Lee TC 9mm mold, what alloy best for .380?

[ErikO]

I have a two-banger Lee truncated cone mold and my wife has a P238 on the way. What alloy should I use to drop ~90-95 gr pills for her little pocket gun to eat?

I have a bunch of WW, some Pb and a spool of Ti 'lead-free' solder.

Anyone have any suggestions on the right alloy to use?

[rexherring]

I've been casting a 50/50 WW/Pb in mine with no problems. I've been shooting a Bersa Thunder Plus .380 with 2 grs of Bullseye behind a 102 RN.

[ErikO]

I've been casting a 50/50 WW/Pb in mine with no problems. I've been shooting a Bersa Thunder Plus .380 with 2 grs of Bullseye behind a 102 RN.

Cool, that will work fine in my wife's P238 for sure. Thanks!

[Spud]

Erik, out of curiosity, what Lee mold do you have of that config that'll drop a 95 gr. boolit? I'm guessing a custom of some kind?

[LouisianaMan]

Same question as Spud. Are you sure you have a 95g mold?

I use the Lee .356-102-LRN-1R with "mystery metal" (WW and Pb, unknown proportions) and a dab of tin for fillout (1% or less), and my bullets weigh about 104g lubed. Works fine in low 900's.

At such velocity ranges, i.e. 600-1000 fps, my ideal is pure lead + <1% tin at the lowest vels, 50-50 + tin in the middle, and straight WW + tin with the autos at 900-1000. I notice little difference attributable to the alloy, so unless I intentionally want to use pure lead for heavy revolver bullets at low vel, any mix of Pb and WW seems fine; the tin makes a very noticeable difference in crisp, sharp fillout.

Lee Liquid Alox mixed about 50-50 with mineral spirits prevents leading problems; what little leading I occasionally encounter may come from soft alloy or undersized bullets. Only in one case was the leading an actual problem, though, and that was when the bullets were .308-.309 from WW and the groove diameter was .312.

[Spud]

I use the same mold as LM at same weight (104 gr.) and same alloy :) Stuff's pretty soft but works fine at any velocity I can get from a Colt 380 Gov't and an LCP using Alliant BE.

[ErikO]

I have the 120gr TC, was just wondering if there was an alloy that would drop closer to 100-115. I'd assume a higher tin content would bring the mass down, correct?

[Spud]

Linotype, mebbee close to the 115 gr. mark, nothing that I know of to 90 - 100 grs. in your mold. I could be wrong, wouldn't be the first time.


edit: get a different mold, they're only around 20 bucks. (2 cav.) Personally, I like a 100 grainer or thereabouts for 380 ACP.

[ErikO]

I can get behind that idea. :)

[Spud]

Erik, another thing about heavy boolits in 380: I loaded some j-bullets once (115 Hornady FMJ), don't remember the load, and wouldn't post it anyway. Suffice it to say they were safe in my gun. Anyway, sometime later I decided to chrono them and to my dismay found they were barely clockin' 650 fps. OK for plinking, paper, etc., granted, but was surprised never-the-less. This was in a Colt 380 Gov't with 3-3/4 in bbl. Expected a bit more, somehow.

Some have loaded 120 grainers in 380ACP safely and with satisfaction. Problem with cast projectiles that heavy is they have to be seated deeply sometimes causing case bulging and attendant chambering probs. You can experiment with the mold you have, just don't forget to don your thinking cap. Look in Lyman's Cast Bullet HB, there's data, albeit older, for a 120 gr. cast boolit, IIRC . Disregard all this if you know this already.