Beware: the bull is pretty thick

[jonk]

We've all heard things like "you can't/shouldn't shoot cast lead, it will lead up your gun" and "that won't be accurate like a jacketed bullet is" and so on and so forth.


I just heard a pretty rich one this last weekend. Shooting reduced loads in a .303 (Lyman 314299, 50/50, GC, 18 gr of SR 4759) a shooter nearby saw me and said, "What are you shooting? That's pretty quiet for an Enfield." I showed him one of the cartridges and he said, "Don't you know you can't shoot a lead bullet unless you're using black powder?" I said, huh, come again? He elaborated, "Modern smokeless powders are so powerful they just blow the bullet up. You need the jacket to hold it all together."

Invitations to view my target (nothing great but a solid 3" group) did nothing to convince him; he just said 'maybe these held together but one WILL come apart and when it does your gun will explode.'

Some people. [smilie=b:

SO what's the biggest dumbest excuse you've ever heard against cast bullets?

[Potsy]

My brother in law still insists they will lead your barrel even after looking down my Kimber barrell after a couple hundred rounds.
Fine by me, keeps me from having to cast .44's for him.

[Rocky Raab]

I think it was Mark Twain who said, "It isn't the unknown that is dangerous, but the things we know for sure - and are dead wrong."

That holds true for a LOT of things in shooting.

[runfiverun]

yeah those copper jackets leave nothing behind..
my favorite one is don't those have to be made from like titanium hardness lead?
or that sure is loud i thought you were shooting cast don't they only go like 300 fps or so?

[44man]

I never complain because scrap lead is so hard to find as it is. I don't know if I want to wise up the stupid! [smilie=1:

[OutHuntn84]

I always like the one "that stuff will ruin your rifling" I don't even try to argue that point anymore.

A few weeks ago I was out of town and stopped at a tire shop to see if they had any lead they wanted to get rid of, the guy looks at me with a straight face and says"you know that stuff will kill ya don't ya, I had a buddy who would make sinkers and boolits out of WWs and he died of cancer" :groner:I oh so wanted to get on my soap box and attempt to educate him[smilie=b:, but figured what good would it do, so I just smiled and waved and hit up the next couple of tire shops on my way home. I think next year when I'm out that way I'll try another angle on this guy and explain to him all the hazards of having that stuff in his shop and that I'm willing to take it and dispose of it safely; for a minimal fee of course :twisted:.

[Freightman]

I was sighting in my Shiloh 45/70 and a guy that was shooting next to me said" If you are going elk hunting the cast bullets will never kill them" yea I said that is the reason there are so many buffalos getting in the way. Then went back to my sight in.

[mpmarty]

Yup! A few years ago I decided to enter a local club high power match. I went and watched a match and nearly everyone was shooting custom AR15s and the groups were really tiny as long as the wind was calm. Later in the morning they opened up a bit with crosswind deflection. I don't own any 223 caliber rifles and seeing the rapid fire string from prone knew I couldn't compete with a bolt gun. These guys loaded two rounds and then eight for the ten round string in sixty seconds. I decided to use my K-31 and brought it to the range the next match day. The range officer informed me that this was a high power match and wimpy cast loads weren't allowed. My cast loads were 175gr at 1700fps. I just turned around and left, you cannot teach the ineducable.

[Recluse]

you cannot teach the ineducable.

Absolutely true, and I no longer even waste good oxygen trying.

I'm with 44man, scrap lead is becoming more scarce and I refuse to waste my time teaching/convincing bonafide egotistical idiots the difference between rumor, myth and fact.

The serious shooter who is a student of the gun, now that is a different matter. Perhaps nothing is more enjoyable than introducing them to the world of reloading, and then casting.

:coffee:

[jonk]

Yup! A few years ago I decided to enter a local club high power match. I went and watched a match and nearly everyone was shooting custom AR15s and the groups were really tiny as long as the wind was calm. Later in the morning they opened up a bit with crosswind deflection. I don't own any 223 caliber rifles and seeing the rapid fire string from prone knew I couldn't compete with a bolt gun. These guys loaded two rounds and then eight for the ten round string in sixty seconds. I decided to use my K-31 and brought it to the range the next match day. The range officer informed me that this was a high power match and wimpy cast loads weren't allowed. My cast loads were 175gr at 1700fps. I just turned around and left, you cannot teach the ineducable.I've shot cast in high power, including at camp perry.

I would have argued with the guy. "Show me where, in the NRA or CMP rules, or any of the club on paper, where it says cast loads are not allowed?" Furthermore, consider that a .223 jacketed load is moving around 3000 fps. Maybe a bit faster, maybe a bit slower. A 55 gr bullet moving at that speed has an energy of 1098 foot pounds at the muzzle. Your cast load moving at your stated speed has an energy of 1122 at the muzzle. Ergo your 'wimpy cast loads' are MORE powerful than the 'high power' .223 loads. Perhaps under that logic you should have asked that 'wimpy .223s be disqualified, they aren't high power?'

[Gohon]

The copy of Decembers "Handloaders" has a section on Cast bullet myths. Pretty interesting article.

[Leftoverdj]

It's the self appointed "safety experts" who make me nuts, particularly when they think their ignorance is an argument. I just came off a disagreement on another board with a guy who who was arguing that H 4895 and IMR 4895 were "different" and following Hodgdon's 60% rule with IMR 4895 could "cause a detonation". His fallback position was, as it always is, "Well, it's always better to be safe."

[StarMetal]

It's the self appointed "safety experts" who make me nuts, particularly when they think their ignorance is an argument. I just came off a disagreement on another board with a guy who who was arguing that H 4895 and IMR 4895 were "different" and following Hodgdon's 60% rule with IMR 4895 could "cause a detonation". His fallback position was, as it always is, "Well, it's always better to be safe."

