Pure lead boolits with gas checks, how fast can i push them?

[bbwhais]

I was wondering if I could cast Lymans 358156 with pure lead and use gas check and push them to 1100 fps. I made a jig to hollow point these boolits and want to get rappid and violent expantion without leading. I am sizing to .359 and lubing with Lees 50/50 alox bees wax. These will be for defencive/preditor control use. The firearm is a Ruger GP100 6" barrel. Is this possible or just stay with hard cast?

[MtGun44]

Oh, yeah - it will be rapid and violent. Depending on the diam and
depth of the HP, they will probably just detonate and blow the whole
HP nose off. They will expand nicely at about 700 fps from a 2"
.38 Spl. I don't think you need anything like this soft for your
intended velocity. Even without a HP at all, I think you will get
excellent expansion (and maybe excessive) at 1100 fps.

Bill

[bbwhais]

1100 fps is what I shoot my hard cast boolits at, so that is where the sights are set for. I was wanting to have similar point of impact at 50 meters. Will the gas checks help scrape any lead deposited? If pure pb is to soft, would 50/50 pure and chilled shot be a better choice? If you needed expanding 158 gn 38cal boolits, what would your route be?

[btroj]

Start with 25 percent shot, 75 percent pure. Cast a few and see how they work. Increase shot until you find that happy place where accuracy, expansion, and no leading occur.
What powder are you using? 2400 is what I would use.
I would be as concerned about accuracy as I was leading. A soft bullet at those velocities is going to skid pretty bad in the forcing cone. A slower powder is going to minimize that but even so, you are asking a lot.

I don't shoot many HP bullets in handguns so I can really help with alloy for expansion. I can tell you that your idea on pure lead would be far better suited to a 800 to 900 fps load.

[44man]

I don't think so. You will get slump pushing them that hard. You can get leading and the check will just run it over. If you could recover some you might see the checks are also leaded. The soft lead will skid all the way past the check.
Checks are not lead scrapers.

[MtGun44]

I have a mold for a 158 with a small, shallow cavity, but I think that worrying much
about a HP is a waste of time. First, drive a non-expanding .358 boolit all the way
thru any animal in the right spot and you got him. Without a hp, I would bet
that a straight wwt alloy will expand somewhat.

Some take the approach that they want a large HP and a hard, brittle boolit
and intentionally blow the nose off to cause a bunch of damage from small
fragments and then drive the remaining base on thru, a bit like the
Nosler partition concept. I have never used this, only read about it, but
I think Glen Fryxell has written about it.

Look up Fryxell's articles on LASC site, I think you will find a lot of
good info there from someone that has done it, not just read about
it.

I have tested soft, no GC boolits for effectiveness at .38 Spl velocities
for a 2" snubbie, but not for hunting, and not for high velocities.
Pb expanding is a tricky topic, and why Jbullets have a jacket, to make
the expansion work over a wider range of velocities. I think you
can develop an alloy that will work, with enough experimentation,
but it will need a tough and not brittle alloy (lino is brittle) unless
you go with the nose blow-off approach.

Bill

[longbow]

What MtgGun44 said.

I can't comment directly on your boolit or caliber because I don't have one but I have messed with .44 mag in a Marlin a lot and have two HP moulds. Both are Mihec Cramer HP moulds with small, large and pentagonal HP pins.

Using ACWW, the solids really don't expand, the small HP's don't do much if any better and the large HP's/penta HP's literally blow up! At least that's what happened in my testing.

If you want a nice "mushroom" and expanded boolit to penetrate you will want a softer alloy and to be honest I am no expert here but 50/50 lead/wheelweights should do it and some tin will help too. I am sure a search will turn up alloy recommendations.

I think with pure lead, you will get leading and possibly poor accuracy due to skidding in the bore.

The nose blow off approach using ACWW works well if you want destruction at impact. Possibly even harder is better so water dropped or oven heat treated... or lino.

My H&G #503's cast from ACWW and with penta point blew the nose off in the first water jug but the remaining shank went through another 3 water jugs. That was a 245 gr. SWC Keith design with large HP and four 1 gal. water jugs.

I am using the same technique with the new Mihec 316410 130 gr. hollow point for my .303's and the boolits explode in the first water jug with only fragments leaving the back side.

The simple answer is ~ try using HP'd ACWW and see if you get the results you want. If not, then you will have to try harder for more fragmentation or softer for more expansion.

Longbow

[Larry Gibson]

I also cast the 358156 of basically pure lead and HP them. I also push them to 1000 -1100 fps out of my .357 magnums also with no leading. I used Javelina or other 50/50 lube. I've never had any such HP "detonate" or blow the nose off when cast of such soft alloy at such a low velocity. Expansion has always been excellent. I HP them with a Forster HP tool.

My velocity level has always been determined by when accuracy falls of with the softer alloy. 1000 - 1100 is about the max velocity with accuracy in my revolvers and Contenders.

Larry Gibson

[Scharfschuetze]

This topic brought to mind the 1970s creation by Lyman of a two part bullet mould. You cast the boolit body of hard alloy and the separate nose of soft alloy and somehow put the two parts together for a bullet that would achieve high velocity yet expand with the soft nose. As I recall they were cut for the common revolver calibres.

Does anyone else remember them? I wasn't much interested in it as the process looked a little too much like "work" to me. I never saw one or knew anyone that tried one and I guess most everyone else was of the same opinion as they didn't stay in the Lyman catalogs or advertising for very long. Must have been around 1977 to 1978 or so.

At any rate, if you could find one, that might be a solution to the original post as they were designed to do just what the OP wants.

[MtGun44]

Pouring a small premeasured slug of pure lead (like a cut down 9mm case on a
wire handle) into the mold and following it with linotype a couple seconds later
had been reported to give a nice hunting boolit with an soft nose and harder
base. As pointed out by the original author that I heard about it from,
Ross Siefried in Rifle or Handloader mag, you only need about a dozen of
these because they shoot exactly like the mono-alloy versions, just use the
softpoints for actual shots on game and a dozen should last a while. All
sighting and practice is done with the regular boolits.

As to blowups with too high velocity, this is the result with soft range lead
about 8 BHN, from a 2" snubby S&W.
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=52430&d=1307446037
The same boolit in a 6" pistol
blew the whole nose off with a load of 6 gr Power Pistol, which is about
1000 fps or so. Test media was saturated phone books, which is identical
to newsprint. Penetration in this media is right at half of what is obtained
in ballistic gelatin, so this would be 9.5-10" to the front of the boolit.

Bill

[dondiego]

Sounds like a .22 LR only larger. Soft lead, HP, similar velocity..............

[detox]

I think Ellmer Keith used an alloy of 16/1 lead tin. Lead/tin bullets give nice mushroom expansion. Antimony or too much will cause breakage.

Here is a good Handloader magazine artical: Velocity, Expansion and Personal Experience
http://www.riflemagazine.com/magazine/PDF/HL285PARTIAL.pdf

[blackthorn]

If you go to the "Mould Maintence and Design" forum and read the "Sticky" by Bruce B on casting 2 part bullets. It has been there almost forever!

[Green Lizzard]

shot a lot of upside down hb wadcutters 2" snubby water jugs massive expansion