Cast HP expansion?

[Glen]

Has anybody here systematically studied cast HP expansion as a function HP cavity diameter? I am currently working with a Lyman 358315 that I converted to drop HP bullets for use in a .35 Remington levergun. A lot of cast HPs have cavities of .150" or greater, and these bullets can fragment at typical rifle velocities, and generally need to be throttled back in order to hold together (not really a problem as these are still good lethal loads that don't make a whole lot of bloodshot goo when you shoot a critter). I wanted to see what I could get out of the .35 Remington, so I made the first version of the 358315 HP with a .110" cavity. It expanded nicely at 1500 fps all the way up to about 2000 fps, and fragmented wildly at 2100 fps (pretty much full throttle for a 200 grain bullet in the .35 Remington). At 2000 fps, I'm pretty sure that this bullet is pretty much on the ragged edge of coming unglued, so I made another version of this bullet with a .085" HP cavity, and have cast a bunch of bullets up and hope to shoot a few this weekend. Has anybody here done anything like this? If so, how do these results compare with your experiences?

[45 2.1]

Expansion is a function of alloy, cavity diameter and depth. At the velocity and mass your trying, another solution might work out better for you. Try a different alloy! 1/2 wheelweights and 1/2 pure lead or range recovery. Cast them and water drop them out of the mold. Size, gas check and load. The boolits will be hard, but will expand well also.

[jhalcott]

hey glen, some years ago I tried the hollow point theme. Various calibers and weights were used. Also the size of hollow points varied. harder alloys didn't expand as reliably as softer ones. The same bulley with a bigger hole did not expand more unless the alloy was softer. The expansion medium was wet newsprint,soaked overnight,then set in wood racks to hold it in a line. Distance to target was 25 yards. A HARD bullet ,oven heat treated to above 25 bhn could be expected to penetrate 30 inches of medium when shot above 2500 fps. A pure lead bullet, paper patched and shot at 2000 fps would leave a better wound channel. many of the recovered bullets had the hollows filled with medium.
there was little or no expansion. There were many instances of bullets fracturing when heavy beef bones embedded in the medium were hit. Often leaving two ,or more,short wound channels from the fracture point. Some jacketed HP's were shot for comparison and did not always exhibit the classic mushrooming effect.Handguns didn't always give the expected results. BUT it was fun trying. I cast the bullets while working the night shift!

[Larry Gibson]

Glen

45.2.1 is correct.


Expansion is a function of alloy, cavity diameter and depth. At the velocity and mass your trying, another solution might work out better for you. Try a different alloy! 1/2 wheelweights and 1/2 pure lead or range recovery. Cast them and water drop them out of the mold. Size, gas check and load. The boolits will be hard, but will expand well also.

I have been shooting cast bullets that were cast that way in .30 (31141HP) and 8mm (323471HP) for years. I also have been HP'ing .38/357s, .41s, .44s, and .45s with the HP tool for the Forster trimmer. I have changed the depth, width and alloys along with varying the FPS from 800 to 2200 fps.

With rifle loads I cast the bullets of 3%+ antimony chilled shot (magnum type) and water quench out of the mould. At 1800 to 2200 fps (depending on cartridge and bore condition) these will hold excellent hunting accuracy for 5 shots from a cold clean barrel and good accuracy for another 5. After that there is some leading but I figure if I haven't killed the critter in 5 shots I'm going home anyways. With the regular HP stem that comes with the mould I find good expansion but the bullet will fragment depending on what is hit. By shortening the HP stem to .025 to .030" I've found I get very good expansion with minimal loss of bullet weight.

I have been going to experiment with 358315 in my Argie M91 .35 Rem but it will only cast to .356" in the softer alloys and does not shoot that well. I'm looking for the RCBS 200 gr FP if anyone has one. I've taper ground a couple drill bits to enlarge the width of the cavity made by the Forster tool. I'm expecting the .35 Rem to become a favorite cast bullet hunting rifle for deer. However, the 3141HP and the 323741HP are going to be pretty tough to improve upon for killing deer.

