Coated cast in Glocks

[Chuck Perry]

I'm using a major maker's HiTek coated 125g RN in my Glock 48 9mm. 4.5g of CFE Pistol over a standard Fed pistol primer, OAL is 1.11". And I'm getting horrible leading, after no more than a few magazines. The leading is on the face of the muzzle and the interior of the barrel viewed from the muzzle. Bullets measure right at .356 before loading. I pulled three loaded rounds. The coating is perfectly intact and the bullets measure consistently at .355 after crimping with a Lee FCD. I know Glocks have a bad rap with standard lubed cast, but I thought the HiTek coating was ok? Is this just a Glock thing or do I have something else going on?
262130

[whisler]

Probably need a larger boolit. You are resizing the boolit with the brass.

[Dusty Bannister]

It sounds like over crimping might be reducing the diameter of the cast bullet in the case. A common problem with the Lee FCD when not carefully adjusted. Do you know what the groove diameter of the barrel actually is? If the groove is .355 and your bullet is .355 it is going to leak hot gas under pressure and lead the barrel as you have found. Nice photo.

Have you reviewed the sticky "getting set up with a new 9MM"? A lot of good information in that thread and maybe you will find a bit of information that will resolve your problem.

[Chuck Perry]

I found that sticky and will review it. I thought of one more thing. I noticed that the outside of my fired cases are black with soot. What would cause that?

[nicholst55]

I found that sticky and will review it. I thought of one more thing. I noticed that the outside of my fired cases are black with soot. What would cause that?

Generally this is caused by a too-light powder charge. The load doesn't create enough chamber pressure to obturate the case to seal the chamber. Try increasing the powder charge or switching powders. Also if you haven't already, take a look at the sticky linked below:

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?33855-The-Truth-about-Glocks-and-Cast

[StuBach]

I can’t speak to 9mm but in my glock 21 (45 ACP) I have never experienced leading of that degree in either traditional lubed or PCd. Haven’t tried HiTek yet.

As others have stated fit is critical so make sure you slug the barrel and size appropriately. Don’t let the case crimp or sizing die size your bullet down which is easy to do with lead.

[Chuck Perry]

I definitely needed to adjust the crimp. I have the FCD die now set so that the outside diameter of the case is .380 after crimping, which is what my Lyman manual shows the spec as. I have Titegroup and W231 on hand, I can try those powders next.

I've never slugged a barrel before. I'm generally aware of the process, pushing a soft lead core down the barrel from chamber to muzzle and then taking measurements of the swaged core. There's probably a sticky around here that talks about it in more detail? Any sources out there for the core material?

[mvintx]

Do a search on this form for slugging a barrel and you'll get enough hits to waste an evening. Check out Boob-tube also...there's a pretty good video of a guy slugging a 9mm barrel. It's easy.

[BigAlofPa.]

I had very bad leading with tight group. With the coated cast. It was the worst with 9mm. Im now using sport pistol. No leading with it.

[onelight]

A good friend of mine has shot a lot of .356 , 125 Hi-Tek in his Glock 48X He loads in mixed cases WW primers and powder is BE-86 normally 50 to 100 rounds per session with no appreciable leading he does clean after every session and he does use the Lee carbide FCD.
Are you getting enough flare to get your bullets started with out scraping the Hi-Tek ?

[Chuck Perry]

Are you getting enough flare to get your bullets started with out scraping the Hi-Tek ?

Flare is good. I pulled three loaded rounds and the coating is perfect on all three.

[megasupermagnum]

That load looks good, and you say the coating is intact after loading, not getting scraped out. Your problem is either the bullet is too small allowing gas cutting, or the coating itself is inadequate. I'm willing to bet the bullet is too small. you say pulled bullets were being sized down to .355". Many on this site run a .357" or .358". The best answer would be to slug your barrel, and get a bullet .002" larger than the groove diameter.

[sigep1764]

When I was setting up for cast for my 9's including three Glocks, I found that .358 boolits left no leading, .357 was marginal, and .356 leaded like crazy. Before switching powders, try some larger diameter boolits. Load them as a dummy rounds, then pull the boolit to make sure it isn't being swaged down in diameter by the brass. If it is .358 after pulling, load some up and shoot. If not, you will need to solve that problem with a custom expander. Lathesmith makes them for Dillon presses and NOE makes inserts for the Lee Universal Expander die that fixes the problem as well. Give us an update when you get a chance to try some of these things.

