How did you make the jump to hunting iwth cast?

[crankycalico]

I know, most of us started out with a 22 and lead bullets for squirrel and other pests. That's not considered an issue anywhere as the typical 22long or long rifle creates muzzle energy, and 50 yard impact energy probably in the range of 70* the body weight of your typical red squirrel.

What im wondering is the thought processes you went through when you decided to switch to lead bullets from those nifty "efficient" expanding jacketed copper deer slayers in your rifle.

Its just that my monolithic rifle ammo and my fmj make my rifles feel very very enjoyable and "proven" and make them carrying them in the field very reassuring, but just sitting at the bench holding a dummy round of a 170 grain cast bullet in my .308 it makes me feel very naked.
Like the time I was tracking a deer and had 10 coyotes watching me from the shadows and all I had was flashlight and knife.

But yet 8x57 dummy round with a big 2-214 grain flat point just feels like im throwing baseball bats down range. Any explanation other then good advertising on the part of ammunition companies?

[Hardcast416taylor]

By not having money to buy loaded `J` ammo, but having a neighbor that did cast and showed me the ropes on doing it a long time ago.Robert

[waksupi]

The first deer I ever shot was with a .45 cal. Bedford County Pennsylvania rifle with a homemade patched round ball. Worked back then, still works now.

[Ateam]

Started casting for pistol so I could shoot more, seemed natural to cast for rifles too. Hunting was the next logical step. 45-70 was my first kill followed by 45acp and 357. I found very little use for cast in bottlenecked rifle cartridges, a jword or copper almost always does the job better (sacrilege, I know, flame on). Just my experience, ymmv.

[bmortell]

Making cast work in bottleneck is certainly harder, i spent a year or more messing off and on with 30-06 cast, made many loads that couldnt hit a paper plate till i hit a sweet spot where i could do near j-word accuracy. As opposed to revolvers where litteraly the first bullets i ever cast shot good groups at 25 yds.

As to the subject matter ive always been interested in loading from more of a science aspect. And casting deffinitly gives you alot more variables that you can play with and customise to your liking. Looking back the choices of jacketed bullets seems very un-interesting. ask any hunter you see around my area and they say " ah i got me some 150gr core-lokt's from walmart, been using em my whole life" where as i am no longer sold on the mythical power of the one size fits all walmart bullet. Now my head is filled with differnt mold designs and what i could do with them.

Plus i dont believe the trend of rifle ammo getting faster and faster over the years is actually helpfull unless your long range hunting and want less drop. It seems like all the extra speed of the jacketed bullet just limits what shots you can take without bloodshotting an entire quarter or blowing it apart. A much slower cast load can do sufficient damage to vitals and have just as much penetration as anything, and do so without blowing your eardrums out and bruising your shoulder.

[RU shooter]

That 170 gr cast 308 bullet will kill any deer around just as dead as that "massive" 8mm your comparing it too not really that much difference in killing effect with only a .015 bigger bullet .

How I made the leap to cast for hunting and not just targets , simple said to myself ok I'm gonna try this . Loaded some up in my 35 Rem accuracy was good enough speed to do the job went out and shot a deer . Says to myself while I'm gutting it yep cast bullets work .

[quilbilly]

Wasn't much of a jump for me. I have hunted with a muzzleloader for decades using either PRB and sabot with SWC pistol boolits from my own molds. That experience made it clear that high velocity is overrated for most hunting except at ranges over 250 yards. Just came naturally to see if I could get all my other center fires to do the same. The only rifle I have that doesn't like CB's is my old 6mm Rem. The real joy was discovering my 338 WM loves cast and is now fun plus economical to shoot.

[Camba]

I used to buy cast boolits to economize and do more shooting; mainly with pistols/revolvers and muzzle loaders.
I have killed deer with my revolver an ml but I expected that from seeing how they work on paper.
Then I joined this forum and ever since, I had converted most if not all of my firearms to shoot cast boolits.
I have yet to kill a deer with my rifle boolits but since I mostly hunt in a place where centerfire rifles, pistols, revolver, are not allowed, I am always dreaming that I will get the chance one day. In the meantime, I have bought rifles and tested multiple calibers to find the prefer load for hunting but had not been lucky yet.
Making my own boolits and getting accurate results is a great accomplishment but I do give a lot of credit to the experts in Cast Boolit forum (here) for all the help.
Camba


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[Crusty Deary Ol'Coot]

Morning Cranky, hope you are having a good day!

