lead bullets coated with polymer paint

[FLDad]

Has anybody tried curing the poly powder-coat with infrared lamps? Seems like it would work, and a lot cheaper than buying another oven. And if Rick459's experiment works out, it could be simpler still: spray, let cure for a week, load! This is getting very, very interesting.

[Silver-Silver]

for dipping and curing and I am using a heat gun to do both.

Shooter6 is using a heat gun to do the curing on powder coat. 350-450 degrees is pretty warm for infra red heat lamps. I am sure it could be done if they are close enough to the surface of the boolits.

Why not look into a toaster oven? It is what I plan on using once my powder gets here. They are cheap on amazon. I bet you would spend more on lamps, holders and wiring than using a toaster oven from Amazon.

As always buy at your own risk and I have no affiliation with the company...
http://www.amazon.com/Proctor-Silex-...526977&sr=1-20
$25.00 and free shipping. That will be hard to beat

With enough people trying different things. We WILL figure out the best/cheapest way to coat boolits.

[Four Fingers of Death]

$44 a can

http://www.bottompaintstore.com/silv...ng-p-9483.html

HaHa! We had a beer which came in a silver coloured can, it was called silver bullets.

[Shooter6]

The trick to using the heat gun is to monitor the temp. because I am using a 500 grain bullet I can heat it up to a little more than 90 to dip. I wait until it returns to 80 knowing the core temp. and not just the exterior is about 80 or a little more. You have to rotate the slug over the heat gun to get a even temp. then after I dip the bullet into the protec I slowly remove and tap off the excess. Then I turn upside down and heat to about 250 from the top. I don't dip the top. I drill the tip and screw a small eye hook into it to hold while curing. I then push a tooth pick through the hole and suspend over a bottle to cool down. I feel this does a good job to cure and it slowly cools. I am using a .616 slug 515 grains with out lube groves that seems to come out great and shoots to about a 6" group the first shooting. I don't know how you could do what I am for a pistol bullet. I going out today to try some more loaded bullets and still putting together the components for building a fluid coating rig.
One other thing. Be careful what kind of plastic you shoot in a gun for a coating. PVC plastic has a nasty habit of giving off a bad gas that will corrode metal. One of the shooters on the savage board makes a CNC sabot out of PVC to shoot a .338 rifle bullet out of a 50 cal and he cleans right after he shoots to keep the bore pristine

[FLDad]

The toaster oven suggestion is brilliant. That pretty much clinches it: I will try this out soon. Both the hot-dipping and powder gun methods have advantages, but the dip method keeps the investment to a minimum so it makes sense as a starting point. Then maybe one of the liquid paints for comparison... it's almost like our hobbies have hobbies!

Now for the big question: what color first?

[Shooter6]

I have done my second shooting session and I am pleased with the results. I now have a plastic coated bullet the shoots as good as the more expensive sabots in my gun and no leading. I do want to try some of the Sandstrom to compare and will probably get some sooner or later. would like to split up a Qt. with some one in the future. Any on from western Mass. want to try?? Next step is to build the fluid coater for a more consistent coating.

[wrinkles]

While all these powder coat experiments are great they are not practical if you are going to shoot lots of rounds. Individually dipping each bullet in powder coat then individually setting them on a sheet with wax paper in order to bake, all the while using tweezer, is too much hassle.

I like the idea of tumbling them to apply the paint until they are dry.

[Shooter6]

I am going to order some 9mm and .357 or 38's from bayou bullet next week if they will ship to Mass.
I am going to make a prediction that lubing lead bullets is on the way out. As soon as coated bullets become available from larger manufacturing I can not see any one using a lubed bullet or very little.
The price is very competitive with what lubed I can buy now and feel it will go down more eventually.

[Four Fingers of Death]

While all these powder coat experiments are great they are not practical if you are going to shoot lots of rounds. Individually dipping each bullet in powder coat then individually setting them on a sheet with wax paper in order to bake, all the while using tweezer, is too much hassle.

I like the idea of tumbling them to apply the paint until they are dry.

The bullet coaters in Australia all tumble the boolits and pour in the liquid 'paint/coating.'

All of the tumblers I have seen so far were cement mixers. they tip them out on a belt or surface to dry.

The only area where they are a spot of trouble is with black powder because the lube won't stick to them. Most of the guys I know who aren't dedicated BP shooters, use coated boolits for the occasional BP shoot that they attend, but just put a cardboard wad and a dob of lube or a lube cookie under the bullet.

[Orochimaru]

A couple of quick notes about powder coating, as it is something I have some experience with... One of my other hobbies is making guitar stomp boxes (effects pedals), and I powder coat the aluminum boxes that house the electronics. It is by far the most durable finish I've worked with.

