Lubing powder coated bullets

[Carrier]

I recently cast and powder coated some pure lead bullets for 44 Mag/Special for a Winchester 1892. I was worried about softness of pure lead so I went ahead and lubed them for some extra protection. Loaded them at 44 special velocities and they worked great with good accuracy and no leading. I then tried them without lube with the same load and had equally good results so I would say the lube didn't make any useful difference in my application. However, I did not shoot them over a chronograph so I cant speak to any added velocity with lube. Added velocity would be a useful thing if you need it but I'm just shooting for fun so I'm not real worried it.

The pc ones I shot with smokeless powder from my Trapdoor worked very well. After 20 rounds the barrel looked unfired except for the half dozen or so sticks of H4198 in the barrel and breach. The only reason I lubed them is I loaded some with Goex and hoping to try them this week.

[coffeeguy]

Carrier, please be sure and post your results, as I'm sure a bunch of us are interested in this. I haven't used my smokepole in several years and it never crossed my mind to PC my muzzleloading boolits...In a lot of respects I imagine it would be just like using a plastic sabot with a jacketed bullet...and I've never needed lube with the sabot.

[Carrier]

Finally got out to shoot these though it was at a 50 yard indoor range as it’s snowing like hell and cold. I’m really happy with the results. I shot 20 smokeless loads then switched to the 60 grains of Goex black powder ones and was really surprised as they were more accurate than the smokeless ones.
I shot the 15 black powder ones without cleaning the barrel or blowing between shots and had no issues with any buildup in the chamber as they went in the same as the smokeless ones.
When cleaning after the first 2 or 3 patches were some ugly but the water and Ballistol cleaned the barrel up and is as clean as it was when shooting smokeless powder. Most important to me there was no lead at all in the barrel.
There was a little lube at the muzzle so I guess there was enough on the pc bullets. I panlubed them using 50/50 beeswax and olive oil.

For some reason I can’t upload the pictures of the targets on this iPad and do not have a pc to use. I will keep trying to upload them as I’m pretty impressed with the groups giving my 61 year old right eye is half blind.

[Carrier]

The first shot with Goex was on the right of #5 then to the left then the two on the 5 then the last 10. Point of aim was at the bottom of the blue.
I’m sure there are many far better than me but I’m pretty happy for first time with this.

[Smoke4320]

Carrier now you are seeing the benefits of pc

[Carrier]

Carrier now you are seeing the benefits of pc

I always did see it but unless you cast and pc yourself there really isn’t anyone up here that does it. A couple companies are starting to but are behind the USA.
I did a quick calculation and these fifty 45/70 rounds of smokeless and black powder have cost me over $20.00 a round. Had to buy everything to cast and powder coat.

[brstevns]

I have tumble lube a few, to help in pushing them thru the Lee sizer die.

[indian joe]

If you are going to use BP, I think think a greese cookie is going to be the most important. Otherwise, swab the barrel after each shot. I’m just starting with BP myself. Normally I PC, but now with BP I’m going with paper patching. Maybe others have more experience and advice, but don’t see why you would need greese the boolit even with BP.

needs the grease lube to soften BP fouling - maybe dont matter if you gonna scrub the barrel every shot but shoot a few shots without grease lube and no scrubbing between shots - get the message fairly fast I think - been there done it with smokeyless lube and BP - you might do it better than me

[Carrier]

needs the grease lube to soften BP fouling - maybe dont matter if you gonna scrub the barrel every shot but shoot a few shots without grease lube and no scrubbing between shots - get the message fairly fast I think - been there done it with smokeyless lube and BP - you might do it better than me

Because I’m so new to the casting of bullets my big concern when I started this was to have zero amounts of lead in the barrel of this trapdoor. By powder coating it proved to me that this was possible when using smokeless powder and the benefit of not having to use any lube.
I wanted to try some black powder and knew I needed to use a lube to keep the fouling soft.
So far this has been a complete success for me.

[Big Boomer]

After beginning powder coating clip-on wheelweight boolits and trying to size them with a Star, it became obvious that the job was much easier with some lube. Now with all the pressure off the lube in the Star and the pump empty, there's no lube coming out when lowering the handle. If boolits are water dropped after curing the powder coat and left for a few days, I have to really press hard on the handle unless I keep a few lubed boolits in the calibers I shoot handy and run one through now and then. However, I do not lube boolits with the Star any longer. Big Boomer

[Carrier]

Does anyone lube powder coated bullets?

Did your question get answered?

[Toymaker]

This made me curious, so I decided to experiment.
The rifle was a Pedersoli 1885 High Wall in 38-55. I used Starline brass, 2.125"long, Lyman 378-674, 1.312" long, 0.379 as cast, 334 grains, 20:1 alloy, "Pete's" lube, CCI Large Rifle Primer, Swiss 1 1/2, 44.0 grains by weight, 0.03" Walters wad, 2 newspaper disks, compressed to get O.A.L. 2.934", no crimp. The first time I shot a 5/8" 3-shot group at 100 yards. The second time it was a 1" 5-shot group at 100 yards. I used the VFG wiping system between each shot with Moose Milk. These results were the baseline results for the test.

For the test everything was the same except the bullet. (The powder and the primers were even from the same containers) It was the Lyman 378-674 but cast from Lyman #2. They were cast at the same time, air cooled, and weighed. 20 were selected that were within 0.5 grains. They were powder coated with Smoke's red all at the same time. All were sized to 0.379" at the same time. At random 10 were selected and set aside = Group A. The other 10 were lubed with Pete's lube = Group B. All were loaded at the same time; one from Group A, one from Group B. Back and forth for the whole 20.