I have cast for handguns for years, but it was maybe ten years back and already in my mid 60s that I began to think about what I could reasonably do in regard to shooting and hand loading that I had not already done at one time or another.

A bit earlier and looking for a good cast hunting bullet for my .44 mag handgun I became acquainted with the LBT (Lead Bullet Technology) Wide and Long Flat nose bullet profile. Then I began reading about peoples experiences with such bullets and even earlier recall the story about Larry Kelly of Magna Port fame taking his .44 mag to Alaska for a big bear hunt.

Well, the story goes that Larry and his guide were in a cabin at some point before the hunt started and a big critter with nasty temper broke into the cabin at which time Larry and the guide assumed a defensive posture along with laying a bunch of hot lead into the critter.

When it was all said and done and into the skinning part of the process, Larry found that all or most of the jacketed bullets fired from his handgun had NOT penetrated beyond or little the fat layer of the bear.

Larry went on to take a big critter with the .44 mag, the difference was that he was using some type of cast bullet instead of the soft and fragile jacketed bullets.

Well, anyway, I read lots of glowing reports on the effectiveness of cast Wide Flat Nose bullets so decided that hunting with my own cast bullets fired from a rifle seemed a reasonable step into an area I had not entered. The 45/70 seemed like a no brainer for a good cast bullet rifle, and I knew where a really nice RUGER #1 had been sitting on a pawn shop rack for an extended period of time.

It still took a measure of faith to take the cast bullets hunting in the 45/70 the first time, but it only took one critter down to make a believer out of me.

I did find that you DON'T need warp velocities and 400gr or more is better then lighter slugs.

That first critter with a 355gr WFN cast at 2300 muzzle was HUGE OVER KILL and left me wondering just what I'd turned loose on the game population.

A 465gr WFN at 1650fps has proved HIGHLY effective on deer and Elk!

Last fall 2017 I took two deer with a 280gr WFN fired from a RUGER 77/44 rifle at a muzzle velocity of 1750fps.. Both dead where they stood and complete pass through.

So, that is how I tool the leap.

Wish I'd done it years before!

Crusty Deary Ol'Coot

[pworley1]

No jump for me. I started out with cast back in the 60's and have not found a reason to change.

[Rcmaveric]

I have always like guns. I care a gun sometimes for work. I had always wanted to hunt. So when i was stationed in California. I bought my fist riffle. Well California bannes lead ammo and my earnest paychecks i couldn't afford ammo. So i got into reloading. Brought the price of ammo to a point i could afford to practice.

While crunching numbers I was looking at what my main expendures were. Brass was free so i was buying powder, primers and bullets. Bullets were the most expensive part and i was curious if i could make those. So i google it and found out i could.

I found a way to cast for everything I reload. I have no plans of ever shooting jacketed again.

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[Smoke4320]

Started looking at ways to shoot more and cost less.. discovered that powdercoating eliminated all the issues I had with cast bullets.. so acasting I went
its was a short trail down to getting my first cast kill.
Only gun I still shoot jacketed in now is a 6.5 Grendel as its my long distance accuracy gun

[bosterr]

I switched to handgun hunting back in 2000 when I put a nice ten point whitetail on the wall with a 10 inch scoped Contender in 357 Max. and 158 gr. XTP. I've taken deer every year since then with Encore and Contender pistols and jacketed bullets. The last 5 years my gun of choice has been a 7 1/2 inch scoped BFR in 475 Linebaugh. I shoot an Accurate 377395BG (gas check) with a good dose of H110. I've taken 6 deer with it so far, the farthest was 113 yds. I've yet to get a bang-flop so many have written about, except one that I spined. The rest only go 40/50 yds. I also took a doe with my Great Grand dad's 121 year old Winchester 94 32-40 with an Accurate Molds 323180C at 85 yds. Again, it went 40 yds. which seems to be the norm for me. A hole in and out on all of them pose no problem finding them.

