Another Newbie Leading Horror Story

[ironmike17]

I have put 27,000 rounds of FMJ through the tube of my Kimber 1911 over the last ten years. Went to lead to save money. Purchased a Lee 230 gr. LRN mold with micro bands for tumble lubing, a Lee pot and Alox. Figured out how to cast good boolits and shot 100 rounds over 4.8 grains of Clays. Got the worst leading I ever saw. Did the following, shooting 100 rounds at a time: bought a sizer in .452, stopped crimping, went to Unique 5.8 grains, then Unique 5.5 grains, and heat treated 100 rounds. After every set of 100 rounds, I had terrible leading. After each 100 rounds, I cleaned the barrel squeaky clean. I figured it must be the barrel with the high round count of FMJ, so I slugged it. The major diameter at the breech is .452 and the major diameter at the muzzle is .454. The minor diameter at the breech is .445 and the minor diameter at the muzzle is out of round, and measures .445 to .457. The chamber at the base of the cartridge is out of round and measures .483 to .485. The chamber at the riflings is .475. Eureka! Bad barrel! Just to make sure, I cleaned the barrel on my newer .45 and put 100 rounds through it, figuring that the newer barrel with only about 1,000 rounds of FMJ through it would shoot clean. These 100 rounds were sized to .452, tumble lubed with liquid Alox and seated to OAL of 1.265 with no crimp. It leaded almost as badly as the first barrel. I am obviously making some rookie mistake and no one at my club has a clue. Any help and advice would be appreciated.

[randyrat]

Have you tried 4.1 grs of Clays and 5.1 grs of unique. Are you sure your not using some real soft lead were heat treating will do nothing to harden your alloy. What i'm leaning toward is your alloy may be too soft for your stout loads. As far as the measurments i'm no help. How did it shoot with FMJs?,,,, Are you sure your not squeezing that cast bullet down too much when your seating the bullet? Did you let the Alox dry over night before you shot/loaded them. Can you chamber them unsized?

[RGS]

Looks to me like you are using a real light load of Unique. I'd try to work it up to the 7 to 7.5 gr level and see if the bullets bump up enough to seal the bore. Too light a load and too hard a bullet will cause leading because the bullet isn't punched hard enough to fill the barrel. Are you able to scratch the bullet with your thumb nail? Your 5.5 load is the starter load listed in the Lyman Handbook for the 225gr lead rn.

Are you getting failures to feed? That is another indication your load is not generating enough pressure to cycle the action fully.

Do you have a chronograph? They are a big help in load development.

I haven't loaded for a 1911 in many years, but I remember I used 700x and it seemed to work fine. If you can't get Unique to work try the faster stuff and work your way up toward the top of the load data. If you can't find something that will work, you may need to try another bullet.

[docone31]

Wow,
Everyone I know who has a Kimber cannot shoot lead. A fairly close acquaintenance has even tried my castings. He is a meticulous cleaner.
I fire 200gn RN, Lee mold, with Blue Dot. My wife's Taurus PT1911 absolutely loves that round. I never slugged it, just sized to .452 and blazed away. Same with my Firestorm. I pan lube, size to .452.
With my Firestorm, with jacketed 200gn HP, it fires dead on. With cast 200gn Flat Point, It is 2" left. Same powder charge. My wife's Taurus doesn't care. I almost wish the grip fit my hand on her pistol. It fits her like a glove.
I cast wheel weights, water drop, pan lube, size. I added tin to the wheel weight mix, and add tin depending on the casting quality. Another thing I do, I mix my alloy, then make ingots again. Mixing the alloy up, I believe helps the consistancy.
Perhaps, trying pan lube types might minimize the leading. Cleaning with chore boy pads assist in deleading. Perhaps sizing to .453 might make up the difference. I also do not crimp, either taper, or plain crimp. I do not do it with jacketeds also.
I do like Blue Dot.

[randyrat]

Double/triple check your numbers.

[HeavyMetal]

Let's take a set backwards here and return to the basics.

first question what is your lead source for the boolits your casting?

Using a tumble lube boolit are you using them as cast?

If so have you "miked" them and what is the as cast diameter?

Have you "miked" your expander button, if so what is it?

With this information we can make some "educated" guess's. Now I'm going to take a WAG as to the issue here. I'm going to guess your using a dies set that has an expander button in the .450 range plus or minus .001. If your boolits are coming out .453 or .452 and your expander is .450 the boolits will be sized to .450 by the case when you set the boolit!

This is particulaly true with the very small bands on the tumble lube boolits!