1) To properly flow the paint, the surface temperature of the coated surface has to reach a given temperature (specified by the powder) for a given length of time. When looking at powder, the specs will say something like 400 degrees @ 10 minutes. This is vastly different than cooking in a 400 degree oven for 10 minutes. A non-contact surface thermometer is typically useful to help you learn the heating time for the metal you're working with.

2) Do NOT use an oven that will be used for food preparation for powder coating! I picked up a very basic toaster oven for about $10 that will never see food prep -- just powder coating.

3) Powder coat outside or in a well ventilated area. The powder itself is harmless, although it can be a lung irritant, so a basic painting mask is fine. However, when it flows, it does out gas for a very brief period of time, and some of the stuff is toxic if in sufficient quantity. Some people I know who powder coat use their garage. I use my back porch which is three-sides of windows.

4) Just like with any other painting process, surface prep is important to the adhesion. I haven't tried bullets yet (although I'm going to now that I've read this thread), so I don't have any magic surface prep tips to share yet.

5) Powder is cheap and available, and a little goes a long way. "Powders Buy the Pound" and Eastwood are a couple of sources that I've had good experience with. PBTP has "heavy duty" and "hi temp" powders, although I fully intend to start with their regular ol' powders.


If you're going the electrostatic route (which is what I have), you need an air compressor and a powder coating gun setup (gun, air line, paint container, power supply). The part to be painted is grounded, and the gun's power supply charges the paint powder on its way out. The charged powder is electrostatically attracted and held to the grounded surface. Once sprayed, into the oven it goes.

You CAN get adhesion of the powder if the target object is heated up. A lot of powder coaters pre-heat what they're painting a bit to assist with the adhesion.


For my aluminum boxes, I suspend them from a wire hanger, but for bullets I think I would try placing them on a metal baking sheet on some aluminum foil. Ground the foil and spray away...


Powder coating is *incredibly* tough stuff and VERY hard to remove, even when trying (I learned this by making mistakes!!). Eastwood sells some nasty stuff specifically made to dissolve powder coating, and it is the only stuff I've found apart from sanding wheels that even touch it.

If there is enough interest, I'll coat a batch of bullets I just cast, and report back on the process. I also posted my process for powder coating boxes on an electronics forum. If there is interest and it is permissible to do so under the TOS of this forum, I'll post a link to it.

[Silver-Silver]

You should definitely post your results.

What is the TOS section of the forum?

If you hit the bullet with a hammer, does it cracking severely? It may sound like a messed up test, but I am thinking of high pressure and contacting the rifiling could cause everyting to crack off the bullet.

If you find pre-heating is helpfull please let us know what temperature.

I know it was mentioned before of using automotive paint, has anyone tried a few bullets?
Any other liquid paints people can think of that would work?

[Orochimaru]

Here is the thread (3+ years old) from the guitar effects site I was referencing above.

Remember -- these enclosures are built for looks as much as function, so I put some extra steps in for appearance sake. I suspect for bullets that much less preparation will still get the job done.

http://www.diystompboxes.com/smfforu...?topic=71244.0


Anyway -- I did not have time today to do any testing, so I'll share results when I can (hopefully tomorrow or Friday).

[Orochimaru]

I made a few attempts at powder coating...

The method that seemed to work the best was to place the bullets, base down, on a cookie sheet lined with aluminum foil. With the sheet/foil grounded, I powder coated the bullets in the normal manner. This produced a thin, but rugged coating that easily survived a run through the sizing die.

I also smashed several of them with a hammer with no loss of the coating. It flexed with the bullet -- so this is promising.

Problems:

1) I have not had a chance to fire (or even load) them yet... and won't for a while thanks to work...

2) This method creates a jacket, it does not enclose the base of the bullet with powder.

3) The powder inevitably sticks to the aluminum foil and the bullet. When the bullet is removed, some foil come with it -- envision a very thin aluminum gas check.

4) On bullets with a sharp plateau, the powder coat was very thin. I think this was a technique error, though, and not systemic. I did not have much of the selected color left, and did not have good flow through the gun. Round nose bullets, on the other hand, coated beautifully and evenly.

I'll report back when I've had a chance to test them. I selected a very bright yellow so I will be able to see what, if any, residue/chips are left by firing.

[Hang Fire]

I am reading all the experiments and results with great interest and appreciate all the effort put forth by the experimenters. I think before this is all said and done, soft lubed boolits will go the way of the buggy whips.

[Orochimaru]

Here are some results from my initial powder coating experiment...

This is a tray of boolits (cast a few days ago) of which I did nearly nothing to prep. They are on a small toaster oven tray which is covered with a sheet of aluminum foil. These bullets have been coated, but not yet baked.



The powder in question called for a 10-minute flow-out at 450 degrees (surface temp), followed by 20 minutes at 400 (surface temp). I tried to pick a color that would be easy to see if it flaked into the barrel.


