Cast Bullet Tumble

[WI Shooter]

This morning the question came up about bullet tumble when shooting cast. Have read about the problem but of course the memory fails. Any comments or wisdom I can pass along will be helpful.

Thanks from WI. Looks like tomorrow will be a nice day to go to the range burn some powder and sling a little lead. I do not cast the boolits but shoot it in my .357 Mag, 45C, 45-70 and .50 cal balls.

[rancher1913]

cast boolits generally only tumble when they are the wrong size for the barrel, with a good fitting boolit you should not have an issue.

[Bzcraig]

Or is too heavy for barrel twist or not pushed hard enough to stabilize

[tazman]

You can also have a situation where the drive bands don't have enough surface area and the rifling shears the small drive bands off so the boolit doesn't spin correctly. This can happen also because the lead is too soft to support the shear forces. This is called skidding.
This may also become a problem when the rifling in the barrel isn't deep enough to grab the boolit well.
An undersize boolit can also cause this as was mentioned in post #2.
Lee TL356-124-RN/TC as a case in point in the 9mm. Not everyone has a problem with that particular boolit, but enough do to suggest this is the problem.

[runfiverun]

good job Guy's.

[WI Shooter]

Thanks all. I will pass your information along.

[Wayne Smith]

Or is too heavy for barrel twist or not pushed hard enough to stabilize

Nope, common misconception. It is boolit length, not weight, that is the important variable.

[popper]

Remember the proper expander plug so the case doesn't 'shrink' the boolit base.