In this instance you now have an undersized boolit, no where near enough pressure to "bump" up the boolit base to fill the rifling, so you get leading and lots of it.

This is the same thing Randyrat mentioned in his post just longer winded.

Please check these suggestions out and see if the problem goes away.

[crabo]

Wow,
Everyone I know who has a Kimber cannot shoot lead. .

I have no problem shooting H&G 68s sized 452 in my Kimber.

[billyb]

[QUOTE=docone31;400299]Wow,
Everyone I know who has a Kimber cannot shoot lead." I have two kimbers, a custom 2 and the stainless eclipse, I shoot lead in both, a lot of lead! I use an alloy close to #2. I use lars carnuba red, used to use zambini red,like the lars lube. I shot 450 rounds through the custom 2 last tuesday, cleaned the gun had one small wisp of leading,acouple of strokes with the chore boy and it was gone. Never had a problem with leading with the kimbers. I size 452 use 4.9 grains of 231 with 200 swc and 230 grain rn. Bill

[The Nyack Kid]

[QUOTE=billyb;400317]

Wow,
Everyone I know who has a Kimber cannot shoot lead." I have two kimbers, a custom 2 and the stainless eclipse, I shoot lead in both, a lot of lead! I use an alloy close to #2. I use lars carnuba red, used to use zambini red,like the lars lube. I shot 450 rounds through the custom 2 last tuesday, cleaned the gun had one small wisp of leading,acouple of strokes with the chore boy and it was gone. Never had a problem with leading with the kimbers. I size 452 use 4.9 grains of 231 with 200 swc and 230 grain rn. Bill

Ditto
I'm using the 230grn 452374 , ACWW ,lube is felix-lube, sized 452 on top of 5.0 grns of WW-231 . I dont get leading in my gold match nor do my buddys pt1911 and hi-point lead up with that load .

[Slogg76]

It is weird, but I shot tens of thousands of rounds of my cast bullets through various firearms from Ruger Redhawks, Winchester 94's, CZ autos, and Kimbers. The only firearms I ever had leading problems with were Kimbers. I shot cast through no less than seven Kimbers (three of my own) and they all leaded horribly. Tried many different loads from light to heavy, soft alloys to laser cast commercial bullets, etc. Nothing would really work. They were all incredibly accurate, but the leading was just horrible. I just started thinking lead was not for Kimbers. Of course that was just my experience with them and seven pistols are not a big sample of all Kimbers produced.

[Just Duke]

Barrels worn out or is a polygonal bore.

[38-55]

Talk about bizzare threads... A barrel is a barrel and it's just takes a little fiddling some times to see what it likes.. I have a kimber with 60,000 plus lyman 452374 down the tube and a pretty good pile of lymans 452460's to boot. No appreciable leading that I can ever remember. I've used lee liquid alox and the old nra formula and some type of moly lube and some orange stuff of unknown origin with no problems ( yes I even went back and checked my notes). I use mostly spg these days and it seems to work well and the fouling stays soft ( and it's what's in both of my sizers ). I've shot unique from 4 gns to 7gns with no problems ( 7 gns is rather spicy ! ).
I'd try your bullet with starting with 5 gns and not sized if it will chamber. Let the 'big light' do the sizing. If that doesn't work I'd try another more traditional bullet with a large lube grove. Another trick I've found with alox is to put it on a patch and run it down the bore after a 'squeaky' cleaning to kinda pre-lube the barrel. Works sometimes..
Just some random thoughts for ya..
Calvin
Ps by the way I use pretty much any kind of lead for the 45's ( mostly ww ) Mine don't seem to need anything in particular in the way of alloys of heat treating

[MT Gianni]

My Kimber has never seen jacketed. I bought it new in 1999. Gianni

[compass will]

Just a thought. The name "Clays" is used on 3 different powders. Are you using the same Clays everybody here is talking about?

Here is the Clays I use in my 45 Colt



Here are the other 2 Clays
International Clays


Universal Clays

[Pawpaw]

In my Kimber, I use that same Lee 230 grain tumble lube bullet over 4.5 grains of Bullseye. The bullets get lubed with a light coat of LLA. I don't size the bullets, but load them as-cast. The final step in loading is to run them through a Lee Factory Crimp die.

They shoot great and leading is not an issue.