[blue32]

That picture brings back memories. You can slug it all day but I have that same "marksman barrel" in my gen5 and I say size to .358 and be done with it. I also crimp to .380" but you may want to push that expander deeper into the case to keep from sizing down upon seating with a larger boolit.

[Drew P]

I did a little fire lapping on mine that actually helped a lot. But you do need to have suitable pressure to obturate well and it sounds like you’re a little light.

[mdi]

Not a Glock owner and only fired one, but are all the stock Glock barrels in all available calibers poly "rifled"?

[Ed_Shot]

While I use Lone Wolf barrels for G22 and G17, and I have a LW barrel for my G21, I find that my G21 OEM barrel performs better (in both function and accuracy) than the LW barrel using either lubed or PC'd boolits. I have no issues with leading.

[Conditor22]

Flare is good. I pulled three loaded rounds and the coating is perfect on all three.


It's not just about the flare. You need to expand the case neck


http://noebulletmolds.com/smf/index.php?topic=1795.0

https://noebulletmolds.com/site/product-category/expanders
first number is the flare/bell size at the case mouth, the second is the neck size. (remember they The cases ) shrink .001 after flaring) you need to find what works for your setup 361-357 -- I use for .357 boolit.

I only crimp the 9MM to the point where pushing the loaded boolit against my bench and the boolit doesn't move. .355 is TO SMALL, even with 15-16 BHN alloy

[onelight]

That load looks good, and you say the coating is intact after loading, not getting scraped out. Your problem is either the bullet is too small allowing gas cutting, or the coating itself is inadequate. I'm willing to bet the bullet is too small. you say pulled bullets were being sized down to .355". Many on this site run a .357" or .358". The best answer would be to slug your barrel, and get a bullet .002" larger than the groove diameter.


Not a Glock owner and only fired one, but are all the stock Glock barrels in all available calibers poly "rifled"?
I have heard they are using I different rifling in some of the Glocks now if I read the pictures correctly it is more of a standard rifling with rounded lands. But many of us have shot a lot of cast particularly with coated bullets that do not lead in Glocks .

[leadhead]

If your going to use .358 dia bullets, and use Lee powder thru dies, order a
Lee powder thru expander die for the .38 S&W and then go with .358 and
don't look back.... Problem solved.
Denny

[fredj338]

Did you smash test the bullets? you should be able to flatten them & have the coating be intact. Are you seating & cr9imping in separate steps? Are you flaring enough that the coatring isn't scraping off the base edge someplace?
IMO, forget slugging, modern bbls are pretty uniform & if you load for more than one gun, & have diff bore dia, an issue. If you are sizing down in the dreaded LFCD, that could be part of the problem, but I have never gotten leading like that in any Glock regardless of the bullet size. That looks like coating failure. I used to run 0.357" in all my 9mm but went back to 0.356" because Ioad in mixed brass & would get the occasional fat round. No issues with accuracy or leading, commercial HT bullets or my own. The only powder I have ever seen hard on coated bullets is TG, so me, I would & do avoid TG.

[Chuck Perry]

I replaced the Lee FCD with a Dillon crimp die and seated/crimped a few dummy rounds. I pulled the bullets from those: coating remained intact and the bullets were still .356. I loaded 50 rounds: 125g RN cast/coated @ 1.125" OAL, 4.2g W231, Fed standard primer, .380 crimp. Shot them just now, leading is just as bad as before.

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[onelight]

I have better luck with Red Dot or a slower powder than 231 , like BE-86 In 9 and 40 with Hi-Tek coated .
But I have seen many posts about good performance from other powders to.

[Idz]

What cured my 9mm leading problems was sizing the PC soft lead bullet to 0.357" and expanding the case neck to about 0.358 with a homemade pin in my M-die to a depth of 0.15 inch. I use the Lee seating die only to set OAL and finish with the Lee FCD for light taper crimp. It seems the normal methods squeezed the bullet too hard and reduced its OD which probably caused the leading. Using my method I cured the leading and have no feeding problems in Beretta 92FS, Sig P320, Glock 17, and some Taurus pistols. My rounds are slightly too large to slip into a case gauge but have no problem in the pistols.

