I had an interesting conversation with Al Nelson, the owner of NOE Bullet Molds, this Friday. Our conversation centered around his 30 caliber Hi-Tech Mold #HTC309-153. For those that do not own this mold, it produces a non-groove single band bullet stepped down to a straight center ending in a gentle taper at the ogive. Photo is of sized bullets.
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I purchased this mold because I felt it would be an excellent bullet to powder coat for a 30-06 and in my M-1 Garand. In fact I believe that the non-groove bullet is exactly what we need for coating. Grooves are for lube, which we don’t need and having these grooves only provides an area to unevenly fill up with polymer, creating an area we can’t size and make uniform.
At the range last week, after a few sighting shots I fired this 5 shot group at 50 yards with this PC bullet driven by 49 grains of IMR 4895. I did not chronograph, but estimated velocity is 2800 FPS.
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Some would say this group is impressive for PC, at least for a 68 year old, but when fired at 100 yards the shots looked more like a pattern than a group.
This finally brings us to the reason for my post. I originally did what I could to make this load accurate in case prep and charge. I used the NOE sizing system to nose size, band size and two powder coats sized between coats.
After the disappointing results at distance, I went back to the drawing board as I believed I was on the right track, building out the polymer jacket with multiple sized coats, which further work hardens the already hard and tough polymer. I wanted a build out of the polymer so to provide for a thicker coating.
I nose and band sized the raw cast bullet down in steps of .001”, to get a band size (caliber diameter) of .308”, NOE’s smallest 30 Cal bushing size, and .298” for the major diameter behind the ogive. I did a couple of bullets and felt I was on the right track but after doing a number and checking the bullets for concentricity it varied considerably. This has been discussed in a couple of posts, but not as a main topic.
To take an imperfect projectile, apply an imperfect coating to then expect the projectile to perform perfectly is unrealistic. Nose Sizing the body and in a separate step, size the band creates two perfect circles. Unfortunately when you lay a nickel on a quarter you have two perfect circles, but that doesn’t mean they are concentric to each other, meaning you have a non-concentric or lopsided bullet. Yes the rifling will impart a spin on the bullet, but it will spin on its imperfect center of gravity.
I believe if we are ever going to get a PC rifle bullet capable of delivering accuracy at full power it is going to take addressing the full bullet in a single operation. Several have already figured this out and they believe swaging the entire bullet is the ultimate answer. I discussed this topic with Al Nelson and he also agrees that swaging is the answer, but we also agreed most casters are not going to drop $500+ dollars on dies to swage every bullet they wish to shoot. What we came up with may be the best alternative and that would be a longer stepped sizing bushing that would fit the existing NOE sizing die. The longer bushing would size the band and center in a single operation, basically sizing everything but the ogive. This should give us as close to a concentric bullet as we can get without breaking the bank. I am sure others can also see this could lead to a line of High-Tech molds and bushings just for Powder Coating.
I would also like to point out that gun articles are already appearing about the rising cost of ammunition. Premium 30 caliber copper jacketed bullets already exceed $0.40 each, so if you could make polymer jacketed bullets that gave satisfactory performance at full power wouldn’t that be of interest?
Like everything we all have to get by economically, and NOE Molds has to make a profit to stay in business, so the question is now how many are interested in seeing a new NOE bushing created because volume sales is what is needed?