Larry Gibson

[Glen]

jhalcott -- I've shot a half dozen mule deer, a couple of feral hogs, several dozen jack rabbits and many hundreds of ground squirrels and prairie dogs with cast HPs, and have been consistantly pleased with the expansion I have gotten from virtually all of them (OK, the .32 S&W Long didn't generate much expansion, but everything else did). For expansion testing, I shoot through water, and then trap the expanded bullet in newspaper. This seems to more closely match the results obtained in the field when shooting critters than does wet newsprint. Wet newsprint is fine with soft point and solid cast bullets, but does not give reliable results with HP bullets (for exactly the reasons you outlined).

45 2.1 -- I recognize that expansion behavior is a function of alloy, I glossed over that in the belief that with this audience I didn't need to re-state the obvious (sorry for that omission). Just for the record, the alloy I'm using is 2 parts range scrap (in this case, a BHN of about 7.5, more or less .22 lead) mixed with 1 part linotype. This consistanly comes out at a BHN of 13, casts beautifully, and makes excellent cast HPs. Earlier this spring, I shot a 250-lb hog with a cast HP made from this alloy, and it ripped a big hole all the way through him, and he was down in less than 15 feet. There was a hole the size of a 50-cent piece through both lungs, surrounded by 6" of bloodshot tissue (but very little bloodshot meat). That's why I like cast HPs.

These experiments are aimed at getting similar performance out of the .35 Remington (a personal favorite). Thanks for the feedback, I'll let you know what I learn.

[Bass Ackward]

Expansion from a hollowpoint comes from two forms. Crushing of the nose upon impact. Or from hydrolic means when the cavity fills with animal material. The effect is so much more dramatic when the expansion comes from hydrolic means.

So I cheat. I melt candle wax in the cavity and keep melting it until I can scrape the nose level with the meplat or nose. Then expansion starts upon impact without any delay.

Just like when you were a kid with a 22LR. You could shoot a bird with a hollow point and the bird came down. If you shot with a hollow point filled with wax, all that came down was feathers.

Small holes, filled with wax, using ductile mixes, is the way to go. All it takes is a dimple filled with wax.

[buck1]

Expansion from a hollowpoint comes from two forms. Crushing of the nose upon impact. Or from hydrolic means when the cavity fills with animal material. The effect is so much more dramatic when the expansion comes from hydrolic means.

So I cheat. I melt candle wax in the cavity and keep melting it until I can scrape the nose level with the meplat or nose. Then expansion starts upon impact without any delay.

Just like when you were a kid with a 22LR. You could shoot a bird with a hollow point and the bird came down. If you shot with a hollow point filled with wax, all that came down was feathers.

Small holes, filled with wax, using ductile mixes, is the way to go. All it takes is a dimple filled with wax.


No kidding!! I thought that would have been one of those myths.
I learn something new every day! .....Buck

[cbrick]

Has anybody here systematically studied cast HP expansion as a function HP cavity diameter? I am currently working with a Lyman 358315 that I converted to drop HP bullets for use in a .35 Remington levergun. A lot of cast HPs have cavities of .150" or greater, and these bullets can fragment at typical rifle velocities, and generally need to be throttled back in order to hold together (not really a problem as these are still good lethal loads that don't make a whole lot of bloodshot goo when you shoot a critter). I wanted to see what I could get out of the .35 Remington, so I made the first version of the 358315 HP with a .110" cavity. It expanded nicely at 1500 fps all the way up to about 2000 fps, and fragmented wildly at 2100 fps (pretty much full throttle for a 200 grain bullet in the .35 Remington). At 2000 fps, I'm pretty sure that this bullet is pretty much on the ragged edge of coming unglued, so I made another version of this bullet with a .085" HP cavity, and have cast a bunch of bullets up and hope to shoot a few this weekend. Has anybody here done anything like this? If so, how do these results compare with your experiences?