On the test day it was 51°F, 28% humidity, 5 mph breeze SWS, barometer 30.1 inHg, bright sun. Shooting was from a firm rest at 100 yards.
Group A was a 4-shot group measuring 1". The 4th shot was called slightly high as I got excited and touched the trigger a tad early. Again, the VFG wiping system using Moose Milk was used between each shot.


Group B was 8-shots trying to get a grouping as good or better than Group A. It didn't happen. The VFG wiping system using Moose Milk was used between each shot.


I would have thought that the Group B results would have duplicated the baseline results or, at least, been close. I'm inclined to test again and shoot over my chrony

[fredj338]

Question would be why bother? The point of coating is to NOT have to put smoky lube on bullets.

[Forrest r]

I've never tried pc'd bullets in any black powered firearm. I've never had any issues with pc'd bullets in revolvers, pistols or loads in hp rifles when the bullets did +/- 2600fps.

Last year I was testing pc'd bullets in a 30" bbl'd 308w. When I got in the 2700fps range this is what I found in the bbl.
[IMG][/IMG]

As you can see the throat area of the bbl is clean & the black streaks started 4"/5" up from the chamber. Same bbl at the +/- 15" or 1/2 way point in the bbl. The black streaks increased.
[IMG][/IMG]

The muzzle end of the bbl was totally black.
[IMG][/IMG]

I used bore-tech eliminator to clean the black streaks out of that ss bbl. It came out easy enough but I was bumbed out because I like what the pc'd bullets brought to the table. +/- 1 1/2" 10-shot groups @ 100yds 2679fps
[IMG][/IMG]

Same bullet with traditional lube.
[IMG][/IMG]

Same bullet tested above, but this time I not only lubed the bullet using a lyman 450 sizer, I tumble lubed them with 45/45/10. The groups shrank.
[IMG][/IMG]

Well the 45/45/10 worked on the traditionally cast/sized/lubed bullets so I figured why not and tried the 45/45/10 lube on the pc'd bullets. The 45/45/10 stopped the black streaks in the 308w bbl with those 2700fps+ loads. The bullet I was using wasn't designed for traditional lubes nor did it have traditional lube grooves.

[IMG][/IMG]

So know I use pc'd bullets for anything 2600fps or less. And pc'd + 45/45/10 for anything over 2600fps.

[Carrier]

Question would be why bother? The point of coating is to NOT have to put smoky lube on bullets.

When using smokeless powder but when using black powder a lube must be used whether the bullet is powder coated or not.

[Toymaker]

As Fredj338 says "Why bother?" - I was getting lead slivers in the first 4 - 6 inches of the barrel as the bullet got shaved trying to engage the rifling. A larger bullet only made the issue worse. Going from pure lead to 30:1 to 20:1 to 10:1 to Lyman #2 helped but didn't stop the issue. Going to powder coating stopped the issue.
As Carrier says, with black powder a lube is used to keep the fouling soft. This is accomplished by lubing the bullets or using a lube cookie. Alternately you can use a blow tube between shots or wipe the bore between shots.
Since I was testing I wanted to keep as much of the process the same between groups as possible. Since the unlubed bullets got wiped I wiped the lubed bullets too. While the baseline test used lubed bullets and wiping, using both with the PCed bullets may have been the cause of the poor results.

[Toymaker]

I repeated the test to see if the results were duplicated, but shot through my chrony to get velocities.
Group 1 - The PC and lube bullet gave 1,250 fps and a Standard Deviation of 4.20
Group 2 - The PC and NO lube bullet gave 1,241 fps and a Standard Deviation of 4.56
Group 3 - The NO PC, lube only bullet gave 1,259 fps and a Standard Deviation of 6.40

At 100 yards the Group 1 were all within 3 inches.
The Group 2 was smaller at slightly less than 2 inches.
The Group 3 was the smallest at 1.5 inches.

It was colder than previously, 30° versus mid-50's and there was a variable at 12 mph with 16 mph gusts.


The lube is 8 oz. of bees wax by weight; 6 oz. of Neats Foot Oil by volume; 1 bar of regular Neutrogena Soap.
The PC is Smokes.

[bmortell]

I want to bring this back because i remember something i forgot to add, and i dont think i saw it mentioned.

If your using a normal lube grove boolit powder coated and it sufficiently soft lead the lube grove will obturate out to a smooth sided boolit, and your base moves up to fill the difference. This ads variables since your changing boolit design mid barrel.

Is the base still as square as it was?

Did the lube grove fill evenly with lead?

here you can see a 10-11 hardness 44 mag keith fired at 1350fps from a 6inch barrel. The left is lubed as normal the right is PC'd empty lube grove.

First thing youll notice is my sizer needed lapped.

Second thing youll notice is the PC boolit lube grove has lead somewhat randomly squished into it, so its balance and base squareness probably isnt as good as the other one.

Filling the grove with lube removes that variable. But it also ads the variable of lube ejecting evenly or not which can affect accuracy also.

In this type of situation id suspect best accuracy would come from PC and a soft enough lube to eject quickly and evenly, i just cant test it because i cant shoot iron sights like a pro.

Other options are harder lead, PC a TL design if your planning on soft lead PC only.