Bullet runout with different lubes?

[zubrato]

I use two lubing methods for my cast and gas checked rifle boolits, tumble lube 45/45/10 and I recently tried a modified barry darr lube.
Seating the Lee TL'd boolits is nice and consistent with little to no runout.
However, when I seat my sized, gas checked, and pan lubed boolits, I get pretty severe runout, to where I can see the boolit is crooked to the naked eye!
I've tried rotating the case when seating, placing the boolit very carefully straight, and seating at different speeds.
Still no solution.

I'm thinking of just abandoning the pan lubing for the tumble lubing, as the 45/45/10 is less tacky, less work, probably higher velocity friendly, and no bullet runout.

My question is, can this be the lube that causes the runout? I've never seen it this bad before, and the TL boolits correct this problem immediately..

[John Boy]

My question is, can this be the lube that causes the runout? I've never seen it this bad before

You'll be the First!

[35 shooter]

Never used that particular lube, but i don't see how lube could be causing that particular problem. Sounds like somethings off center..necks, dies, etc. I know that's not much help, but i would suspect something along those lines before lube. Necks not expanded or flared enough? Hard to tell without actually seeing it.

[btroj]

Are you sizing the TL bullets? What size are each set of bullets?

It isn't the lube, it is something in the manner of handling, sizing, and seating bullets.

What differences are there? Are all bullets loaded in same case prepared the same ways?

[geargnasher]

Are you using a cast-bullet-specific neck expanding tool to prepare the necks before seating the bullets?

Gear

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

I use two lubing methods for my cast and gas checked rifle boolits, tumble lube 45/45/10 and I recently tried a modified barry darr lube.
Seating the Lee TL'd boolits is nice and consistent with little to no runout.
However, when I seat my sized, gas checked, and pan lubed boolits, I get pretty severe runout, to where I can see the boolit is crooked to the naked eye!
I've tried rotating the case when seating, placing the boolit very carefully straight, and seating at different speeds.
Still no solution.

I'm thinking of just abandoning the pan lubing for the tumble lubing, as the 45/45/10 is less tacky, less work, probably higher velocity friendly, and no bullet runout.

My question is, can this be the lube that causes the runout? I've never seen it this bad before, and the TL boolits correct this problem immediately..

Please tell us how you are installing your Gas Checks...and if you are sizing the bullets.
Please be detailed in your discription of your processes of the Boolits that have runout and/or don't have runout.

[zubrato]

These are Lee 324-175-1R boolits.
I use a Lee universal case neck expander, for a bunch of 30-06 brass after I converted, annealed, and sized again. I did the whole batch in one go, just barely enough to seat a boolit without shaving lead.

Before each process each cast boolit is inspected for flaws and full gas check shank.

The TL process: TL boolits, dry. tap on gas check, size. tumble lube dry. sort by weight
Pan Lubing process: tap on gas checks, size to seat gas checks, heat up with double boiler, cool in fridge until the wax almost cracks. Use kinda oversized custom kake cutter to extract, size boolits again to take off excess lube, seat.
the kake cutter is a 223 case with the neck/shoulder cut away, deburred, and expanded. then nail/wood block to push out the boolit. Works suprisingly well. the boolits are sized and gas checks fully seated before pan lubing. At this point I'm admiring the fact they aren't tumble lubed, and I give them a once over inspection for fully seated gas checks. This is where I seat the bullets and notice the HUGE bullet runout, with the lube seeping out the side of the neck with bad runout. I've also had one gas check fall off a shank during storage of the PL boolits, never happened with the tumble lube, despite vigorous tumbling, and I've been treating the PL boolits like queens, storing them individually as to not disrupt the pretty blue lube groove.