These experiments are aimed at getting similar performance out of the .35 Remington (a personal favorite). Thanks for the feedback, I'll let you know what I learn.

Glen, did you ever come to a conclusion on the cavity diameter for the 35 Remington and/or did you change alloy's?

Rick

[beagle]

Glen..I think you're on the right track there.

Here are some results from my .30 carbine tests.

I had a #254 and a #302 Saeco hollowpointed with a .090" cavity.

In the Ruger BH, this appears to be too small for the velocities I'm driving them to...about 1400 FPS. They appear to open pretty well in the M1 Carbine at 17-1800 FPS.

I have a 3118HP with a .100" cavity and a 311359HP with a .125" cavity. Both of these do well in the Blackhawk but in the M1 carbine, they tend to come apart due to the velocity and leave small .30 "buttons". Too much of a good thing I think.

I have two 31133s. One has a .125" HP amd one has a .100" hollow point. Normally, these are used in the .32-20 and .30 Carbine Rugers and both expand well.

I've always thought that Elmers' thoughts on HP cavity size were a little on the liberal size with the 358439 and 429421HPs running .156". But, he and many other folks used them in .38 Specials and .44 Specials so they worked out all right. I have gotten some huge expansions on both bullets in both the .357 Mag and .44 Mag and I don't drive them to the wall. Even Elmer and Phil Sharpe has a dissagreement on cavity size in the .357 Mag when they were developing bullets for Remington and Sharpe won over Elmer. BUt, consider that Elmer was shooting a hell of a lot of jack rabbits in those days and needed the expansion that the larger cavities afforded.

For rifles, I've settled on .070" for .22s, .090" for .25s, .100" for 30s and .32s, .125" on .35s and .375s and .140s on .458 rifles. The .45 pistol moulds get .156" HP pins as the velocity is lower.

For the .35 Rem use exclusively, I'd drop to .100" and even your .085" may be just fine depending on what velocities you're running then. I'm only shooting mine to about 1700 FPS.

Still looking for a suitable testing medium and will be looking forward to your test results./beagle

[Glen]

I had forgotten that I started a thread on this topic! Yes, I made the 0.085" HP pin and it behaved a little bit better than the .110" bullet when fired at 2000 fps, but not a huge difference. So I shortened the 0.085" pin from .450" deep to .375", and it was still pretty similar (again, at 2000 fps). So I decided to limit this bullet to about 1800 fps.

The test I use is a 2L pop bottle filled with water, laid on its side and back with a tighly packed bale of newspapers, all bound up with duct tape. I shoot throught the bottle lengthwise so that the expanded bullet passes through the duct tape (so I get a record of how big it is after the water expansion), and then the dry newspring stops the bullet for recovery. It also usually breaks it up (dry newsprint is pretty hard on a bullet, but that's OK since I know how big it was coming out of the water, and I can weigh all of the pieces).

Some people say that using water is a bad way to test bullet expansion because it's an incompressible fluid and as a result is too hard on a bullet. That's true if you're shooting into a large body of water like a swimming pool and the water was nowhere to go. But with a 6" tube of water inside a stretchy polyethylene bottle the water gets pushed out of the way in a hurry. It's still an incompressible fluid, but it puts up much less resistance this way, and it makes a good, reproducible test. It correlates pretty well with my experiences with game animals.

PS -- Beagle, I am intrigued by your experience with the .30 Carbine Blackhwak. I also have one and I have also shot the 31133 and 311008 HP out of at about those same speeds. I will have to go out and measure the HP pins on my moulds and see how they compare to yours (the 311008 was one that I had a machinist friend convert for me). Mostly anymore I just shoot the 311316 GC-HP out of it at about 1550 fps. It is explosive to say the least -- an excellent varmint bullet! I like your ideas on HP cavities for rifles....

