22-250 cast adventure, coyote

[birdadly]

I was hoping my next post would be pics of my targets, but I'm stuck again. I'm trying to find an OAL and these range from 2.148 to 2.323 and they chamber quite hard (i forget, the longest might not have closed the bolt), or at least the bolt closes noticeably harder than a factory round. That's not normal, right? If not, is it possible this bullet just won't work in my gun?

Also I think I have to start over. If my Seating die puts that little circle on the nose just from seating the bullet... my lead must be too soft like you guys said; I was hoping to at least try these.

The silver lead round shows the horizontal markings the bullet gets from trying to chamber it.

Thanks in advance. -Brad

[wmitty]

Do you have a piece of fired brass which will allow one of your boolits to be pushed into the neck and held loose enough to slide back into the case as you close the bolt? This will give you the o.a.l. with the nose just touching the leade, which is where I'd start with load development. The mark on the ogive from the bullet seater depends on case neck tension; and the boolits might work fine. Shoot a few and let us in on the results.

[floydboy]

You can take a hacksaw blade and cut one of you case necks lengthwise down to where the shoulder begins. squeeze the neck tight enough to hold your boolit pretty tight. seat your boolit intentionally too far out. Carefully chamber it, close the bolt and carefully eject it. Measure it and repeat a few times until your sure the measurement is correct. This is your maximum cartridge length. Make up a dummy round and try chambering it. It may be too tight to close the bolt. Shorten this cartridge by .010 and try again. If it closes easily you know you are very close to just touching the lands. most people like to start just touching the lands and shorten the length from there if needed.



I had a savage with a 14 twist barrel I worked with a few years ago. Used air cooled WW alloy. I could get MOA less than 50% of the time. usually 1.5 to 2 inch groups. I strive for minute of blackbird and this wasn't cutting it so moved on to a 222 and did much better. Good luck. 22-250 isn't the easiest to get to shoot cast real well. Some have had good luck. Most seem to have less than spectacular results.

Floyd

[birdadly]

SUCCESS!!! I swear there won't be ANY questions in this post!!!

Here is a pic of my first time out with these, after all the frustration (aka "learning"). This is my 15 and 16 grains of 5744 groups. I also did 14.5, 17 and 18 but they weren't as good.

2 reloading things I had to figure out:

I covered a piece of sized brass in black sharpie and tried to chamber it, found that the shoulder area was being scuffed up while not chambering. This told someone else online that it wasn't truly being FL sized.

My Hornady FL size die instructions say to turn it down to contact the shell holder, then tighten. Others had this issue and were told to give it an 1/8 to 1/4 turn further down after it touches. I did this and MY SIZED BRASS CHAMBERED!!!!

But, then after making 5 rounds I tried chambering them and they didn't go... geesh! Turns out the opening the M die made needed to be brought in a bit, so i set the seater die a bit lower and then... MY FINISHED ROUNDS CHAMBERED!!!

I imagine that means I crimped them slightly, but I guess if accuracy is okay, that's ok because at some point I may hunt with these.

It put a big smile on my face and gave me a sense of accomplishment and relief. And then I got to shoot them today, not even knowing if they'd hit paper! And then to find out they didn't do too badly!! Ahhh, I learned not only from you fine fellows, but also (probably how most of you did it in the first place)... by personal trial and error, research and not giving up

So once again, THANK YOU! -Brad

[Jim..47]

I've used a 55 grain cast boolit for the .223 and 22-250 on groundhogs with great success. MY alloy was straight ACWW with a gas check. I usually cast a few days before checking and lube/sizing the bullets. I found that I saved a LOT of time by tumble lubing (some people do NOT like the FROG SNOT!). I worked up some loads to around 2500 fps with decent accuracy in a couple of my guns. The loads were definetely NOT for ANY gun of the same caliber though. I have a 14" TC Contender that refused to group with any cast bullet. The loads did not work in some of my guns, BUT were very good in another of same caliber. I tried some Linotype alloy that seemed better for all the .22's I have/had but they penciled thru the critters and let them get back into their holes.

What is ACWW? melt mix etc.?

2500 FPS with tumble lube. You have my attention! I've never tumble lubed and really don't even know, but I don't want to steel this thread. I can start another when its better weather to cast.

[Jim..47]

-Brad

Great Brad. Congratulations on your success. Do you have any idea what your velocity is?

[dondiego]

ACWW= Air Cooled Wheel Weights.......usually refers to the clip on type.

[birdadly]

Thanks Jim. I haven't invested in a chronograph yet. Just guessing by the same weight bullet in the books, maybe around 2,100 fps. I didn't clean the barrel yet but looking down it I see nothing but smoothness. These I guess we're pretty soft lead and powder coated. -Brad

[SSGOldfart]

Hi fellas. I didn't recast these little buggers, but I decided to toughen them up with some PC and still give them a try. So i made a jig and I think they turned out well! I set the GC's on by hand and ran them thru a LEE 225 sizing die.

