is there hardness to the coating

[Lloyd Smale]

Say if a guy is pushing soft bullets at rifle speeds. Will they strip through the rifling like a soft lead bullet has the tendency to or is the coating hard enough to grip the rifling? Does this stuff act more like a jacket or more like a lubricant? Did some today for the beo and they were cast out of #2 and I water dropped them out of the oven and final sized them to 501 and was wondering if I'm gaining anything by water dropping them.

[noisewaterphd]

Does this stuff act more like a jacket or more like a lubricant?

Neither. It acts like a powder coating.

You can coat dead soft lead and keep it from leading according to some others on the forum.

But, if you are dealing with any kind of pressure, alloy hardness is still going to matter for accuracy.

[Smoke4320]

Air dryed 98/2 alloy
in a 358 Winchester I was able to get to 2100 FPS using WW and 2% HBS No gas check and shoot very accurately at 100 and 200 yds
Then gas checked and got to avg 2369 FPS .. I stopped there as group started to open up again.. and hunting season was just around the corner
Below are 2 50 yd targets using the 2369 FPS Load

166722166723

and next is a 200 yd 4 shots on left .. Then I adjusted scope for a center shot

166724

[noisewaterphd]

And, as Smoke just presented above ^^, gas checks can help you hold accuracy bit longer without having to use a harder alloy.

I've seen those same results first-hand.

It's hard to say without knowing all of your details, but I would guess you probably don't need to water drop.

Depending on the alloy you are working with that is. I have pushed ~12bhn bullets pretty dang hard, lubed and PC, with good results.

[Lloyd Smale]

Smoke I'm actually wanting to do something kind of similar to yours. I have a big bore 356 and a 220 grain lbt lfngc mold. What I want is some expansion. My idea was to push a bullet cast out of 1/3 ww 2/3 pure to 1800-2000 fps for whitetail black bear pigs ect. I didn't think it would help with the bullet integrity but I was hoping the pc coating would at least keep the softer alloy from stripping through the rifling at these levels which is the other problem pushing soft alloys. I sure have no problem with using a gas check

[noisewaterphd]

Yes, a coated bullet will still "strip the rifling".

At what point will it happen? That is going to depend on a lot of things, the PC itself being one of them.

Currently the only way you are going to know for sure is to try it in your gun, with your load, your PC, and your alloy.

But, if you go too soft, you will likely have accuracy issues from bullet deformation before you ever get to the point of stripping the rifling.

[popper]

I think you asked 2 questions. 1) there are claims PC helps soft alloys, we don't know for sure & it depends. If I can ever get to the range I have really thick and normal thick to test.
2) WD after how much time in oven has little data. I do an hour for 308W and it works. Again, 10 min. is claimed to help.

[blikseme300]

I think you asked 2 questions. 1) there are claims PC helps soft alloys, we don't know for sure & it depends. If I can ever get to the range I have really thick and normal thick to test.
2) WD after how much time in oven has little data. I do an hour for 308W and it works. Again, 10 min. is claimed to help.

I have the following question/comment - if care is not taken then the thicker coat of PC could be uneven and then the center of mass of the CB will be off-axis and this will probably cause inaccuracy, right?

My limited testing with 444M and 458WM shows that a thin single coat on ACWW PB CB's pushed to 1,800fps are accurate and with no leading. More testing to follow using twice coated and softer alloy.

[runfiverun]

remember your still using the cast type fitment here.
even though you have a jacket of sorts it isn't either thick enough or strong enough to do all the work itself.
now if you thicken and strengthen the 'jacket' as well as apply it evenly you can get to some impressive velocity's with accuracy.
distortion of the core can still happen... work on overcoming that just like we do with naked lead and you'll be another step ahead.

[popper]

I'm to 2100 PB in BO, AC isocore. I sized this latest bunch first, then coat, bake and measure coating thickness. I have some 0.002ish and 0.004ish to test when I get to the range. I'll be looking for stripping failure and accuracy due to consistent thickness after sizing. I consider coating and alloy as uncompressible. Last test (ESPC sprayed) gave a 1" radii circle - maybe my bases aren't flat enough - didn't measure coating thickness.

[OS OK]

I was just talking with Dragonheart this morning about this issue. The following was pasted in from my e-mails with Rich. The first sentence addresses the COAL of the 8mm I'm working up, (from the previous e-mail, not included here) the rest of the conversation refers to what your asking…I think?

(Me to Dragonheart)
No, that measurement, .005" was referring to how close I could place that boolits nose from the lands for less jump w/out touching.My bore is .3233", I'm sizing at .3238".
My theory is to use an alloy that will obturate and cause the PC to be the jacket and keep those pesky gasses behind the boolit. I thought that by playing with the BHN in this manor, I might discover something? (like maybe we can over pressure the lead further than the tables reveal for lube/sized rounds.)
These boolits, thus far are only one coat and I noticed in looking at the .45 ACP's I've PC'd, fired and recovered that the PC is stretching around the lands without tearing and exposing the lead. Of course I realize that these .45's (@ 12 BHN ) are operating around 1/3 the pressure that the 8mm will but they look like they spin-up without wide engraving at the nose of the boolit. Did I say that right…where they would skid at first engraving a bit and as more boolit comes into contact with the lands they start tracking properly without over widened tracks from the lands…
Am I barking the wrong tree? What are your observations? I know that you have been using a high quality clear-hi-gloss so your observations should generally apply to my PC work also.


charlie


PS…This is my first experimenting on rifle rounds…yet to do the first test...if I'm in the wrong boat…hell just say so, I have thick skin Rich, don't worry about upsetting my 'theories'…I've learned over the last 1/2 century that smarter people have a lot to say…if...you just keep ears open and pie hole shut!


charlie

(Dragonhearts reply)
A while back I single coated some pure lead handgun bullets or as pure lead as I could find and fired them at 1100 fps. According to the pressure tables pure lead cannot withstand that velocity. I went to great effort to recover the bullets, basically undamaged except slightly on the nose. My result was there was no evidence that the bullet had any tearing. The rifling cuts were sharp, even and well defined; the alloy tightly locked in by the polymer jacket.