[Chuck Perry]

Thought I'd give the JB Bore paste a break. Anyone remember these gizmos?

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20200516/4445926e2dba9a5a9bb9abe48bfb2c63.jpg

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[Idz]

Foul out works great! Its been discontinued but the formulas and operation can be found online.

[blackriver]

Check hardness of your bullets. I had the same problem and same results. Turned out to be soft alloy. Bullets were replaced from a different batch, problems solved.

[Handloader109]

Try .358. I use powder coating and zero issues in gen 3 model 17.::

[Chuck Perry]

I have some similar bullets from a different commercial caster. I loaded them up identical with the W231 load, will test fire them tomorrow.

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[GTIV]

I suggest you use a normal taper crimp so you don't resize the bullets.

The white residue is normal but if lead is building up its no good.

I also think you should try load the round a bit longer and see if that helps.



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[Jhopson]

With the run on bullets many manufacturers are sending them out as soon as they are made. It takes a minimum of 21 days for a lead bullet to reach the original hardness of the alloy.

White residue at the end of the muzzle is normal. When you run a brass bore brush through your barrel, make sure you do it over a piece of paper. That way, you will see pieces of lead on this paper and know for sure that it is leading.
The easiest way to get out small amounts of lead is to wrap a small strand of copper wire around your bore brush and push through the barrel several times.

Most 9mm Glocks will function better with a .357 sized bullet.


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[Chuck Perry]

I got out to fire my latest batch today after work. These were the 124 coated cast bullets from a different vendor. These are also sized .356 and coated with red HiTek, but have a grease groove whereas the original ones did not. Other than the bullet itself the load was identical. I fired 50 rounds and noticed no leading.
The original vendor is sending me a box of the same "problem" bullet, but sized larger at .357. I'll report back once I have tested those.

[fredj338]

The soot is your really low charge of CFE. Medium burn rate powders like to run well over midrange for complete combustion. You are barely over starting data. If you want low vel, clean burning loads, then go to a faster powder.
I feel HT is a bit finicky compared to PC when running softer alloy. I can get really good results with PC & range scrap in full power 9mm & 40 without leading or accuracy issues.

[Curly James]

I use the 6 CAVITY 356-125 2R bullet mold. Powder coated and sized to .356. Seated to 1.110 over 5.1 grains of CFE Pistol powder. The crimp matters a great deal. I taper crimp mine at .377. These shoot wonderfully in a Glock Gen 4 26 and a Kahr CM9. They do not pass the "plunk" test in a Springfield XD compact nor my Glock 19X. The throats are too short. I really only shoot them in the 26 and the Kahr so I haven't experimented with a shorter COL. I have had no leading at all in either gun. Good luck. It sounds like the alloy may have been too soft or the coating wasn't up to par. Although, I have loaded some pure lead hollowpoints that I powder coated and fired from a .357 magnum at some pretty fast velocities with no leading.

[Chuck Perry]

I recieved the new .357 diameter bullets today. I loaded 50 with a full charge of CFE pistol and ran them thru the Glock. I believe my leading issues are gone. I did have a few that failed to fully chamber, hung up 3/4 way into the chamber. I think maybe I need a bit more crimp? I adjusted the crimp down a few thousandths. I'll load and test some more tomorrow.

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[Chuck Perry]

I spoke too soon about the .357 diameter bullets. Leading continued, despite several changes I tried in OAL and powder/charge. Whereas the .356 diameter bullets from the other vendor don't lead at all, are quite accurate and around $10/1000 cheaper. I think I know what to do :)

[Hanzy4200]

Try bumping up the diameter, and as others have said, play with the crimping. If you are casting at .356, with a coat it should bring it up to .357-.3575. Shoot them as cast or pony up the $20 for Lee .357 push through. I have 3 Glocks, two 9's and a .45. I have run a metric ton of cast through them. Two have never tasted a jacketed bullet. Traditional lube, tumble lube, and powder coat, as my preferences have changed. I can run 500+ rds through any of them without a single smear. Glocks hating lead is the biggest pile of horse sh*t being repeated online. No offense to you at all.

