Why Pure Lead for Black Powder??

[Al. H]

Hi,
I'm new to bullet casting and black powder - all sources say pure lead must be used for black powder guns but no one says why. I understand that hardness increases with increased antimonium and tin - but why is increased hardness a problem?
I'm in Finland and have had trouble sourcing pure lead at a reasonable cost. I've been using lead from a scrap metal dealer - its not pure but I've no idea of how impure. Its harder that pure lead bullets and balls.
When shooting the scrap lead out of my uberti 1851 colt accuracy is far better than using the shop pure lead balls. Last year I put 1500 balls down the barrel and barrel shows little sign of wear (its still blued on the inside). I've noticed the same with a uberti 1858 Remington and 1853 Enfield but I've shot them far less.
So...whats the deal why is pure lead so important for black powder guns??
PS - I'm target shooting not hunting and I use the smallest BP load possible on 25m pistol and 50m rifle range.

[MBTcustom]

Most of it has to do with muzzle loading. If you have to poke the ball down the barrel from the bore, and that ball/boolit has to fully engrave the rifling, then it had better be soft lead or your going to need a hammer.
The other reason, is that soft lead obturates the bore more effectively than hard lead does. However, if you are shooting cartridges at targets, you may find that best accuracy will be with an oversize boolit that fits the throat well, and is of a slightly harder alloy like 20-1.
Some of this is tradition, there are many many myths that castboolits has put to rest, and how to size your boolit to fit your gun is the same no matter what propellent or firearm you are using.
Slug the bore, make sure the boolit is at least .001 oversize, or fit to the throat/lead in of your rifling, experiment with lubes and powder charges till you get what you're after.
Every time, same thing.

[Al. H]

Thanks - in the revolvers the bullets are sized when pressed into the cylinder - a thin ring of lead is sheared off. The Enfield does require the bullet to be rammed down - I've noticed that the more difficult the bullet is to load (ie tighter) the better it shoots!
I've experemented with all types of lube and not noticed a difference.
However, if the revolers are loaded thus: powder + thick wad + grease + ball + grease you can shoot 100 rounds and still have a clean barrel and mechanism as free as the first few shots. Do anything else and after 40 shots the gun starts to sieze with BP residue.

[44man]

Patched round balls or maxi balls in a rifle need to be soft.
I use a bore size ball and thick patch in all of my guns. The ball is actually engraved .005" from the bottoms of the grooves. I would never pound a hard ball in.
As long as you can load, hard works fine and I have been planning on doing that with my cap and ball. I load the cylinder out of the gun. You need to be careful the loading lever does not break while loading the cylinder in the gun.
I use STP oil treatment on the cylinder pin, keeps the gun running longer.
I also use thick BPCR lube over the ball, it does not blow away so easy.

[Wayne Smith]

It is the revolvers for which this is the rule. Harder lead will bend or break the loading lever as you try to shear off that ring of lead. Usually I use a greased wad under the ball and that's all that I need, but then I haven't tried to shoot 100 rds. straight, either. With a patched round ball in a rifle or an undersized mini ball that has a hollow skirt and will expand it really doesn't matter. Cartridge rifles typically used anything from 1-16 (Sharps) to 1-20 (Remington) and worked fine.

[StrawHat]

To further muddy the waters, some of the great hunters of days past would harden the alloy when casting round ball for their muzzle loaders. Usually larger bore guns like the 16 bore rifle and up. They would typically use a smaller ball than what is commonly used today and a thicker patch. When I shot muzzle loading rifles a lot, I found the smaller ball and thicker patch worked well in the field for hunting accuracy. It also made for a faster reload. For one rifle, rather than one thicker patch, two thinner ones did the trick nicely. And when the bore fouled, I could just use one patch and accuracy was still acceptable for hunting.

[JeffinNZ]

I cast my .40cal Minies out of 40-1. Some of our members make RB from WW and report good results.

