*** questions

[Bullet Magnet]

Hello ladies and gents,

I have been lurking around for awhile and I think you folks have me convinced. I am giving all this a try. I have handloaded for years with store bought components but am now on the fence. I am trying to cross the fence from jacketed bullets for many reasons. Cost, the ability to make your own bullet is just too cool, etc. I know you guys probably get tired of the friggin' new guy questions, but here are some more.

I am just trying to make sure I am tracking. I did the wheel weight to ingot to bullet thing with great results. The bullets look great. I am to the loading phase. I intend to start with light charges. Cast bullets should work in .40 Sig 226, Beretta 92, and Walther PPS in 9mm., right?

Man, I hope I get the same kind of results as the rest of you here. Free bullets to shoot off just seems great.

[Edubya]

Welcome to the forum Bullet Magnet.
The .40 and, especially, the 9mm are hard calibers to cast for (IMHO). The 9mm seems to be very picky about the bullet, bullet alloy, powder and charge. Due it's diminutive size and almost magnum pressures, it requires attention t every aspect. On the other hand, 700 to 900 fps and large boolits of a .45 spread lower pressure over a larger surface. Your .40 will be somewhere in between.
Once you start, there's no going back. You will be buying moulds, and bigger and better equipment for the rest of your life. It's like stepping into the casino and saying, "I'll try this out for a little while." You'll make some extraordinary success and then you'll fall on your face, it's one step forward, then two back until you have so much time and effort into it that you don't dare quit!
Ain't nothing free about the hobby and sport that we participate in!
Good luck
EW

[Bullet Magnet]

Thanks. I imagine you are correct about not going back. Now I am pondering a revolver. Then I don't have to worry about cycling. Should be easier for a noob.

[EOD3]

Man, I hope I get the same kind of results as the rest of you here. Free bullets to shoot off just seems great.

Few things are as expensive as "free". Once you're hooked, it'll be too late :D

[ddixie884]

You will find that the old hands on this board are helpful, patient, kind, and knowledgable. They will always offer info to anyone willing to learn. I find them to be some of the best on the internet. JMHO

[shooting on a shoestring]

Welcome aboard. You would be the perfect candidate for a .38, .357, 41, 44, or 45Colt. Its really nice to fire 5 or 6 rounds on target, then have the brass neatly ejected into your hand, nice and clean and free from dirt, grass or gravel dings. And then there are so many meplat shapes to shoot in a revolver that won't even feed one at a time in an auto. Then there's the wide velocity window to work with in revolvers. Then comes the realization that revolvers can shoot farther, faster, and heavier boolits than the autos, and what has magazine capacity ever done for anyone?

Not knockin the autos, but revolvers sure have more to offer the reloader/caster in terms of fast, slow, light, heavy, boolit shape, range, and easy of recovering brass. Start shopping, Christmas is coming.

[NickSS]

I happen to load 9mm in quantity using lead bullets that I cast myself. I get about the same accuracy as I do with hard ball without too much trouble. I use only two bullets in this caliber both are 120 gr slugs. One is a lyman round nose and the other is a lee truncated cone slug. I lube both with 50-50 allox and bees wax and sized .356. Some loads that work for me is 3.8 gr of Red Dot and 5 gr of Unique. I do not load the 40 but do a 45 ACP. I have used all sorts of loads with lead bullets in these weapons with good success. Mostly what I shoot these days is either a 230 gr round nose or a 200 gr SWC both lubed as above and sized .452. Hope this helps you get started.

[Bullet Magnet]

I should have added that my buddy is doing the 45 ACP as well.

We took the Sig 226 .40 and the 1911 to the range. We both had issues with leading within 50 rounds or so. We are going to tone down our charge and go again. We were worried about cycling issues and likely used a hotter charge than we really needed.

We were amazed with our accuracy results though. These "boolits" equal or surpass the accuracy of our jacketed bullets. Most impressive. I think this is going to be a great hobby. :drinks:

Thanks for the input!

[Angus]

Magnet, don't immediately assume that it is a high-speed or high-pressure issue causing your leading. What size are your boolits vs your bore size? What are you lubing with? Full-house loads out of my P89 leave a very manageable amount of leading using Lee Liquid Alox and a tumble-lubed 124gr TC, as cast it is .357. If you are using a sizer, go with LBT Blue lube. It does magical things in my 41 mag until velocities get over 1200fps with plain base boolits.

[Bullet Magnet]

I am using Lee Alox with tumble lubed 124 gr round nose. I am using Lee moulds with microbands.

I suspected the charge as we found that my new progressive press, a Hornady LNL, was progressively increasing the powder charge. We initially started with a "lightish" charge, measured every charge for 10 rounds or so. We checked again after 50-60 rounds and realized that somehow we made it to max charge...
I didn't have this issue with a Dillion 1050 or my other Lyman powder measure. I think as the measure goes up and down while charging cases it is compacting the powder and thus is dumping more grains of powder even though the volume setting is unchanged. I bought a baffle for the LNL and next time we experiment we will better control more of the variables.

I have stick on wheel weights that I plan on melting into slugs so that I can figure the dimensions of the barrels.