Paper Patching of raw 311291's & how to do properly.

[OverMax]

I've been giving some thought to casting 311291s in the Spring for my 94 30-30. I have been in the past g/c-ing and resizing to .311. But now considering to paper patch instead since I've read many others commenting on their good results in their applications in doing so. I'm actually hoping to eliminate the need of g/c 'ing & resizing altogether. Questions I have:

Is it possible to paper patch a raw 311291 cooled & or right out of its mold?

What thickness of paper material would be appropriate and perhaps found in one's home?

Are there certain Tips Hints or guidelines I need to be made aware of other than the (above) Sticky's?

Appreciate all comments.

[pdawg_shooter]

First answer is no. You will need to size the bullet down to bore size +.001/.0015 and then patch it back to groove size +.001/.003. After the patch dries, you will need to clip the tail, smear a little lube on it, and run it through a final size die. In my Marlin micro groove 30-30 I size the bullet down to .302. Make sure the nose section is at least that large. If not you will want to lap the mold. I patch back up with 16# green bar printer paper. After clipping the tail and lubing I run it through a .310 die to "iron on" the patch and remove excess lube. After spring back the bullet with patch mikes out at .311. I use push through dies for every step. If I am working up a load I do not size, just re-prime and load. Seat the bullet long and let the rifling finish the job. Choose a powder that will give 100%+ load density, I get my best accuracy that way.

If you are looking for a way to save time prepping your bullets, keep looking. PPing is labor intensive, but gives you the advantage of jacketed velocity and accuracy with no chance of fouling the bore, as the only thing left in the barrel is the powder fouling from the last shot. I will also turn a rough factory into a barrel the rivals the best custom hand barrel you can buy.

[OverMax]

I just read all of the sticky's top to bottom. And you are spot on Sir. As lots of work >and lots of details needing to pay attention too. Having a RCBS Lubesizer bolted down here and not having Lee push thru resizing dies surely may turn out to be a problem then again maybe not if I don't apply any lube pressure during my boolits papered resizing.
I really wanted to give this PP deal a try. Since I cast my 30-30 boolits. But I don't know which of// or whether Lyman's 291 or 041 would be good choices for the project.
Apologies. As now I may have to give my plans some second thought.

[CJR]

Ditto on what Pdawg said. I started PP with a 311291 where I had lapped my mould to give a forebody diameter of about 0.302"D. The CB were then sized down in steps to get about 0.301"D. When PPed this CB has been very accurate at hivel. The powders I've been using in my 308Win are the Winchester W748 & W760 ball powders. W748 would be ideal in the 30/30 as it would be a compressed charge, i.e. no air space. The round nose of the 311291 may not be a problem in the Win 94 tubular magazine, i.e. nose indenting the primer of the round in front. If it is, you can always simply flatten the nose slightly in a die. I used to do that with a die that would also swage the forebody diameter larger before I decided to lap my mould larger. Now I'm slowly changing over to all custom designed PPCB for all my rifles.

Best regards,

CJR

[mikeym1a]

According to what I have read, if you paper patch, you need to size the slug to + .001-.0015 of the bore diameter. After patching, you need to size the projectile to +.001-.0015 of the groove diameter. I believe the bore diameter of the .30-30 is .30, so, the slug would need to be sized to .301-.3015 before patching. You might try 9lb paper for this, or maybe 12lb. Only experimenting will tell. So, the answer to your question is NO. If you look at the Lyman boolit mold charts, they at one time made a mold for paper patching .30 cal, and IIRC, it was supposed to produce a .303 boolit. Hope this helps. mikey ps. I forgot to add, if you want, you can get 'Shotgun' to make you a sizer of the correct size. You would need to slug your bore, and get the bore and groove sizes, and do the math. I had him make one for my argentine mauser in .303. Works great. Since I don't have a PP mold, I use one of my other boolits, and size it in steps. If the boolit is .316, I'll start with a .311, go to .308, and then the .303. When it's done, it's almost completely slick, with just vestiges of grease grooves. But they wrap really well. mikey

[OverMax]

I believe 30 cal is .308 dia. And yes 311291s work well in a tube magazine. Well at least they did in my tube magazine's as I don't use overly hardened BHN casting material. Only CO/WW.

