Lee REAL and ALOX??

[Elbow]

Just got a Lee REAL 50 cal 250 grain mold and made some soft lead boolits. I will be shooting these in my TC White Mountain Carbine with a 1-32" twist. wondering if tumble lubing them in ALOX will work ok? thoughts? Experiences?

[richhodg66]

The general wisdom is black powder and petroleum based lubes don't work well together. I have used LLA and Pyrodex together before and it worked OK. Since then, I started using Bore Butter and it works great. Ordinary old Crisco isn't bad either.

[725]

I think you would be better off perusing the lube section here and finding a BP lube. Lots out there and they are easy to mix up.

[koger]

Post pics of your bullets!

[johnson1942]

check your pm/s

[forrest-hunter]

Please post what you ended up using - have some REAL molds I plan to use and wondering the same thing - called Lee - they recommended Alox

[fouronesix]

Since Lee makes and sells LLA, I wouldn't expect them to recommend something else

I've tried both LLA and Rooster (another somewhat similar tumble type lube) on various conicals in MLs. Definitely easier to handle once dried... but results were only so-so. Have always had better results using one of the other common softer BP lubes or even common Crisco.

But hey, do a little experimenting with different lubes and report results. Keeping everything else the same- shoot a string with LLA. Clean the bore. Shoot another string with a different lube. Clean the bore. Shoot another string with a different lube, and so on…. Report results.

[Fly]

Mr Lee use to say no it was not for BP. Now he may have changed something.
But I,m like the rest, I would stick with good black powder lube. Many like this
one & others another. But it can effect accuracy. That's more important than anything.

Fly

[Omnivore]

Hmm. There are different purposes for what we generally call "lube". In black powder shooting you're generally not concerned with lubrication as much as you're concerned about fouling mitigation. You want to keep the fouling soft, and a hard, dried, high pressure lubricant like LLA isn't going to do anything to keep your fouling soft, I don't believe. How can it?

Several people have reported using LLA in BP shooting, and it doesn't appear to hurt anything. I just don't see it helping much either.

Enough Bore Butter or Gatofeo #1 (or any of a number of proven BP lubes) on the other hand will actually leave a soft, fouling/grease mixture in the bore after several shots, and will wipe right out, easily.

So that would me my test; after several shots, can you easily run a patch through the bore once or twice and end up with a fairly clean bore, or is it going to take water, spit, or some other solvent and require more effort? Or can you reload after three or four shots almost as easily as you loaded the cold, clean bore? Those are about the same test, if you think about it.

[rsrocket1]

I made a simple concoction of 2 parts beeswax from the local bee and candle making store and 1 part Vaseline. Melted in a double boiler then dipped the REAL's up to the top band while holding the bullets with needle nose pliers. The stuff is soft enough to apply by hand since the cold texture is about as stiff as chapstick, but it doesn't seem to melt off even in 110F summer temperatures.

The lube forms a gas tight seal in the barrel that causes the ramrod to bounce back up unless you take the used primer out of the breechplug. When shooting these in my CVA Optima, at the end of a 25-30 shot session, the bore is shiny bright that takes no more than 1-2 passes with a wet patch to clean. I run a dry patch between shots and shoot with Alliant Black MZ and Blackhorn 209, not real black powder.

[Omnivore]

rsrocket1; That sounds like a good one. I'd use it over LLA any day. I just might have to try that with BP and see what happens. I still need to try round ball with patches moistened with Balistol. The point is there are a lot of things that can work well, so it comes down to convenience and cost, and what works with a given load.

[white eagle]

I use alox on my REAL'S and have not had any problems
,
first group with a new Accurate Molds mold from a 54 cal T/C Hawken
these were lubed with alox

[Bphunter]

The problem with LLA is it won't keep the fouling soft between shots. I just smear some TC wonderlube on the REAL and set in on top of a felt wad to keep the lube from getting into the powder. Works great and I don't get the dreaded crud ring.