get close to RotoMetals alloy called Hardball (2% tin, 6% antimony, 92% lead)

Yeah I just looked at the alloy calculator your right. I'll just order the stuff you are talking about. Might have to be next week though.


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[michael.birdsley]

Update: so I decided to try to drop my charge of unique from 4.8 down to 4.0. Honestly that's the two best magazine grouping I have shot out of my ruger sr9c. Top left of the bulls eye looks like a key hole but, it is two bullets close. So I mean, no key holing is good, and with the groupings I am happy with atleast. There is what I think still a tad of leading after 20 rounds(picture). However, I bought 5lbs of super hard from roto metals to add to my wheel weights so I will use that along with my powder coat I bought from smoke so I don't have to use my jig paint. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170318/4c2856af0aab99440d5ac7b39eab38e4.jpghttps://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170318/595b7fcb65e705337be590308e374714.jpg


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[Boolseye]

Nice groups. There is always that much leading for me in the 9mm, it won't do no harm.

[JeffG]

Another consideration or thing to try here is after shooting 30-50 rounds, brush the bore with a bronze brush. Is the 'leading' removed? If so, it may instead be antimony wash and not leading. I had to get past that not understanding of the difference between the two.

[michael.birdsley]

So this would be considered an acceptable amount of leading in the barrel?


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[Boolseye]

judging only from the photo, yes. That looks normal. Can't see the rest of the barrel. Accuracy will suffer when leading gets bad, then you'll get keyholes.