DJ,

Early this past summer I talked to the powder tech at Hodgdon. H4895 is indeed different then any of the other 4895's. Talking current production not the stuff from decades ago. The difference is the coating that Hodgdon puts on theirs. All the other 4895's are heavily graphite coated and they look like pencil lead. Notice H4895 is a much lighter color. Others control their burn rate with this graphite coating, Hodgdon does not. I was told Hodgdon puts a light coating of it on the powder to let it flow better through measures and to ward off static electricity.

I'm not touching on the subject of detonation.

Joe

[mdi]

Common sense seems to be getting rarer and rarer these days. Also I think a bit of "power" (rangemaster or old timer) makes the "expert" a bit more arrogant/forceful (closed minded) about their misinformation (BS).

[jhrosier]

... I don't know if I want to wise up the stupid! [smilie=1:

I already made that mistake and dried up my supply of range scrap.
Usta get 150 lbs a year without hardly trying, now I get 1/10 of that with a lot of digging.

I'm going back to telling folks that lead boolits are inaccurate, dangerous to your gun and deadly poison.:(

Jack

[Leftoverdj]

TY, Joe. I was not aware of a change. I am reasonably sure that such a change did not grossly affect the properties of the powder or Hodgdon would have changed the designation. It would be corporate suicide to market a product as H4895 which could not be safely used with published data.

[peter nap]

I used to argue/educate, then I realized that about 80% of this country's population is too stoopid to talk to.

50 years ago, they would mostly have died at an early age because of stoopidity. Some would have fallen down a well and some eaten night shade berries and others walked in front of a moving horse and buggy....some would just have forgotten to take a breath.
The Government protects them now.

After giving it a lot of thought, I decided to just say, "yep, you must be right" to any and all idiotic statement made.

If someone points to Nightshade and ays "Those look good" I just say "Yep, you must be right, need a bag to put them in?"

[Marlin Hunter]

When I was 18 and bought my first 308 rifle and started reloading, I read a lot of books on bullets, reloading, and casting. It was hard for me to believe a cast boolit would work in a 308, but I never thought it wouldn't work; plus I had a semi-auto and I read that bare cast lead would deform when being fed into the barrel (yea, I know about jacked soft points). I was more under the impression that the whole boolit had to be made of lube grooves. I read that you have to work up to the right boolit and load for the gun, but didn't want to waste my time doing that, and since jacketed bullets were $12 per 1000, it wasn't worth the time to cast. I told my friend that if the jacketed boolits ever became too expensive I would start wasting my time casting. Well jacketed bullets are too expensive and I started casting. I think when you are young you just want things as fast and simple as possible, but as you get older you slow down and enjoy doing more time consuming things.

[StarMetal]

TY, Joe. I was not aware of a change. I am reasonably sure that such a change did not grossly affect the properties of the powder or Hodgdon would have changed the designation. It would be corporate suicide to market a product as H4895 which could not be safely used with published data.

left, you notice how many of the Hodgdon powders look grey/yellow? I know you know when you have a round that didn't fire with stick powder and you pull it down, the primer fired, but the powder didn't light, you discover that the powder kernels are yellow. That they are graphite coated. Well that gives you an idea of how little coating Hodgdon's puts on their powders. I will say this, after I done a thorough shooting test, of all the 4895's...that is Hodgdon, surplus, IMR, and Accurate...that they are indeed very very close.

Joe

[Marlin Hunter]

1) I used to argue/educate, then I realized that about 80% of this country's population is too stoopid to talk to.

2) 50 years ago, they would mostly have died at an early age because of stoopidity. Some would have fallen down a well and some eaten night shade berries and others walked in front of a moving horse and buggy....some would just have forgotten to take a breath.
The Government protects them now.



1) I agree, but it might be more like 98%

2) 100 years ago cocaine and heroin were sold over the counter at drug stores. Society didn't have a drug problem. If a person abused the stuff and died, then it was "good riddance."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cocaine_tooth_drops.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bayer_Heroin_bottle.jpg

[felix]

We're OK if all 4895 brands are single base, with a very similar density log style, and within 5 percent of burning characteristics. There are all kinds of powder formulations made close to the 4895 speed designation that any more than a 5 percent variance from the standard would be way too much. Those powders must be called something else entirely to keep life off the ragged edge. ... felix

[StarMetal]

We're OK if all 4895 brands are single base, with a very similar density log style, and within 5 percent of burning characteristics. There are all kinds of powder formulations made close to the 4895 speed designation that any more than a 5 percent variance from the standard would be way too much. Those powders must be called something else entirely to keep life off the ragged edge. ... felix

I can tell you in the testing I done for myself Felix that they are frightening close.

Joe

[Lunk]

I used to argue/educate, then I realized that about 80% of this country's population is too stoopid to talk to.

50 years ago, they would mostly have died at an early age because of stoopidity. Some would have fallen down a well and some eaten night shade berries and others walked in front of a moving horse and buggy....some would just have forgotten to take a breath.
The Government protects them now.

After giving it a lot of thought, I decided to just say, "yep, you must be right" to any and all idiotic statement made.

If someone points to Nightshade and ays "Those look good" I just say "Yep, you must be right, need a bag to put them in?"

Mmmmm eggplant......

But seriously, I totally agree.
I hate to say it but Ron White said it best when he stated "You can't fix stupid."

[johnho]

A saying I heard once:

Never argue with an idiot. all they do is bring you down to their level and then beat you with experience.

[geargnasher]

Mmmmm eggplant......

But seriously, I totally agree.
I hate to say it but Ron White said it best when he stated "You can't fix stupid."

Read my last signature quote. Steve is one of my old college RA buddies.

Gear