cure my ignorance

[ss40_70]

i have been stuck at home for more then a few weeks now with a broken leg and the boredom is realy starting to get to me. ( also my wife and kids )
i also have developed an urge to try patching . i'm not sure why exactly but part of the draw is the work needed to get things right . another part is just wanting to try something differant .
i have decided to use my trusty 45-70 sharps for this . and that leads me to a few questions .

1 molds .. i need to try this with a bit of attention to cost , as it is christmas time and i am not working till the cast comes off .. are there any production molds being made suitable for patching to bore dia ?

2 alloy .. with costs being a factor i am thinking of trying wheel weights mixed with pure .. is this possible if so what should i aim for as far as hardness .. if not feel free to educate me i am ignorant about this

3 self education materials ... what would you recomend as far as what to read to educate myself so i dont have to ask a bunch of fool questions , this is realy the question i most need answered

thanks

[Don McDowell]

Might get ahold of Bernie at Old West for a mould, but it'll be 125$ or so. Other than that the BACO moulds are the same price range, unless you can find a mould on Ebay or gunbroker etc.

Straight wheelweights work alright with patched bullets. Mixing pure lead may or may not help.

Read about anything you can find on the net, by Powderburner, Leadpot (kurt), and Kenny Wasserburger.

[Don McDowell]

There may also be an article or two on paper patching on the articles page at bpcr.net.

[Baron von Trollwhack]

Slug your bore first. Check the wrap and shrink on your paper by actually patching. Measuring will tell you what diameter slug is needed. Things never line up alphabetically without help. To get the bullet seating snugness you desire you may have to diddle paper thickness, or bullet hardness, or case neck dimensions. Just to start learning, you can use a well shaped GG mould to patch that will shoot nicely or you can go directly to the smooth sided at some point.

READ, READ, read. There are very knowledgeable people here and elsewhere.

BvT

[Don McDowell]

If you decide to go with one of Bernie's , I'ld recommend the .441 creedmoor. I'm shooting the .444 but wishing I had of gone with the 441.

[ss40_70]

i have been doing a bit of reading threw old posts and what not , i hafta say it all seems a bit intimidating ,..
hearing that wheel weights will work is encouraging , i hate to sound cheap but buying alloy or tin to make it gets expensive i went that route when i started with grease groove boolits but have switched to ww as i am not a good enough shot to see any measurable loss of acuracy

there is one concept i keep reading and bvt also mentioned above ( if i'm understanding correctly ) is choose a paper first then a bullet dia .. ok now this confuses me just a tiny bit .. .. ok now i do understand how the paper will stretch as you wrap the patch and then shrink as it dries that is the easy part to get ,... what throws me off is ( maybe i am overthinking a bit ) how am i to know what the finished product is going to be without using the bullet i plan on shooting ... if i try wrapping one of my gg bullets that are not only a larger dia but will have less surface area for that patch will i get the same results as on a smooth smaller dia bullet ,. as in the same stretch and shrinkage
or will they be close enough to not matter .
or would i be better served as a rookie to just decide on a bullet dia then find a paper that gets me where i want to be .
if it helps my bore dia is .450 and thinking i should have a patched dia of .449

[Don McDowell]

IMHO this stuff that has cropped up on the internet as of late about finding the paper and then get the bullet to match is, mostly just something to sound cool while rolling up a higher post count.
If you go with a 9# onionskin or any other paper that is about .002 thick and a .441 bullet you won't be to far wrong.
Sometimes depending on the rifle and the bullet rolling dry can shoot better than rolling wet. But that's just something that needs to be decided between you and your rifle.
Rolling greasegroove bullets in paper is a perfectly good waste of time and patching paper. The only reason to do that would be on account of having absolutely no other way to load a round for that particular cartridge.
The biggest mistake folks make is trying to lob a bullet to long for the twist. Remember when you're shooting bore diameter patched bullets in a 45-xx the bullet itself is actually 44 caliber and not 45. That's the nicest part about the nosepour adjustable nose moulds, you can make adjustments to bullet length to suit your rifle , and there's alot to be said for the original Sharps 45-75 load and it's 1.1 inch, 420 gr bullet.