[Hanzy4200]

I will add, not knowing your experience level, 9MM is about the worst caliber to learn on. .38, .44, .45, ect, are all much more forgiving. The 9's tapered case can be a real bunghole for newbies. My first 6 months casting I thought the guys on here were using magic powers. All kinds of issues. Started working on the .45 and I had tack driving loads in a week.

[P Flados]

A 9mm Glock was my biggest challenge for finding leading free boolit happiness.

Now that I am happy, I have posted responses a few times in a few threads. Just to make it easy, I went back grabbed what I think are key items.
The combination below worked for me and may help others figure out something that they may want to try next.

I use a custom deep plug 0.3575" expander
I use 0.3595" PC coated boolits (Lee 120 TC)
I use select brass, a mix of Blazer, FC and CCI
I seat and I do flare removal (not really crimping) as separate steps
I can now use any powder I want and loads up to book max with great accuracy and no leading.

I have come to believe that much of the 9mm "just can't figure it out frustration" comes from having boolits sized down by the case more than you think and/or just not going with big enough boolits. I am also convinced that sorting headstamps is an easy thing to try early on when your are having problems. More details of my basis for these can be found in post 37 of

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?369567-I-m-losing-steam-trying-to-develop-accurate-cast-9mm/page3

[bwframe]

Thanks for the helpful info folks! Just getting back into casting/coating after a couple years off.

I'm casting for new to me Gen5 Glocks with the marksman barrels. I'm looking to start sizing at .357. I sized to .356 on the Gen4's in the past.

Any insight onto what OAL's you folks are passing plunk tests with in your Gen5 barrels?

TIA. Yes, I'm aware I need to slug and plunk my own barrels.

[Coopaloop86]

I have cast for many 9mm Glocks. I found that generally when I get leading, it is because I did something with the hitek improperly. I size 99% of my 9mm to .357 and powdercoat now and my Glocks actually look cleaner after shooting than before. I'm not knocking Hi-tek, I ran it for several years but it can be a fickle beast and unless youre smash testing and acetone wiping every single batch, you can get some that slip by. I just had to remelt 500 .311 boolits because I bungled something in the coating process.

[RobClarke]

I just dumped a Glock 17 for a CZ because I didn't want to take chances with a loose chamber. I have had a couple of tight barrels throated by Doug, but the Glock I only shot jacketed rounds through it and got rid of it after the newness wore off.

[oley55]

I thought there was an absolutely never do it rule about using a Lee Factory Crimp die with cast bullets. If not there should be.

A properly adjusted Lee collet die is a much better option.

[onelight]

I thought there was an absolutely never do it rule about using a Lee Factory Crimp die with cast bullets. If not there should be.

A properly adjusted Lee collet die is a much better option.
Lots of us use that die with good results .

[44Blam]

I shoot a whole lot of cast 40 in my G35. But I shoot it through a KKM barrel.
My stock Glock barrel only had less than 50 rounds through it until I went to Front Sight a little while back...

[Lloyd Smale]

Did you smash test the bullets? you should be able to flatten them & have the coating be intact. Are you seating & cr9imping in separate steps? Are you flaring enough that the coatring isn't scraping off the base edge someplace?
IMO, forget slugging, modern bbls are pretty uniform & if you load for more than one gun, & have diff bore dia, an issue. If you are sizing down in the dreaded LFCD, that could be part of the problem, but I have never gotten leading like that in any Glock regardless of the bullet size. That looks like coating failure. I used to run 0.357" in all my 9mm but went back to 0.356" because Ioad in mixed brass & would get the occasional fat round. No issues with accuracy or leading, commercial HT bullets or my own. The only powder I have ever seen hard on coated bullets is TG, so me, I would & do avoid TG.

that would have been my first test. I think you just coated a batch that werent cured well enough. With pc it shouldnt matter what alloy your using at pistol velocitys. If shot 10s of thousands of coated bullets through my many glocks and never got leading. I size all my 9mm bullets to 357 and have never had an issue with any of them and ive got 6 different 9mm glocks.