Wheel weight bullet size to small

[karlrudin]

Im using a Lyman #287641 for my 7-08 Rem. Its a 160 Silhouette bullet with a bore riding front end and 2 bands in the rear. I have been trying to work up loads for it but the best I can get at 100 yards is 2.25". On closer inspection and more reading than I care to admit, I found that the for-end needs to at least inprint the lands on the forward portion. The problem is, its .275 vs the .276 that I need. I know I need to add Tin to the mix to bring my alloy up to Lyman #2 but will the added Tin be enough. Help yall. :sad:

[craig61a]

You could try beagling the mold to get the size up a little bit.

[243winxb]

Antimony will increase diameter. Lower alloy temperatures may help also. You do not want frosted bullets . I just add linotype .

[Yodogsandman]

Adding a little tin will help, antimony is better. Casting boolits just right at the frosted temperature will also increase the diameter. Casting at lower temperatures for shiny boolits, will reduce that size.

Depending on the speed you want to operate at, heat treating will help accuracy over about 1800-1900 FPS. Faster speeds will also bump up the nose on acceleration at firing.

Also, while the nose helps initial alignment, the base does the real steering. Is your boolit sized to fit the chamber freebore and not just the bore?

[karlrudin]

151020Pictured here is one of my bullets that has been put into the breach. you can see that the lands inprinted on the ring. But the is nothing on the nose. I'm agreeing with the antimony. The forend needs to be larger and that would do it. The bullet is sized .285. These cases are already loaded in the 1950fps range guesstimate. Bullets are cast from W.W. and water dropped. Lee lubed and sized with aluminum gas checks which are glued on. My best group so far with these is 2.25" with IMR 4198, 24.5grains. poly fill and no crimp.

[bangerjim]

You can mess with the alloy.

...........or...................

Powder coating will increase any boolit 0.002 in diameter. I use it to take 356 to 358 all the time with excellent results. And PC has no leading! (in a proper fit barrel). You can skip the grease lube totally.

Easy way to add size to your boolits.

bangerjim

[jsizemore]

Casting around 640-650degF bought me .0003-.0005" depending on alloy. You may have to dump a little alloy in between pours to keep the spout from freezing.

[karlrudin]

I thank y'all for your input. I ended up pouring some more today with w.w. again. But I ended up putting a piece of aluminum tape inside the mold to shim it out. Worked like a champ and my boolit nose ended up a .277. Not to let them age up and load them up. We will see if this will work. Will keep y'all posted :)

[leadbutt]

Powder coating will increase any boolit 0.002 in diameter. I use it to take 356 to 358 all the time with excellent results. And PC has no leading! (in a proper fit barrel). You can skip the grease lube totally.

Easy way to add size to your boolits.

bangerjim

Im starting to think Jim collects royalties from PC manufacturers.:kidding:

L. Bottoms

[Nose Dive]

Karlrudin:

I read your post several times. And really, 2.25" at 100 ain't nothing to sneeze at for hunting and you didn't mention your 'use'... but, a 'shilouette' boolit mold makes me think your punching 'target holes' for competition. Right on!

I too like my boolits to pour .003 to .001 larger than bore lands. (.003 or so is my goal) I 'punch' size my bores and buy molds accordingly and this helps the issue your having. I sometimes get help with this very issue using some pewter, sometimes not. As mentioned above, alloys and temperature play a role. (yes, i water drop, resize, lube, all)

However, looking at your picture, (it's a bit fuzzy, (or my cataracts are fuzzy), it looks like the OAL my be playing some role here. When I load jacketed boolits, as you, I like the boolit 'out' as close to the lands in the 'head space' as possible. I have an old .270 I bought 'new' at a pawn shop in Fort Worth in the 70's. It has provided me with 40 or 50 whitetails over the years, all with my reloads. Now, keep in mind these are my store bought 'jacketed' variety of boolit. And, as you, i load them 'long' so they are all longer than the 'book' says they should be. Their OAL is bigger than the 'book' says. I do however keep them 'off the lands'. There is a technique to determine this and I won't go into that here, but,.... I do this as a 'safety AND Accuracy' step. When I load them 'too long' and they touch the lands, i get bulged cases and my accuracy drops. Simply, it causes high case pressure and things don't work the way the 'gun' likes them. I found, when loading my lead boolits, the same thing happens. My mold is 'big' and I water drop and resize and lube. But, the same thing happens.

Now I have a cousin who is a 'Mag-Man' 100%. If the firearm does not have 'magnum' somewhere in the terminology of the firearm, he turns his nose up at it. I do reload his .300 Weatherby (ARM CANNON) for him as he pays for everything...powder, primers, cases. It is a very nice rifle and I simply cannot shoot it. I hurts my arm, shoulder, ears...I think it dislodged an disc in my neck! UGH! But, he loves it, his rifle,,,his fun. 'to each his own'..

Roy Weatherby did alot of load and arm development before he came out with his 'mags'. He did well. And, upon my inspection of the ones I have had in my hands, i know he allowed a 'huge' amount of head space. I will not put in print here how long I reload my cousins rounds as it 'could tend to incriminate' me! And, his "MAG-Man" mind set is 'hottest powder-highest powder weight' is just too hot for normal, 'sane' shooters.... And I do have a written 'responsibility' release signed by him and witnessed by two others.... I will tell you he and I both hunt with Barnes all copper offerings. So...all that being said....

My observation for your accuracy issue may be 'load assembly' in part. Have you 'logged' the OAL of your loads as you work them up? Have you 'cheated out' a bit more and seen any improvement? Have you tried another powder?? Primer?? Brand of case? My old .270 above loves 4831 and loathes 4350. Why? I wish I knew!!!