So... first rifle reloads I'm ever doing on my own (had help once before)... I have a new Hornady 2-die set. I lubed the cases and the first de-primed/re-sized and seemed perfect. The second round created the picture below, apparently bending the spindle; I don't recall putting that much pressure on it! So I took the spindle out, de-capped w/a universal de-capper, and sized w/out the spindle.

1. is that ok since I will be using a 22 M die to flare the mouth?
2. after sizing, a few measure too long compared to the max length in the book, so do i use the M die, measure again and THEN trim?
3. does anyone know if these PC'd rounds will still be okay (if they shoot ok) to hunt with? or is the coating too tough?

Thanks a bunch. -Brad
Attachment 160806

Brad the pc shouldn't hurt the Boolits for hunting,I'm also a 22-250 fan.
My FIL had a model 70 Winchester in 22-250 back about mid-60's I put a crease in the hood of my 49 Ford flat
bed shooting ground hogs but that's a long story,I hope the OP will keep trying with his casting and loading,lots and lots of good advice in this threadplease keep us updated on this subject

[Handgunr]

birdadly,
If you truly know the hardness of your alloy, you can push those rounds up to some amazing speeds for cast bullets. I just posted it on another thread, but if you use the equation of "? BHN x 1422", you can come to a working pressure for your alloy. Picking a powder like W748, which gives higher velocities with lower pressures, you can easily find a load that will push cast bullets (without destroying their accuracy) up to velocities around the 2500 fps range (or above).........as I said, depending on your alloy of course.

I've had the Lyman 55gr. gas checked round for years and haven't spent a lot of time with it to be honest. Maybe this year I can do more experimenting, who knows......good read guys.


Bob

[birdadly]

Bob thanks for the info. I plan to look for your thread after this post. I know my alloy so for BHN I can go off the alloy calculator estimate. I'm really a novice regarding velocities, pressures, etc. but I want/need to do more learning so I can someday say that I actually know what all this means, and not just that i make a bullet, pull the trigger and look at my targets!

I have a pic of my newest target and I really don't know how much better I could expect! I made 8-shot groups, only changing the amount of powder (5744), at 100 yards, from a rest with minimal wind and sunny-blue skies. Bullets were from previous casting (50% pure, 50% coww and 11oz of pewter), but different color PC (es gun).

So there's 8 shots here... I hope. I have a close-up, hoping one of you will say Yes! there's definitely 8 shots there!!! This was on an 18 x 22" piece of card board, so if the 8th shot isn't in this group... that means it was WAY off. I checked my barrel before making the next shot, just in case! I really think there are 2 in the top-left spot.

I still could go .1 and .2 grains different on either side of this group, but as far as everything else, I guess I don't see any reason to change, for now at least. This was meant to be a hunting alloy, but there's no reason it can't be my everyday range alloy if it shoots this good, so I think.

Any who, just wanted to post a new pic -Brad

[4719dave]

With that 22-250 ide bet ww plus some tin water dropped is going to be your best bet .Did you slug your barrel ?

[Handgunr]

Birdadly,

Very welcome........Hell, I wouldn't sneeze at those groups at all.....damn good for 8 rounds of cast. More than likely, based on the group and the space around it, the 8th one went through the center not touching paper. To be honest, I wouldn't change a thing.........but as casters and loaders, I know that will never happen.....lol.....we always gotta tweak stuff.

What was the BHN on your alloy btw ?.......

Bob

[birdadly]

Hi fellas. I didn't slug the barrel. It's a new rifle so my plan was to try a .225 sizer and hope it's what it needed. If results were poor, or I had leading I'd slug it at that time.

Per the alloy calculator, I believe the estimated BHN to be about 11.2 -Brad

[GONRA]

GONRA's curious about the inital birdally post.
Picture shows the wrong top punch!
(Maybe this was discussed, if so, just delete this post. Thanx.)

[Jim..47]

Bob thanks for the info. I plan to look for your thread after this post. I know my alloy so for BHN I can go off the alloy calculator estimate. I'm really a novice regarding velocities, pressures, etc. but I want/need to do more learning so I can someday say that I actually know what all this means, and not just that i make a bullet, pull the trigger and look at my targets!

I have a pic of my newest target and I really don't know how much better I could expect! I made 8-shot groups, only changing the amount of powder (5744), at 100 yards, from a rest with minimal wind and sunny-blue skies. Bullets were from previous casting (50% pure, 50% coww and 11oz of pewter), but different color PC (es gun).

So there's 8 shots here... I hope. I have a close-up, hoping one of you will say Yes! there's definitely 8 shots there!!! This was on an 18 x 22" piece of card board, so if the 8th shot isn't in this group... that means it was WAY off. I checked my barrel before making the next shot, just in case! I really think there are 2 in the top-left spot.

I still could go .1 and .2 grains different on either side of this group, but as far as everything else, I guess I don't see any reason to change, for now at least. This was meant to be a hunting alloy, but there's no reason it can't be my everyday range alloy if it shoots this good, so I think.

Any who, just wanted to post a new pic -Brad

You have 8 shots there. The 8th shot is in that cluster. Very good target!