I'm pretty sure my 311291 mold casts a raw .3115 or so. Not much lead gets moved around when its resized to .311 that I took notice of. If I have to resize down to .302 as suggested. Curious now. When resizing down I know that boolit is displacing its lead and filling in its groves. Wouldn't you think a boolit would grow some in length? .302 dia. is no doubt a big step in downsizing. Just how many resizing dies would it take to go from .311 to .302 anyway?

[pdawg_shooter]

I size 311 down to .302 in one pass through a push through die.

[Nobade]

Ditto. They do get a bit longer but it isn't very much. Use some sort of lube to size them with. I like a RCBS case lube pad and the RCBS lube. It is water soluble so after sizing I wash the boolits in warm water and they clean up easily. You will need a custom sizing die, but after you have that you don't need much else.

-Nobade

[bigted]

NAAA ... don't give up the patching idea. nuttin worth a hoot is ever had the easy way. patching gives immense satisfaction as well as the accuracy and speed that rivals or exceeds jacketed bullets.

you can get going on the cheep with Lee push thru dies that mount up in your loading press. there is a feller here named "Buckshot" that will build the sizes that Lee does not offer.

paper wise you can begin with copy paper from a copy machine or regular yellow lined tablet paper. all that is needed is to get a good wax/lube for your final product and just leap in with a start with anything you have around mold wise that is near the size you want to begin with.

I have used regular grease groove boolits to good effect for instance. sized down ... the greasers give a great place for the paper to shrink into for a great grip on the boolit as well as having the advantage of already being there.

this endeavor can be the most satisfying venture of your life. the puff of paper at the muzzle will most def. attract attention at the range and give a great excuse to "explain" your procedure to others ...[BRAG]... also the knowledge that with a little effort you have an accurate boolit that will shoot along side the jacketed crowd as well as knowing that for the same price you cast for ... you now have a superior projectile that will be just as comfy on the range as in the hunting fields. these soft lead boolits really hammer the game animules as well.

don't throw in the towel just yet. you are venturing down a well traveled road and it is well traveled because of the end results we get with it. venture forwards and join our addiction my friend.

[CJR]

Sizing down in one step? When I first did that my CB came out well. Then every now and then I'd notice the grease grooves were more deformed on one side then the other. That is not good, as it unbalances the CB. Deformed grease grooves laterally shift the CG and that affects accuracy, but that may be fine if you only want hunting accuracy. In my case, I'm looking for the best PPCB accuracy at the highest velocity that equals or betters match jacketed bullet accuracy. In my view, to do that requires the best quality CB I can produce.


Best regards,

CJR

[OverMax]

That's was another issue that kept me up last night late. (where in the h--- did they get their .302 dies at.) Looking at catalogs till my eyes blurred late last night then finally one last try of the Web for the last 1/2 hour of hard pressed deliberate consciousness before finding myself near asleep at the keyboard. Yup! Now this morning I'm embarrassed bigted. Shame on me. Here I forgot all about Buckshot's machinists talents. Well now. That last part of the puzzle in PP 'ing now comes to light. Thank Goodness (we) have Buckshot to turn too for the tooling.
Time to get moving A Honey-do is now being asked of me. Then its time to slug the old barrel. Thanks fellows for your comments. (They sure have helped. well~~ for the time being anyway. No doubt I'll have a question or two yet to ask.)

[pdawg_shooter]

You can lap out a Lee .285 to .302 in about a half hour, or better yet have Buckshot make you one to the size you want. He does great work at a very fair price.

[wmitty]

I lapped out the Lee .285" with out much trouble. Works fine.

[barrabruce]

Don't forget a pound slug of your chamber.
Can be quite revelling to find what you actually have.

And then fun begins !!!

Five years into this and I'm just beginning to really learn a thing or two.
Hopefully I will be able to accomplish my desired consistency yet.

[bigted]

in the "muzzle loading" section below ... there is a sticky on ... "paper patching the muzzle loader" ... this is a good read and has a pictorial on wrapping and preparing your boolits. patching is patching and except for size ... it is the same procedure. the pictures on the 4rth page are some of what I posted for a comparison and may be a bit of help for the beginning of patching.

another great book to have is from "Write" and "Mathews" ... these fella's have done a great job of explaining the system of patching and after getting the basics ... you can get specialized in your experiments as for the accuracy you want to chase.