Here is a 38SPL from this test:




And a 45ACP:



Which I then proceeded to smash with 3-4 hammer hits...




The small, ragged areas at the base of the bullet are caused by the powder sticking to the aluminum foil. The sizing die removes this -- neither of these bullets had been sized at this point.

So -- what I don't know yet is how these behave when fired. Do they need lube? Who knows? Perhaps a light pass of Alox + Mineral Spirits?

[Four Fingers of Death]

We shoot truckloads of polymer coated bullets in Australia and I have never heard of anyone lubing them or applying any other sort of preparation.

Would you be better using a piece of wood, drilled to accept the nose of the boolit? This would leave the bases sticking up and when sprayed and dried off, the base of the bullet would be intact. Also, they should break away cleanly from the wood. The nose would be uncoated, but, I can't see that being a problem as it doesn't touch the bore anyway.

[FLDad]

That would make it difficult because the boolits still need to be grounded. Maybe a piece of sheet metal drilled at intervals would work. Matching the shape of the nose to an appropriate diameter should be pretty easy, and the shoulder would keep the base from falling through.

[Four Fingers of Death]

That would make it difficult because the boolits still need to be grounded. Maybe a piece of sheet metal drilled at intervals would work. Matching the shape of the nose to an appropriate diameter should be pretty easy, and the shoulder would keep the base from falling through.

I have seen electrical current used often but, I didn't realise that you had to pass a current through when powder coating. That adds another variable as they say. Isn't lead a non -conductor?

That is what I meant about the holes, so the point sits in the hole and the shoulder butts up against it.

Could you roll them down an incline while you spray them or spray them as they tumble? Seems like you are trying to re-invent the wheel with this, but I don't have any knowledge of powder coating (except that it is virtually impossible to remove if you decide it isn't suitable).

I had a very knocked about SAKO that some dill had got buffalo blood all over in the Northern Territory and then used a big wire brush to clean the rust off, D'Oh! I had a mate convince me that powder coating was the way to go as he had done a few 22s that way. I got the SAKO powder coated, but the coating got into the screw holes, which I managed to fix, but the external parts such as the bolt release, etc, wouldn't fit as the thickness of the coating interferred with the fit. All sorts of things were tried and it ended up in the acid tank at the auto radiator repair shop overnight. Didn't make a dent in it! Ten days later the finish was finally removed on a wire wheel and the rifle re-finished. Strangely enough, it still shot ok! My mate oiled it and put it aside until he was firing up the blueing tanks. A week or so later he rang me and said he needed a SAKO action for a custom gun and he had built a series of them on exactly that action and he was unable to source one like it. I ended up swapping the rifle which was in the white and the old stock for a nice rifle in great condition, I can't remember what rifle I got for it, but I remember being very happy with the deal at that time, lol. Powder coating is ultra tough! I can't for the life of me figure why I didn't try a blow torch on it.

The stock ended up getting sold by the gunsmith at a gun show and the barrel ended up replacing a shot out one on another SAKO. The new owner was told of the history of it and got it cheap and it worked well apparently.

[Orochimaru]

For powder coating, the recipient surface must be at an electrical potential that attracts the charged paint particles. In this case, the objects must be grounded. Lead *is* a conductor -- it just isn't as good as something like silver or copper (by about a factor of 10). It is, however, good enough to electroplate and good enough to accept powder.

Powder will also adhere to warm/hot surfaces. I messed around with that a bit, too, but without much luck. I have not yet hit upon the temperature where the powder sticks but doesn't start to flow-out and get sticky (I had one batch where they all tried to stick together...). The other thing I'm not sure about using just heat is how to control the amount of powder. The electrostatic process is rather self-regulating. As the surface gets thicker with powder, the less and less new powder wants to stick. The heat process seems to have no such limits. I made one 45 that was so thick with powder that the lube grooves were completely gone! That's no good!

I'm not sure that I'm going to spend any time worrying about powder not completely covering the base. It doesn't contact the barrel, and as long as the local indoor ranges will accept my bullets as meeting their requirements, I'll be happy. They allow plated, jacketed, and semi-jacketed bullets -- the latter two having exposed lead at the base. The key seems to be no lead against the rifling of the barrel and (perhaps) no heavy lube.

Powder is REALLY tough stuff, as you pointed out. The only things I've been able to use to remove mistakes are physical abrasion (80 grit sandpaper / heavy wire brush) and some stuff specifically designed to remove powder coating (made by Eastwood). However, the key to getting it to BE tough stuff is surface prep. This first batch featured almost no surface prep at all other than a quick baking to try to reduce moisture. Perhaps the next batch will get a quick run through a tumbler with corn cob first.

[Four Fingers of Death]

The military have used open based bullets for yonks at high pressure and at ridiculously high temps in machine guns in combat situations and lead running out of the jacket was never a problem.