[Texas by God]

I started casting boots in 1980 in .38 special for informal target and small game and .45 ACP for combat competition and bowling pins. I bought a Lee .309150f for my 30-30 and discovered it was the perfect Turkey hunting round. After joining this forum, I'm casting for all my rifles that shoot cast well. Certain ones(ARs and long range ) still get j-words only. As I've gotten older, fatter, and reflective I've decided that it's more fun to get a deer with a bullet I made myself at close range than picking them off at 3-400 yards with a 25-06. Next time I hunt(maybe today) I'll carry my 38-55 or 44-40 with home made boolits to the creek.

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[GhostHawk]

I was a .22lr and shotgun guy for decades.

Got into rifles late in life, was on a severe budget. Found a nice pair of Mosin's for 150$ each, then started looking at ammo. Soft point boxer primed ammo was not cheap.

Jacketed bullets were not cheap. But I had the basic tools to cast. A Lee Mold and a bag of gas checks, and a Lee sizer were not so bad. The advantage was that if I spent the same money on Jword bullets, when they were gone, i was done.

But with casting, you can continue to cast, and cast. Just need lead and time.

I started out with a pretty good stash of COWW and some pure. By the time that was getting low I had bought more.

I never looked back. Almost all my shooting is at paper targets, they don't care what they get hit with.

Now I have a hole stable of rifles, many of them single shots.
They all shoot cast.

I have a small stash of .224 jacketed for my .223rem, but even it is shooting cast.

Once you catch the bug your hooked for life

[daloper]

After many years I finally connected with my uncle and he casts. As he doesn't have any kids local and none of them ever showed an interest in casting or shooting , he passed it down to me and my brother. We cast to keep him in ammo for his 45 ACP. I purchased his .357 from him and he had all the stuff needed to cast for it. I already had a Ruger 480 and the cost to shoot that was more than I could do even with the reloading. Casting lets me shoot more so I don't save any money but I tell the wife I am.

[atr]

I started reloading back in the 60's when I was in high school. Got into casting to feed my .38 spl and .380 auto. From there I gradually got into casting for rifles; .303Brit and 30-06, 30-30. Decided to use cast for hunting when I moved to WA and was hunting in areas where the game was within range for lead cast. I didn't figure there was any need to have jacketed moving at 2800 fps if the game was within 150 yds and a lead slug at 2000 fps would do the job.

[toallmy]

I have not yet used my own cast boolits to take game but in the past I have used store bought Speer 44 caliber boolits on deer , store bought 50 caliber , as well as slugs . So I don't see a reason why not to .
I started casting planing on casting for a 50 caliber inline . Well to keep it simple wile I figured out how to cast I decided to try my handguns first because I was pretty comfortable shooting lead out of them now I'm moving over into casting for my rifles , it seams a natural progression . By the way I haven't shot my own cast in the inline yet .....

[FredBuddy]

In my retirement, I needed a challenge for my brain.

I found this site, and marlinowners.com. Between
the two, I saw how with minimal expense, I could
start casting my own. I have no fancy equipment,
just ladle pour into 1 and 2 cavity moulds I have
picked up along the way.

The daily challenges, the chase for solutions keep
me out of the bars !!!

The products from LEE and NOE are my friends
as well as the 2 websites I mentioned.

CAST ON !!!

[owejia]

Started out with 22's and shotgun. Could only deer hunt in my county with slugs. Then allowed cf pistols, 44 mag Ruger, cast hard leadbullets,shot at five deer and killed four. Muzzle loader also uses lead. Traded for my first cf rifle in the late 70's, used store bought ammo until I started to reload. Cast rb for a cap and ball revolver back in the 70's. Been using lead for a long time, so was really no big transition. That cf rifle is a 7mm mag and have only shot it less than 200 times as long as I've owned it. We used buckshot and slugs when I lived in Va for deer also.