Lubing buckshot

[OnHoPr]

Has anybody tried lubing their buckshot for better patterns? Such as graphite, mica, LLA, beeswax, grease, or other home remedies that would produce lubricity and better flow down the barrel and choke.:coffee:

[tomme boy]

I take my BS an put it in an extra tumbler with a couple of sticks of refillable pencil lead. I run it for a few hours outside as it is very loud. It coats them very nice with a coat of graphite like factory shot is. It also helps to round off the sprue cut.

[lavenatti]

It is surprisingly loud isn't it?

[spuddicus]

how much buckshot do you run at one time?

I usually run ~8lbs for a day and a half and those seem to come out very nice
Using a lyman 1200 that is.

[John in WI]

After reading a recent post about "tumbling buckshot" I found a kid's 3# rock tumbler at a garage sale.

I did like you guys said--a few inches of graphite, and let them tumble. And only about 1/3 full, that little plastic drum just rattled like you wouldn't believe! I tumbled (about a pound at a time) a coffee can of #1 and #F. They came out a nice even grey. They were hard cast, so the tumbling didn't help too much rounding out defects.

Anyway, the shot is pretty, and it made me feel good! But I haven't done any honest testing.

One person on CB recommended putting a small amount of Johnson's Paste Wax in the tumbler and letting it run for half an hour. I bet a good coat of hard wax would do the trick.

[OnHoPr]

I might try that John in WI. I tried pure Pb in my Lee .311 mold but they came out of the barrel/ choke combo badly deformed, so I started WQing WW. Then I tumbled them to smooth out sprues, but got a rougher matte finish. I load 19 pellets with a fed12s4 behind Steel powder in a 3 1/2" hull. Out of my Mossy with a mod. choke I get on average about 12 pellets in a bread basket at 40 yd. The other 7 pellets tend fly out of the pattern with a couple not even hitting the 36" test paper. The 12 .314 pellets in a consistent bread basket IMO at point of aim is huntable, but I'm looking to bring those other 7 pellets into at least the 24" circle. Thanx

[John in WI]

I hope the water dropped WW helps things out for you. I'm not sure if I mentioned it, but I hop up my WW with a bit of lino and a bit lead free solder (tin and antimony). The tumbling doesn't do much to round them out. I think they are just too hard!

But after blasting them into wet and dry phone books, the shot doesn't look too deformed. The soft buck I started with, some of the pellets would look almost splattered. No idea if that's from firing or from impact.

The other thing with buckshot is that velocity can have a serious effect on the pattern. My patterns get much smaller at the low end of the velocity range. Another thing BPI recommends (Buckshot Manual III) is using a good spherical buffer.

[pirkfan]

I dump my Do-It 1/10 oz buckshot in a tumbler and then spray it with a shot or two of Blaster dry graphite lube (homedepot), and tumble for a couple of hours. Gives the shot a nice slick coating

[Fla9-40]

Does anyone use the Lee alox for BS lube?

[SPRINGFIELDM141972]

Does anyone use the Lee alox for BS lube?

I don't for BS because it is in a shotcup. I do use it for roundball .690 loads. I haven't been able to tell if it helps with the leading wash or not, but I do it anyway.

Regards,
Everett

[Rattlesnake Charlie]

So, the original questions remains unanswered. Does lubricating buckshot improve patterns? BPI claims that their plated shot patterns are improved because the plating acts as a "lubricant" allowing the shot to better "flow" through the choke. Seems reasonable, but not yet demonstrated by empirical testing on buckshot. Maybe bumping this back to the top we can find someone who has done further testing. I'll be following this thread.