Makes me cringe...

[JBinMN]

I feel we (most of us) are in this hobby for the enjoyment it brings us. If being OCD or just plain picky-picky adds to your enjoyment than have at it. Gp

Ditto.

I am a firm believer in," Choose & Walk your own path the way ya like.", as long as it is not causing issues for anyone else..


Or, "if ya don't like my gate, then ya don't have to swing on the hinges."


Suit yourself & do what makes "you" happy.

[Lloyd Smale]

you size your bullets? your deforming your base. are are you shooting blackpowder? Your base is being distorted every time you pull the trigger. That goes even for smokeless and it sure isn't going to be exactly the same every time. I guess if im looking for ultimate accuracy im using a gas check anyway. Maybe if your talking .001 of an inch in group size it might make a difference but id suggest you take some of your bullets you worry about and shoot them and then take some and drop them just like that guy did and shoot those. My bet is it doesn't mean squat. Heck I see competitors in handgun comp that think you have to true primer holes, clean primer pockets after every firing, trim there brass every time. Even go beyond sorting brass into matching headstamp to making sure all there brass came out of the same lot. weighting every bullet and about using a magnifying glass to check them out. ME? I shoot mixed brass NEVER trim a piece of pistol brass. NEVER clean a primer pocket and don't even look at the holes and as to sorting bullets I use my eyeball. funny thing is when I showed up they all groaned. No fancy holsters or 2000 dollar guns. Just the ability to shoot. Learned by spending as much time as possible practicing shoot and wasting no time on frivolous reloading practices. Like was said if you shooting comp your not shooting pc. Most cast bullet rifle comp is black powder where you need black powder lubes and pure lead (SOFT) bullets that are a lot more likely to get damaged.

[owejia]

If you want perfect boolits , believe they will have to be turned on a lathe, or precision ground, and handled very carefully, the edge of the base will need to be chmf slightly or a small raidus cut to break the sharp edge. About impossible to machine out of lead, probably brass or similar material. Kinda takes the fun out of shooting. A cnc turning lathe can do this.

[pmer]

Oh great, I'm just about ready to tumble coat some 45 ACP SWC LOL.

If you have hollow points you can set them upside down on pins or nails and spray PC them. I use a bed of sheet metal screws and the bases are safe that way. Spraying seems to produce better coverage for me anyways. The screws need to be a good inch away from each other for best coverage otherwise you'll run into troubles with Ohm's law. I think it's called the Farraday? effect.

Sometimes I wish there was a productive way to locate spitzer type boolits on the ogive for spraying.

[jsizemore]

Let's see. You drop them when cast, you coat and bake then you ram them through a sizer. Next you force them into a case and then you slap them in the rear end with 25,000+ psi of hot gas. ????

Try an experiment. Load some of both and have the most respected shooter you know try them on target. See how much difference it makes to satisfy yourself.

Above all else, confidence is a big factor. Skill and good equipment are right up there too. If you need to wave a dead chicken head over your stuff to shoot good, then do it twice.

[DonH]

I did not start this thread to be elitist. The "cringe" was partly tongue-in-cheek in acknowledgement of different philosophies regarding casting/shooting.
I have cast many thousands of hanging bullets, the majority being H&G 68s for .45 bullseye competition. I got satisfaction from making guys shot very good scores with. I though I was careful in technique and in handling. Then I fell in love with the kinds of single shot rifles made between the wars (Civil War and WWII).
Starting first in BPCR, I copied the practice of visually inspecting then weighing each bullet. This is very revealing. A 530gr .45-70 bullet can appear perfect and weigh 3 grains less than it's neighbor in the box. Bullets are cast from molds which drop bullets of correct size so no sizer ever touches the bullet. Then I got into Schuetzen where bullets are handled as carefully as a baby's backside. Why all the fuss just to shoot obsolete rifles, some with smelly powder? Well...
The Dale Reynolds mentioned by Here Frog shot two perfect targets, that is 10 shots each, 1.5" center ring, at 200 yds in 45 minutes. He has fired at least 1 group at 200 yds measuring less than .5" center to center. With an obsolete type rifle and rather soft plain base bullets.
A fellow BPCR shooter asked (hire) me to cast 2000 .45-70 bullets for him. When I got 200 I decided to cast the rest of his lead. When done I had 2700 530 gr bullets, each visually inspected and weighed. When I finished culling the 2700 bullets had a total weight spread of 3 grains. Each box of 250 had a spread no greater than .5 GR. The payoff? In addition to getting a barrel fitted/chambered I got the satisfaction of seeing him shoot groups at 300 yds that a man's palm would cover.
I relate this not to put myself above anyone. Rather, to say that this process teaches something of what Nick's, dings or casting defects mean.
BTW, for casting those big bullets nothing beats a Steve Brooks mold!

[Green Frog]

Don, as I’ve said here on a variety of topics, it’s just like John Sebastian sang, “...it’s like tryin’ to tell a stranger ‘bout Rock-n-Roll...” Our endeavors are so far out of the mainstream of even other bullet casters that our practices and reasoning seem incomprehensible. It’s not that they (or we) are wrong, it’s just that our priorities are different. BTW, give my best to the gang @ Beeson’s Range. I hope to get back some day.

Froggie

PS Speaking of moulds, the one I do best with in my Peregrine bench gun is a Jerry Barnett mould I got from our mutual friend Keith Foster when he found it too big to shoot unsized from his chamber, but it was perfect for mine. I lube the bullets as cast in my Dell lube pump and breech seat them the Peregrine. Although I can’t quite keep up with Dale and Jeff, I don’t embarrass myself.

