Do you lube or powder coat the cast boolits?

[GregLaROCHE]

I powder coat for my 45-70 with no gas checks and tumble my 6.5mm x 55 in liquid Alox and gas check. That's why I checked "other".

[kevin c]

Certainly of course there are some new casters who only powder coat and don't know the older ways, but I bet that's a small minority.

This pretty much describes me, except I HiTek.

I started reloading for action pistol with commercially bought j words. I'd tried commercial cast with regular lube, but didn't care for the stickiness, the gummed up dies and the smoke. I ended up using commercial coated bullets that I found had satisfactory accuracy, very little smoke, and the additional advantage of lower cost compared to jacketed. Casting my own, I went straight to HiTek as the comparable coating but applied at home. I did try tumble lubing with BLL, but never got the technique down.

[David2011]

Another “other” here. Some get lube and some get PC. An additional benefit of PC is that they size much easier than when I use lube. I like that everything stays much cleaner when I PC, too. My fingers, the dies, the guns- everything involved stays cleaner and I don’t have to clean the ammo after it’s loaded.

A few years back I opened a thread asking about lower smoke. Got lots of “could care less about the smoke as long as it doesn’t lead” answers. Some folks just didn’t understand the concept of firing 4 or 5 shots in one second. On a light wind day facing the sun the targets can be obscured. PC fixes that, too.

[6622729]

I'd consider powder coat if someone could demonstrate a quality powder coated finish that is as quick and easy as tumble lubing Recluse 45-45-10. I am a tumble luber.

[Castinator]

I lubed and sized since back in the 90's. I tried powder coating recently, because it's supposed "cleaner." That might be true once it's in the gun, but nobody seems to talk about what an absolute pig mess the powder itself can be in your kitchen or outside on a windy day.

Plus, it's way more time work to powder coat (if you use a luber/sizer, it's all done in one stroke). I do want to PC when I start casting for the Desert Eagle, since that has some important port fouling issues (although I think shooting pure linotype through it will solve that).

Truth is, even with my brief experiments with powder coating, I still use lube (since they still have to go through the sizer), and sometimes even gas checks.

One problem I've had is the top punch of the sizer deforming the powder coat at the top of the bullet. Might experiment with a flat-top punch.

[L Erie Caster]

I lube my boolits, I think powder coating is interesting, but I have not gotten around to it. “YET”

[Eddie1971]

I do powder coating. Down side is it's time consuming. Up sides are its cleaner and with a check you can push rifle bullets faster. Another plus is with pistol rounds I treat them like jacketed. Being a Mil Surp shooter this has been a godsend since J word bullets are so expensive now.

[MrHarmless]

I powder coat exclusively. If you're careful with the powder, it's less messy to work with, and I don't have to worry about wax/lube or gas checks.

[Yooper003]

I really enjoy powder coating, it adds another dimension to the whole casting, reloading thing.somthing I have not seen mentioned is the ability to color code your boolits.handy to know in a glance which boolit you are using or shooting.

[Arkansas Paul]

I pan lube magnum stuff and tumble lube low velocity stuff like .38 spcl.

If I ever get around to getting a lever gun in .44 mag or .45 Colt, I'll probably start powder coating.

[Beeks]

Lube.

[flyingmonkey35]

As a one of few super early adopters of powder coating. I PC 98 % of all my pistol rounds.

I am fortunate to live in a very dry climate so shake and bake. Works for me.

I do not stand my bullets up anymore I just shake them all up. Dump the lot gently in a colander to sift out excess powder. Dump I a big pile in a basket and bake.

The throw the whole thing in a bucket of water. Size and load and shoot

I can coat 250 + rounds per basket really fast.

The 2% 45 long colt is Lee liquid. Over black powder
And 357 mag are factory rounds.

Shoot and stay safe.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

[Hossfly]

I started out powder coating 9mm, never lubed any, have shot lubed purchased commercial,but since casting have always powered coated. Also .224 with gas checks.

[Chainsaw.]

I do 99% power coat, have dinked with lube just to experiment, what a pain. Messy sticky pain! I mostly did itto get the look of bare lead, now I just use lead colored powder coat!

[brass410]

I do both cause sometimes I just feel like doing the same job a different way

[Traffer]

I got very near an infraction for suggesting that lubing was going to become obsolete because of PC.

[rcslotcar]

Voted other, as I do both.

[rrob692326]

Powdercoat with a gun and the right equipment bullets come out smooth and looking like plastic.

[Black Jaque Janaviac]

Powder coat. I haven't actually counted the minutes but I'd have to say that powder coating has got to be about as easy as tumble lubing. Yes to powder coat I have to put on a vinyl glove before handling bare bullets, I have to preheat the bullets a tad before tumbling, and I have to filter the air soft BBs after coating bullets. These things only add a couple minutes of effort to the process. But the hidden effort of using Lee Liquid Alox is in vigilantly measuring OAL of cartridges because the lube gunks up the dies and starts to throw off the seating depth, then cleaning the dies regularly, and wiping off pocket lint and sand from a cartridge before chambering it, and washing your filthy hands after reloading a batch (I still wash my hands after reloading, but it doesn't take as long).

My sense is that the effort expended is a wash compared with tumble lubing (again assuming Lee Liquid Alox), but that you get a cleaner process.

[ghh3rd]

Powder coating my 38, 357, 40 & 45 ACP, and using Felix lube on my 44 mag and 45-70 boolits that I shoot for accuracy.