[GLynn41]

this is and is not what you are talking about-- several years ago -- I started casting dabs -dual alloy bullets -- sounded cool--- and also not what you are talking about -- anyway using my Foster case trimmer I played with with hps-- I used a Philips head screw driver of various sizes to change the the hp opening---and a three cornered file on them also never used it on any thing but ground hogs -- but the large philips head dabs (lphdabs) bullets were awful on ghs -- the bullet was a 410459 -- seating was a problem as they were easily deformed-- but it was fun-- I have been thinking about getting my nib single cavity mold hp'd it is a 410459-- I have no handguns but .41s-- have also considered some work with one of the 2 .358 I have also-- so this thread is interesting to me-- btw Veral Smith says no single alloy will expand at handgun velocity

[cbrick]

btw Veral Smith says no single alloy will expand at handgun velocity

While I have a good bit of respect for Veral that just t'aint so.

Here are some examples of a single alloy fired at 800 fps.

http://www.lasc.us/DSCN1661-9.jpg

Rick

[GLynn41]

cbrick what did you shoot them into--I use --sorry glen-- about 6" of wet newsprintand then something catch the bullet or not the paper tells a good story -- so as long as I can remelt the boolit its ok--I settled on 6" because of arrow tests -- 6" would catch my sons arrows from a 50# bow - heavier than that will shoot through --so it is kinda my simple standard- if it looks good in 6" it does well on deer it seems--at what ever range I think I will shoot---as for veral -- that is a statement He made in his first cast bullet handbook back-- way back--do not know if he has changed or not

[GLL]

Rick:

The expansion on those bullets is beautiful !

The alloy has a most interesting "look" !

Would you be willing to provide details? :)

Jerry

[cbrick]

I tested these looking for a lack of penetration to use as home defense rounds, thus the 800 fps. I live in CA and if a round went through an evil doer or a wall and killed (Or even injured) somebody else my efforts at saving my own hieny would get me life in the gas chamber.

The above boolits were fired straight down into 3 feet of water. I am well aware that water is a much harder medium than say a home burglars belly but these tests in water told me exactly what I wanted to know . . . even hitting something as hard as water they stayed together and did not fragment. I have no illusions that these bullets penetrated no more than a couple of inches and then simply sank to the bottom of the tank. In water all of the expansion had to have been at the surface.

The bullet is the Lyman 45 cal 200 gr Devastator. The alloy is stick-on WW+ a couple percent tin @ 6 BHN. At the moment I don't remember the charge but its a Unique load that got me to 800fps.

So much for a lack of penetration, how about a load that does penetrate? Below is an 800 fps SWC cast of clip-on WW fired straight down into 3 feet of water. The plastic tank had steel sheets on the bottom to prevent holes. A lot of people have seen the TV show Myth Busters where they attempted bullet penetration in water and couldn't even get the 50 BMG past a couple of feet. The key is velocity or more accurately, a lack of velocity.

These bullets hit the steel at the bottom after penetrating 3 feet of water hard enough to do this. The bullet is SAECO # 068, 45 cal 200 gr SWCBB.

http://www.lasc.us/Selection-9.jpg http://www.lasc.us/DSCN1500-3.jpg

Rick

[Lloyd Smale]