And believe me, your concern of Overall Diameter, is dead on!... As noted above, i like all my cast boolits .001 to.003 bigger than my barrel, 'out of the mold'. Did you size the ID of the barrel? Have you identified a 'clear boolit OD target?... In some of the old mold manuals, i have on occasion found some 'fat' boolit molds that really turn you loose.... I mean... it lets you 'go shopping' for your OD desires via resizing inserts. I have three .38 caliber pistols.....EACH takes it's own resizing die! Each barrel is different.

Lastly, as I stated above.. My 'go to' solution for 99% of my casting woes is,,,Pewter...at varying degrees of concentration. And yes, I do 'cheat' up sometimes with pure tin.

I also suggest a bit of 'paper work'. Measure your loads, write it down. Note your alloy mix too. And then, be sure to note the loads 'performance' at the range. I have had many discerning stares while at the range with my beat up old note book. Simply, when I find something that is working, I like to 'know what it is' so I can 'repeat it'. And yes, I have had several people ask me to work up loads for their rifles and reload for them. And, with out product liability insurance, a fist full of lawyers and a million bucks in the bank.... the answer is always 'no, no can do'...

[ there is a 'durability' clause in my cousin's signed release. If he gives his father-in-law a few of my reloads and he blows up his gun and puts his eyes out. 'My cousin' will pay off his house note, feed his wife and dogs, pay off his kids school loans... You know, do what he should do as any dummy that goes nuts behind his reloading bench] Gee,,,did I just describe myself?

Nose Dive

Cheap, Fast, Good. Kindly pick two

[jcren]

If I may interject on the above, Berger Bullets website has the simplest description for finding a given loads "jam or jump" preference.

[karlrudin]

Well finally an update today since bullets had come of age Monday. To start, the groups went from the same to worse. But, let me fill in some blanks. Yes I am working up this caliber for target shooting. And I thank all the comment on my groups. Lets see, my load consists of Lapua 308 Win Palma brass. All brass has been necked down to 7-08 Rem, then neck turned down to .004 smaller than the chamber for a tight fit. I use a flash hole tool to clean up the holes. Which in this case, didn't need hardly any work out of 100 cases. Then the primer pockets are uniformed. Then all cases are trimmed to 308 Win trim length and chamfered with a VLD tool. Then cases are sorted by weight within .5 grain variance. Next my primers are Winchester SRP #6 1/2. Powder is IMR 4064 which for this test ranged from 35-37 grains in .5 grain increments in groups of 4. Finally, what I ended up doing with my mold was adding 1 thickness of aluminum duct tape to the inside of the mold to make up the size of .277 on the nose. These bullets were cast from W.W. and water dropped. Sorting out the culls for wrinkles or other flaws, then sorting them for weight. I ended up with a bulk group with ranged of 1 whole grain only culling 7 out of 100+ that were keepers. The bullets were then had aluminum gas check which was super glued on. Then they were sized using a Lee push through die of .285". Then I coated them with Lee Alox cut 30% mineral spirits. Then let sit for 2 days before weighing them into smaller batches of .1grain variance. After waiting 8 more days for the bullets to cure, I assembled 1 box to test. My OAL had to be adjusted to where the bearing ring on the bullet was not touching the lands but there were land marks on the forward part of the bullets. The only thing I omitted this time while assembling was not using poly fill. Since j bullet loads for this weight max run from 36 to 39 grains, I didn't feel the need to add the poly since the case was mostly full anyway. That might be my second mistake. More on my first in a moment. Shots of 4 were put on a different target for each group, with 2 j bullets to clear the bore afterwards then a 5 minute wait time between each group. Temp today was an average of 66' so there wasn't much need for a longer cool. The first 2 sets stayed withing the 2.25-2.5" groups. The 3rd group opened up to about 6" and the last 2 sets didn't stay on a 8.5x11" targets. My first mistake or problem I'm considering is the use of the Palma cases with the small primers. And my third mistake I'm considering is the use of a to slow of a powder. BUT this powder has worked for all of my loads from 7-08 up to 45/70. So I don't know about that one. Input on the small rifle primer thought or anything else encouraged. Thanks y'all.

[rosst]

i wouldn't let another j bullet near the rifle as long as i was going to use boolits
i would drop the velocity to 1600fps range

sometimes its just better to walk away from a certain boolit design/mold, your rifle just doesn't like it.

[Yodogsandman]

You are applying jacketed bullet technology to cast boolits. Cast boolits are slipperier that jacketed and generate less pressure than jacketed because of this.

You used too much medium burning powder for the hardness of your boolit, causing it to over spin and skid right off the lands.

Fit is key to accurate loads. A pound slug made from your rifle chamber can be measured to ensure a tight fit. Boolits get smacked by a lot of pressure at once when the powder ignites. The lead becomes "plastic-like" and can be formed and deformed. This causes the boolits to bend, obturate and rivet on firing. The tighter the boolit fit to the chamber and throat, the less it can smoosh itself out of alignment with the bore.

Start by cleaning your rifle barrel of all jacketed bullet fouling. Don't shoot jacketed if you want to shoot cast acurately without cleaning the barrel thoroughly.

Your boolits will need to be real hard to withstand the forces of pressure at those velocities generated with that much IMR4064 powder. Try to figure all this stuff out first at slower velocities where air cooled boolits will be fine. You can move up in velocities when you're OK going slower.

Your powder is too FAST for the boolit in those powder charge ranges. Start with small amounts of a faster powder from a good cast boolit reloading manual like the Lyman #4. Those powders suggested will be good to propel your boolit slower. Stick to published loads to start out.

Using small rifle primers is OK, unless you're trying to ignite large amounts of ball powders at low temperatures. Try some cases with large rifle primers too, to see if you like them better for your uses.