[Lead pot]

40-70.
Patching is straight forward. You dont need to pound lead slugs down the bore o get a exact diameter if you use black powder. Like Don said a .441 diameter unpatched bullet will work and work very good even in some of the Import rifles that have slightly different bore/groove diameters. With a .441 to .444 diameter bullets you can just about regulate how tight you want the bullet to fit your bore with the paper you can get.
The mould would be a little more difficult to get with the over the counter moulds from Lyman, RCBS, Lee, or Saeco, I have no idea if they even offer a proper one.
Buffalo arms http://www.buffaloarms.com/Buffalo_a...s_pr-3853.aspx make excellent moulds that dont take the back seat to any of the high priced moulds. I have no idea what the mould Don mentioned is like I never had one. NEI http://www.neihandtools.com/catalog.html have a big selection of different types of mould blocks, but I have not dealt with them since Walt died.
Keep it simple and you will get along just fine.

Forgot, WW straight or mixed 50/50 will cast and shoot just fine. I use a lot of WW.
Go to the scrap yard and get lead, it runs about .50 cents/lb to .80 cents for clean sheet lead or pure lead ingots some times.

[BrentD]

SS40, it is sounds like you are looking for a target bullet for the most part, so shoot for a .450 bullet when it is wrapped.

As for the paper first, then bullet, routine, what you are trying to find out is how much additional diameter will be added to the bullet when you wrap it twice with your chosen paper. Most of the papers we use add between 0.006 and 0.010" to the diameter of the bullet.

For measuring this before you have your bullet mould, it doesn't matter if you use a bigger bullet, or a drill bit shank of any diameter. The point is only how much bigger is the diameter with the paper? So measure before you wrap, then measure after you wrap (and dry if you wet wrap) and the difference between those two is the magic number you want.

BTW, you can get a cheap and very effective push-through sizing die for $30 from Lee Precision. It can size a paper patched bullet a bit smaller, but it can't bump it up. So, if you err, err on the high side.

[Lead pot]

Brent to add $30. for a sizing die to the price over a over the counter mould wouldn't it be better to just order a BACO mould??

[BrentD]

Brent to add $30. for a sizing die to the price over a over the counter mould wouldn't it be better to just order a BACO mould??

If it is the right size, sure, but now we aren't supposed to the paper first thing according to the resident expert, so sizing might be the only post-purchase option to get a correct fit. In my book the fit is critical.

Also, I believe that the shapes of the .441 and .446 Money bullets are considerably different from each other, with the latter being a good bit pointier.

A local shooter has done both of the BA money bullets for his .45 and one was very blunt. The pointier of the two (closer to a true prolate shape) gave better results.

[montana_charlie]

IMHO this stuff that has cropped up on the internet as of late about finding the paper and then get the bullet to match is, mostly just something to sound cool while rolling up a higher post count.

would i be better served as a rookie to just decide on a bullet dia then find a paper that gets me where i want to be .

When I got equipped for paper patching, the first thing I found was a great price on two reams of discontinued ononskin on Ebay.

My most careful measuring said the paper was .0019" thick.
I then ordered a bullet mould which would throw the diameter I wanted, believing that when patched it would be a particular size.

I was wrong.
The paper yielded considerably less increase in diameter than I thought is would.

My bullet mould arrived two thousandths larger than I had ordered ... and it was still too small for the paper I had.
That left me in the position of buying different papers until I found one the right thickness ... or buying a larger mould.
I chose to have a new mould made, and got the fit that I originally wanted.

BUT IF I HAD ACTUALLY TEST WRAPPED with my paper to begin with ... I would have known from the start what bullet diameter I really needed.

I had a thread going at the time, and I think it was in there that I said something like ... I have gone about this the way others do, but I think it makes more sense to buy the paper first ... then get a bullet to match it ... rather than the other way around.