[gnostic]

I wouldn't go so far as to call it OCD, but you might be overthinking it a bit. At some point, 'The Law Of Diminishing Returns' come into play....

[am44mag]

I do the ol shake and bake method with PC and I can't say I've seen damage to the base that can be attributed to that. Then again, most of my casting is for pistols, and is done in bulk for cheap shooting. I'm not shooting for tiny little groups or for competition. If accuracy was my sole concern, I wouldn't be powder coating.

[WinchesterM1]

I’m not the best shot in the world, but this was shot by my TC compass 308 with a 4-12 vortex scope at a distance of 75 yardsAttachment 245261

It is the Lee 160grn 312 6 cavity using 50/50 we/Pb PCed with HF red TUMBLED with NO BBs just took about 2-300 bullets with 2 tablespoons of powder threw it in a screw on lid container and shook the pisswater out of them for about 30 seconds then dumbed them on a mesh tray and shook them again until all of the access powder came off, baked for 25 min and then seated a Gator Al GC and sized to .310..... I don’t think it’s that bad

[popper]

145gr PB PC 100 yds, 2100 fps - 300BO AR carbine. Just tumble coated and WD after cooking. Working on a sprue cutting tool that gets very flat base with NO divots.

[Green Frog]

WinchesterM1, for what has been done with/to your bullets, that's very impressive 75 yard group. What DonH and I were talking about however is a group that size at 200 yards on a pretty regular basis. I'm not saying that what we are talking about here is wrong, for what it is, it's just that we're talking about two completely different kinds of shooting. Please don't take this as a put down or me as being a ****, it's just that we're talking about different things.

Regards,
Froggie

[303Guy]

145gr PB PC 100 yds, 2100 fps - 300BO AR carbine. Just tumble coated and WD after cooking. Working on a sprue cutting tool that gets very flat base with NO divots.

I went nose pour. Easily said when one makes smooth sided molds. Might be possible with wadcutters in regular molds.

I haven't made a new mold in a number of years now.

[lightman]

I'm not a big fan of Youtube. I've seen too many videos that show dangerous stuff being done. Not to say that there is not some good stuff on there.

I store my sized and lubed bullets in cigar boxes. Stacked neatly in rows with cardboard between the layers. But before I size and lube them I store them in large mouth plastic jugs. But I don't throw or drop them into the jug. I carefully place them in the jug a handful at a time. I'm pretty picky with my bullets and I have not noticed any damage from storing them this way.

[DonH]

It's been fun reading different perspectives. What this medium cannot show was the half grin on my face when I made the original post. I realize we all do what we do and how we do it for different reasons.
In the Schuetzen game bullets are cast in molds which if casting is consistent will drop bullets of correct diameter so no sizing is necessary. Bullets are pan-luber or lubed in a pump with an exact-fitting chamber for the bullet. The bullet is cast of a relatively soft lead-tin alloy and thus not allowed to come in contact with another bullet and are (at least in my case) dropped from the mold onto a well-padded surface. My .32 caliber bullets are stored in plastic pistol cartridge boxes, each in its own compartments. They are taken from the box one at a time and placed directly into a tool with which the bullet is gently inserted into the throat and rifling then a case charged with powder is placed in the chamber behind the bullet. This may be OCD and Schuetzen IS an arcane form of shooting competition.
If all this bullet handling sounds anal consider that the shooter is bound by ruled which limit him/her to rifles which are antique or of an antique type. Bullets MUST be plainbase thus velocity is generally 1450 fps or less and most matches are shot at 200 yes. A shooter has enough limitations without creating more by being less than careful with his/her ammunition.
I am not this fussy when loading for my 03A3 or Lee-Enfield but some habits are hard to break! ��

[Green Frog]

Amen Brother Don, you've got a witness! Preach on, brother.

As I said in previous posts, there is casting and there is casting, and the precision style we engage in for our particular form of insanity is certainly a little more fastidious than that for bullets destined for shooting at tin cans at short distances. It's a big tent we casters occupy and there's room under it for all kinds.

Froggie

[Petander]

This thread came to my mind tonight when I was picking single powder granules from my old Webster scale, loading 300 WM for 300 m BR competition next thursday. It's a j-bullet thing,I weigh bullets AND brass, do all the voodoo... Not because it necessarily matters technically - but I do shoot better when I know everything is exactly right, those 20 rounds are as uniform as it gets.

I enjoy this very much, OCD or not.

[DonH]

My logic is this: if I load 3 moa ammo and I am a 3 moa shooter I just may turn 3 into 9! Lol

[Green Frog]

My logic is this: if I load 3 moa ammo and I am a 3 moa shooter I just may turn 3 into 9! Lol

Don,

By any means of logic I can find, that would be reasonable... in fact, the very best I would hope for would be that the inaccuracies would be additive and they would become 3+3=6, but since we're dealing with tolerances, it is much more likely to describe the tendencies to make it a multiplication problem and go to a factor of 9. Does that mean you always have that big a group? No, even the proverbial blind hog finds an occasional acorn, but what you will be able to do on demand, day in and day out, will be a function of the worst of the tolerance factors, not the best. There's a fellow by the name of Murphy, and his law might be occasionally broken, but he will get you sooner or later!

Best regards,
Froggie

[Petander]

My logic is this: if I load 3 moa ammo and I am a 3 moa shooter I just may turn 3 into 9! Lol

Exactly.

I'm not a great shot so I need the best ammo/gun I can get.

Cleaned my 300 WM ,all copper out.

.

My first 75 m three shot group from the clean barrel:



Zeroing:

.

I need this (or better) accuracy next thursday in a 300m competition. Grouping from a Bore Tech clean barrel like this is very good news. I'll deep clean again for the competition.