[mooman76]

You don't "have" to shoot pure lead out of MLs. Sometimes it is better but if all you have is hard lead, then use it. You can adjust your loads for the harder lead if needed, i.e. use a slightly thinner patch, or in a revolver you could use a slightly smaller ball if the force needed to seat it is too much. Every gun is different so you may not even need to change anything. If you have shot that many and are doing that good, I would just keep doing it or as the saying goes, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

[malpaismike]

Hello the camp! You'll find that what works for you is just that --forget the 'rules' Virtually all my bp cartridge and bp rifle boolits to date have been ww. They work: they load, they fit the arm, they hit the target--if I do my part. There is no doubt that the accumulated wisdom has merit. Soft--pure--lead balls seat in percussion cylinders better/easier. By the same token, I throw .454 balls for my ROAs, cuz they load easier han .457. On top of that, I have shot all 12 stages at Winter Range and Border Town without cleaning. I consider 20:1 optimum for bp rifle with good grease grooves--a gas-checked boolit can exceed 2000fps with no leading.
Enyyhoo, welcome to the club; the water's fine. Feel free to ask any bp question, or winning lottey numbers--malpaismike@msn.com. See ya round the campfire. mm

[Al. H]

Thanks for the advice - I'll carry on just the same.
The scrap lead balls load easily onto the revolver which I load in the gun without a stand - Just like in the good ol days! I have two cylinders load both then swap them - it helps keep the cylinder turning freely and is faster (time on range is always limited).
As for the rifle I think there is inconsistency of size when casting - my guess is the temp fluctuation and the Lee mould. Plan is to upgrade to Lyman for a more consistant bullet.

[malpaismike]

Al H, before you start tap dancing with new molds, consider investing in CerroSafe, from Brownell's. It is a sorta-low-temp process for getting an accurate chamber cast. This, in turn, will optimize bullet sizing. I started to have fits with a .38-55 ww boolit; too small as-cast for my Win 94. I beagled it and got ww to work, but not great accuracy. I finally made a chamber cast--really oversize. Before getting a custom mold, I cast some 20:1; that did the trick. hth mm

[troy_mclure]

i have an euroarms new army .44 c&b. i sheared the pin to the loading arm when i mistakenly cast some .454 balls from lyman #2.

[missionary5155]

Greetings Al. H and welcome to our lead home.
In my .58 Zouave I found 40- 1 makes the best RB. Fills out perfectly in my Lyman .570 mold and there is little weight variance. 50-50 shoots just as well but with a thinner patch. In my smoothbores I go the same route generally. Have to say pure WW shoots just as well as long as it is loaded with the proper patch snugness. Above caliber.54 I do not get concerned about RB expansion on target as caliber .58 and larger make a big enough hole on thier own to get good leakage. If I ever get to pop a bear I plan on using 50-50 mix as I want good penetration. Probably will use a caliber .60 and larger.
In my C&B revolvers they are all loaded with 40-1 or plain range scrap which is soft. As I have heard about broken rammers I stay away from any lead balls that are hard or excessively over diameter.
I hope someday to get to your area of Europe. My grandparents were from the northern Polish / Lithuania area. They left through Warsaw early 1923.
Mike in Peru

[MikeS]

As was already said, there really aren't any hard and fast rules. If the lead you have is working for you, then use it, and don't worry that it's not pure! The only thing to watch out for concerns the lube. Some lubes will combine with the BP residue, and create a tar like sludge that's really hard to get out of the gun. Make sure the lube you're using is BP friendly (there are several BP lube formulas in the lube forum's stickies), and you should be good to go.

You mentioned something about having problems with a Lee mould, and replacing it with a Lyman mould to 'fix' the problem, and that might not be a good idea. Is the Lee mould a hollow base mould? If so, it's designed to bump up to fill the bore (with a smaller diameter to ease loading in a fouled bore), and if your lead is too hard the base might not be expanding to fill the bore. Also you might want to check in the stickies, and checkout the one about Leementing a mould, that might help your mould. And yet another thing to consider, new Lyman moulds seem to be having trouble with many of them casting undersized boolits, so if you do want to go with a Lyman mould you might be better off finding an older used on, rather than buying a new one.

[Tatume]

Wheelweight metal works fine in patched round balls. I shoot lots of WW balls. Old timers used to use hardened round balls on dangereous game, many in Canada still use hardened balls on moose and brown bears.

[DIRT Farmer]

The old rule was the ball had to be soft enough to take the "weave of the patch when loaded. Think of the patch as a clutch between the ball and the rifling. If the weave of the patch is imprinted on the ball, there is a positive grip on the ball by the rifling and no slip when firing the shot. As we know in shooting cast fit to the rifling is king. It all depends what your need is. For hunting my 28 ga smooth bore is good to 100 yards. For small bore shilliotee my 40 Green Mountain requires a .400 ball and .0015 ticking in a swabed bore.

Patched round ball and revolvers are a whole different game. If it loads well and shaves a ring it should be good to go. Remember, the recomended moulds are designed for pure. You may be getting a different size ball.