It was just a random thought at the time, but since then BrentD and Leadpot have both recommended the same sequence in other threads they have replied to.
Those guys understand the significance of the idea, while some others don't.


Having said all of that, I see that my post count just went up ...

CM

[BrentD]

My post count is too pitifull to worry about, but what a great opportunity to bag #101 anyway...

[Lead pot]

I have several boxes of paper that range from .0016 to .0021.
I like my patched paper thickness that is right at groove depth to two thousands over and I personally like to patch .003 over bore for the target range one of my rifles I load .004 over bore diameter but it has a throat that will use a .446" unpatched bullet and it shoots it better then one patched just under bore diameter.
Three of my rifles I patch .002 over bore diameter but all of these rifles have a throat that will allow a bullet seated in the case .200 and chamber with out a problem and accuracy is good.
All this patching depends what works in a particular rifle chamber.
The reason I said the .441 diameter is the paper that is the easiest to get is .002 to .0022 and that makes the .441 good to fit the bore.
I have the BA .441 and it shoots very good using the paper mill .0021 paper and it also will drop right in the chamber if it gets patched using a thinner paper if one wants to shoot with out fouling control.
It all depends on how you want to use the rifle on how you patch your bullet.

[Lead pot]

I might add.

I also use unpatched bullets that are naked right at bore diameter and use .002 paper and patch it to .001 over groove diameter, but for those I use a bullet breach seating tool and load a full case of powder with a flush wad at the case mouth and those shoot very good, but It is not the way to go at the gong shoots because time does not allow to load this way.

[Don McDowell]

Keep in mind 40-70 wanted to know about shooting bore diameter bullets. So this hubbub about paper thickness does not play the part it does when your trying to shoot groove diameter bullets.
The paper texture is more important than the thickness, a slick paper won't shoot as well as a courser textured paper. As one well known shooter puts it, sort of like wipin your butt with the slick paper from the Wards catalog compared against a softer textured paper..

[BrentD]

Keep in mind 40-70 wanted to know about shooting bore diameter bullets. So this hubbub about paper thickness does not play the part it does when your trying to shoot groove diameter bullets.

Of course it does.

The paper texture is more important than the thickness, a slick paper won't shoot as well as a courser textured paper. As one well known shooter puts it, sort of like wipin your butt with the slick paper from the Wards catalog compared against a softer textured paper..

Hell, I shoot cooking parchment paper at times - and with excellent results. Texture-smexture, it ain't important to me, and I'll put my system's accuracy against anyone's.

[Don McDowell]

Well whoopytytedooo. I shot some coffee filters,,, didn't work worth a hoot.....Thickness was right tho.....

[BrentD]

Great. I don't shoot coffee filters myself. I shoot targets and animals. But whatever.

You are about the only person I know that thinks paper thickness is so unimportant. Everyone that shoots paper patches competitively thinks bullet fit is everything and that starts with paper. MOst of us have been working at this a long long time to figure out these little details. I don't think they are trivial unless one is happy with minute of boulder or minute of pie plate accuracy.

FWIW, parchment is prelubed with something like silicone I suppose. It is slick as hell. Shoots well too. Rolls like ****, but if you get it on there right, it shoots well. Very well.

Another somewhat slick paper that is thin and tough is some of the heavier weights of tracing paper sold in art stores. It is not cheap stuff, but rather pretty pricey, finely made paper that will add about 0.007" to a bullet's diameter even though it is listed as 20 or 25# bond. That stuff must be compressed somehow. Anyway, slicker than most papers, thin and a good shooter. But pricey.

Ha, I"m up to #104. Climbing up there!

[Don McDowell]

OOOOOO one of them hairy chested bowlegged competition shooters....
Never said paper thickness wasn't important, said it didn't make as much difference as some try to portray it.
If 40-70 were to start with a .441 bullet in the original Sharps/remington style not over 1.3 inches long rolled in 9lb onion skin, or some of the midweight tracing paper from the office supply, chances are once he got his wad stack down and his fouling control figured out he could go compete with the best of em.