I guess i dont understand what all the worrying about nose fractures is worth. I shot a 800 lb cow buffalo with a 250 grain devestator out of a 4 5/8s super blackhawk. Bullet was cast out of 5050 ww/pure. It basicaly lost its nose and the remainder of the bullet gave complete penetration. (2 shots both acted the same) The buffalo staggered at the first shot and was dead on his feet. the second shot wasnt a vital shot and did very little to change the outcome. (I hit it in the hump ;) on the run) It ran maybe 30 yards at most and was one of the quickest kills ive seen on a buffalo with any gun and my buddy who owns the place said the same. I never saw the recovered bullet but we did find some small lead fragments in both wounds. It didnt do any more meat damage then any jacketed big bore rifle bullet would have. I guess like i said a little fragmenting didnt hurt and if you think about it thats the way nosler partitiions are designed to work and people have been swearing by them for years. Personaly i wouldnt have considered using this gun and load on something as big as a buffalo but the opertunity presented itself and its the gun i had on me. We set out that day to shoot a hog with that bullet to see how it would do and no hogs presented themselves for a shot and i just wanted to kill something with that bullet. It worked out well though as ive allways been a firm beliver in hardcast non expanding bullets on game and was skeptical about using hps even on deer and this sure gave me the confindence that they are more then capable of kill deer and bear sized game. I thought they performed very well at 1200 fps. THe only other kill with them for me was a doe about 100 lbs with a 44 devestator out of an inline muzzle loader cast out of pure at about 1700 fps and that load caused some serious meat damage. But then a lfn or swc cast pure probably would have done the same. Ive seen just round balls cast pure put a hell of a hole in a deer. I think if i was going to do that again id cast them out of #2 and hope that they blew the nose off just like the handgun bullet did. I thought that gave me the best of both worlds. I got good tissure damage a quick kill and still had an exit wound to leave a blood trail. If i would have or could have casted that bullet to give a classic mushroom im sure it wouldnt have given me an exit wound on something as big as a buffalo

[GLL]

Rick:

Thank you very much for the details ! :)

Jerry

[cbrick]

Lloyd,

Interesting hunting report but if you'll re-read the first two sentences in my last post (#15) you will see that penetration is what I was trying to avoid.

Where I live 800 pound cow buffalo breaking into homes is not really much of a problem. I suppose if that were a problem around here penetration would be a good thing but then . . . I don't think I'd grab a 1911 45 ACP at 800 fps as a defense choice.

I did that testing to find a home and own hieny defense round that would NOT penetrate or break apart. First as defense against an idiot breaking into my home. Second as defense against a liberal district attorney that would have me standing in front of a judge for violating the rights of the moron that died breaking into my home or even worse, penetrating a wall and injuring an innocent.

Rick

[crabo]

Glen, in your article about the Lyman Devastors, you said the 9mm was a rather fragile bullet. Do you think if you were to reduce the size of the hollowpoint pin, it would make a better bullet for shooting small game? Maybe yote size animals?

Also, do you think removing the bevel base would make it more accurate?

Thanks,

Crabo

[Glen]

crabo -- I think it would do OK on coyote-sized game as it is, but I wouldn't want to use it on stuff much bigger than a coyote in its current configuration. Yes, I think if the cavity size were reduced somewhat it would be less destrcutive to edible small game, and might penetrate better on coyotes, badgers, etc.

I don't know that removing the bevel base would have any significant impact on accuracy, but it would add some bullet weight, which in turn should slow it dow a little bit, thereby slowing down expansion (of course one could do the same thing with a little less powder...).

[beagle]

I reduced one of the 9mm Devestators to .125". It shoots all right but so far, I've only recovered some from the 100 yards berm. They didn't open at all at that distance.

Guess I have to get closer./beagle

[twotrees]

Was water dropped 357156 HP out of a 6 barreled Ruger Blackhawk. The alloy was Battery lead (NOTE: NEW, NEVER IN A BATTERY !!) I had cast some up and tried to get these to break apart but couldn't. Even shot a 50 LB block of ice and it oppened up to 60 cal and stayed togeather.

The guy that got me the ally said it had 3 X the ammount of arsnic in it than normal. I gave him some that he loaded for his son to hunt deer with. Son shot a 150 LB doe at 30 yards . The bullet came apart and all 3 pieces of it came out the far side.

Thats was the only one that I knew of that came apart.

I sectioned one and the outside was almost lino hard but the inside was like dead soft lead.

They closed the battery group not long after that so no more "super alloy"

It was fun while it lasted.

TwoTrees