Charles Darnall reported he has test fired my double coated 30 caliber bullets at 3100 fps out of his 30/06. He emailed me the target, the bullets cut absolutely clean round holes in the target like a paper punch, indicating the bullets were completely stable. Unfortunately, at that speed my soft range lead (about 8 BHN) only left fragments after hitting the embankment. Also according to the alloy pressure chart 8 BHN alone would not withstand 3100 fps & 48K psi.
Charlie fired some bullets into a log and was able to dig out enough to examine the bullet’s bases. He lightly sanded the carbon off the base and the color remained. Charlie says the polymer jacket seals the bore and he is out of business (FreeChex Gas Check Making Tools) as there is no longer a need for gas checks if you properly powder coat. So you have that information second hand, but directly from the horse.

The polymer jacket works; question now is accuracy at full velocity?


Richard

>>>Hope this will address your question…Rich and I have a little different idea about the PC coating being just a coating and lube replacement. We think that the PC coating is more of a jacket than most realize…we are testing along these lines primarily.

OS OK

[Motor]

This has been discussed a few times on here. Many of us are finding that we can "get away" with using a softer alloy than we used to.

I used to use 15bhn in 9mm and 1850f/s 7.62x54R ammo. Now I am finding 12bhn powder coated is doing just fine for everything.

Lloyd this may or may not help but I'm using HF red on a 440gr Lee .501" (hardness 12bhn.) in 500 S&W with 27.5gr Lil-Gun. This is a gas check designed boolit but I am NOT using a gas check.

Motor

[Lloyd Smale]

what kind of accuracy are you getting off the bench
This has been discussed a few times on here. Many of us are finding that we can "get away" with using a softer alloy than we used to.

I used to use 15bhn in 9mm and 1850f/s 7.62x54R ammo. Now I am finding 12bhn powder coated is doing just fine for everything.

Lloyd this may or may not help but I'm using HF red on a 440gr Lee .501" (hardness 12bhn.) in 500 S&W with 27.5gr Lil-Gun. This is a gas check designed boolit but I am NOT using a gas check.

Motor

[popper]

When I started ESPC a while back, I gave a heavy coat over 4-6% Sb & WD for 180 gr. 40SW,1:16. Now I just use the isocore ACd (~11 BHN) for everything but the 308W, accuracy is the same. Both work but evidently I was using too hard an alloy to start.

[Motor]

what kind of accuracy are you getting off the bench

We (my brothers and I) have 3, 8 3/8" S&W 500s. 2 have optics and one is iron sights although I recently got a fiber optic front for it.

All 3 are amazingly accurate. Near one ragged hole groups at 50 yards are common. My brother uses a Burris Fast Fire II. He put 3 rounds of the Lil-Gun load into the chest of a man sized silhouette target at 200 yards. None were edge hits.

I cast a 250gr REAL (muzzleloader boolit) and size it .501" also. This was actually the first cast boolit I tried in the 500. With 12gr Unique it is amazingly accurate as well.

My personal loading is the 440gr using 13gr Unique. I call it the slow sledge hammer. It turns gallon jugs filled with water inside out at 100 yards. It's kinda funny because it doesn't explode them like a high power rifle its more of splat !!!! but then there it is inside out. :) 6 out of 6 with the scoped (2x-7x) gun is normal.

I have also tried the 350gr? Lee Mini ball. When loaded in the 500 they look the old flat nosed wad cutters. They shoot good too but really offer no advantage so we decided to just stick with the 250 REAL and the 440. However, I have heard of people loading the mini backwards (with the hallow base in front) creating a huge hallow point. Some day I may have to re-visit that.

Motor

[popper]

5 shots heavy coated, 20 thinner coating ESPC. Same load, sized 308, coated, resized 3085. Thin is 311-312, thick is 315-316 so 0.002-3 vs 0.004-5. 145gr PB @ 2100, 100 yds, 1:10 300BO. Green is thick, disregard the 4 150 gr SPP at top.. Doesn't work good. Alloy is AC isocore. Shooting wasn't best but show the difference. Oh, Smoke's black, 65F, high humidity and gusty breeze.
166970 166971

[noisewaterphd]

5 shots heavy coated, 20 thinner coating ESPC. Same load, sized 308, coated, resized 3085. Thin is 311-312, thick is 315-316 so 0.002-3 vs 0.004-5. 145gr PB @ 2100, 100 yds, 1:10 300BO. Green is thick, disregard the 4 150 gr SPP at top.. Doesn't work good. Alloy is AC isocore. Shooting wasn't best but show the difference. Oh, Smoke's black, 65F, high humidity and gusty breeze.
166970 166971

I haven't tried extra thick coating yet. I was afraid it might be pretty hard to get a consistent enough coating to not degrade accuracy with a thick coating.

Do you think that is what's happening in your test? Did you recover any fired projectiles?