My pan lube is : 9 oz candlewax, 8 oz vaseline, soap slivers, 1 blue crayon, 1 tablespoon STP, 1 laughing cow wax rind.
Hardens really nicely, and it's slick.
I CANNOT replicate this problem with the TL boolits. Except for the lube/process, I truly cannot think of anything that causes this..
After all the work I've put into making these boolits I won't be wasting time pan lubing. But I am VERY curious as to what caused this. I'm not a new reloader, despite being sorta new to cast in rifles and I've NEVER seen runout this bad in any circumstance. I take pride in my reloads and the whole experience was a slap in the face.

What went wrong? Could it be I left a bit too much lube on the boolits?

[randyrat]

You may have really soft brass and really hard lube, can you "dip lube" a few just for comparison.

-Warm a few bullets up , hot to the touch and dip them in some melted lube, wipe the bases off on a paper towel and let them cool on wax paper. This will be a nice thin coat and then load them in some brass that is not annealed and some that is annealed.
-Load some Pan Lubed in some UN annealed brass

It is possible to over anneal your brass? Making it too soft to work with it.

One more idea
Soft brass , too much hard lube , as you seat the bullet gas check is enlarging the neck and spring back is squeezing some lube out. Are you seating gas check below the neck?

[btroj]

Lube seeping? That is a sign of a lube issue but it isn't gonna cause runout.

Can you post a photo of loaded rounds with each lube?

I don't see any way the difference in lube would increase runout. Have you tried rolling a few loaded rounds ona really flat surface slowly? Look at the nose of the bullet, is it moving in little circles or a straight line? That is actually a pretty good way to see bullet runout.

[randyrat]

I just checked some 7mm 08 last night as you mentioned btroj. I rolled them on a inclined flat surface

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

If your runout is truely a bent boolit,
I'd suspect your cakecutter, when you push the boolit out of the mod'd 223 with nail/wood. you can check your boolits, before and after***, they are run through the gauntlet of the cakecutter.

Otherwise, if the boolits aren't bent, then you need to look closer at your brass and seating die. If the same setup seats the TL'd boolits straight, but the PL'd boolits crooked...MAYBE, you are just noticing the runout (crooked seated boolit in this case), because of the displacement of Lube, whereas the TL'd boolits don't show that telltail sign. As others have suggested, 'roll' the cartridge on a flat surface.
Good Luck,
Jon


*** To check runout on a boolit, I roll a boolit on a flat surface, must be very flat, I use a 'recovered' piece of marble from the base of a Large old trophy, obviously the lube must be cleaned off, I use mineral spirits and a rag.
OR you can spend a few hundred dollars on a bullet comparator, I'd sure like to buy one of those someday

[btroj]

I wouldn't doubt that what is being seen is a surface issue, not a change in actual runout. Seeing lube on the sides and nose of the bullet can make it appear to be worse.

Big question, how do they both shoot? If one truly has a huge amount more runout it should show up on paper.

[Ben]

When is the last time the bullet seating die was cleaned out good with Aerosol Carb Cleaner ?

[geargnasher]

Ditch the Lee universal bellmouthing tool and get yourself a REAL cast bullet neck expanding die of the appropriate size to give no more than .002" total interference fit between bullet and neck.

Gear

[runfiverun]

I see your sizing your pan lubed boolits dry, then lubing them.
as the difference between the two steps.

[zubrato]

Sorry guys, no pictures because I shot them up. No accuracy problems.
I discovered the rolling thing when a case fell over, and that's when I first realized how bad the runout was.
Sorry to dissapoint, but I won't be pan lubing. The 45/45/10 is so easy to apply, and works so well I can't spend 3-4x the amount of time for a quarter of the amount I could do tumble lubing.

Neither my home lube, nor the 45/45/10 ended up leading my barrel and I stuck with a pretty warm load, 37gr of 3031 with a 186gr boolit in a 23" barrel.

Won't be chasing the problem any further, because I'd be searching for a solution to a problem I don't want to have in the first place. Thank you for taking the time to help me troubleshoot the issue, however and being an excellent source of information for researching potential future lubing methods and recipes.

Just made a new batch of 45/45/10 and I can't wait to get back on the range!