[Firebird]

I have an old Kimber Polymer (old grip frame, not the later "II" that's squared off like a 2x4) that I shot Bullseye using a 12 lb recoil spring and a light target load consisting of the old Star swaged 185 LSWCHP bullets above 3.8 gains of Titegroup. First several times the barrel leaded badly, I cleaned it with a brush wrapped in bronze wool, then polished it with JB bore paste. After several weeks, the leading went away and now that gun can go 500+ rounds without any leading. I just thought that the leading was caused by roughness in the bore that was gradually polished away by the JB paste.

[35remington]

First, a list of don't do's having to do with the previous posts:

DO NOT use 7 to 7.5 grains Unique with 230 grain lead bullets. This is old, obsolete information. Pressures in excess of +P WILL result, and velocities will be well over 1000 fps with this bullet. Too much. 6.5 Unique will send a jacketed 230 RN out of my 5 inch 1911's at 920 fps and should be considered top end.

Your load of Clays exceeds Hodgdon's data. Perhaps you have another source that allows more? You're near top end with that powder as well.

Your alloy is wheelweights, I presume? Have you tried softer mixes like range scrap or such, in the range of BHN 8-11 to see if a softer alloy works better?

About your measurements - a barrel that is larger at the muzzle than the breech is hard to deal with as regards leading, if your figures are accurate.

While the barrel is still clean, fire and recover a few bullets in wet newsprint. Look for severe gascutting or other clues something is going on, and report back here. You can learn much from bullet recovery from an unfouled barrel - you will see the things occuring that lead to lead fouling.

[38-55]

To ALL !
My bad about posting the 7 gns of unique. While I have done it I do not recommend it. It is wayyyyyyy to hot. I would say the even 6.5 may be to much. These days I limit my lead stuff to 6 gns of unique though I mostly load 5 gns. Hope that clears some thing up.
My load info shows that 4 gn is max for clays...
Calvin

[ironmike17]

I would like to thank all of you who took the time to share your knowledge. randyrat: The lead is wheel weights. I will definitely try 4.1 gr of Clays, as I have an unopened 8-pound jug left. The Kimber ran fine with FMJ's. I did not always let the Alox dry overnight. I tried some dried for two days and got a little less leading. The bullets chamber fine in the unsized condition. RGS: I will work with both Clays & Unique loadings. I can scratch the bullet with my thumbnail, but it is more like a polished line than a scratch. My thumbnail barely catches on the scratch. Last night at the range I had two failures to go into full battery out of 65 rounds, and once the slide did not stay back on an empty mag. Not good reliability. Probably short-cycling. I don't have a chronograph, but Santa will probably bring me one. Doesn't help now. docone31: I will try water-dropping some, next time I cast, and will check out pan lube. randyrat: I will also try beeswax. Note: It will take me a couple of weeks to change one variable at a time, so I know what is helping. heavymetal: My metal source is wheelweights. To get started, I did not melt actual wheelweights, but purchased clean ingots. I tried them "as cast" early on, but the "as cast" boolits were oversized at the heel or base, running between .452 and .454. The dimension near the lube grooves was .452 I purchased a .452 sizer, which is only swaging of metal occurs at the base. I think your comments on the bullet being sized by the case makes sense, as a loaded round shows a slight case bulge at the boolit. I will mic. my dies. I will also pull some boolits out of loaded rounds and mic. them. To crabo, billyb The Nyack Kid, Slogg 76, DUKE NUKEM, Pawpaw, Firebird and MT Gianni concerning Kimber barrels: I hope you are right about Kimber barrels, because I don't want to buy a new barrel if it doesn't help. I will only abandon the Kimber barrel if all else fails. I am concerned that I damaged my barrel somehow in the past, as shown by the premature wear (.452 breech, .454 muzzle) and the taper in the chamber dimensions. I have used an Outer's Foul-Out kit tor years to remove copper fouling. Maybe I used it wrong. 38-55: I did try running a patch of Alox through the barrel, and last night's leading was easier to remove. compass will: I am using Clays (your top picture) and not International or Universal. 35remington: Thanks for the powder charge tips. I slugged the barrel twice when I saw taper the first time. I always clean from the breech using a brass rod, but somehow I have damaged the barrel. I still want to work with it for now, as I am cheap. I will fire into wet newsprint and examine for gas cutting. What thickness of newsprint do you recommend? Once again, my thanks to all of you. It will take me a couple of weeks to set up the proper sequence of testing and carry out the tests. I will post the results then. Best Regards, Mike

[randyrat]

Could be as simple as a new rough barrel, not broke in yet and the first barrel was worn out.. BTW if you size at .452 it is normal to see a slight bulge. I was thinking that your die may have been sizing your brass and bullet down too much when seating the bullet.