Shooting boolits without lube

[lawboy]

Not sure what forum this goes in but here goes.
Has anyone tried shooting pistol boolits without lube on them?
I am talking standard stuff -- 9mm, 40 cal, 45ACP, etc.
I know it is possible to shoot lead without lube and have no leading using hard lead and gaschecks in rifles but I have never tied lubeless plain base pistol boolits.
I am thinking of trying it and figured I could avoid reinventing the wheel if others here have done it and will share.
I am thinking the way to start is with soft lead boolits, properly sized to fit the bore, and with medium level loads. Say in 45ACP lead at 9-10bhn, 4.7grs Bullseye with a #68 boolit.
What say you?

[stainless1911]

.....

[mdi]

I've read about target shooters not using lube in pistol rounds and schutzen rifles, without leading (Cast Bullets for Beginner & Expert, by Joseph Brennan).

[Doc Highwall]

I would not recommend it, and it would probably be a waist of hard lead. Never mind cleaning the gun afterwards.

[Shiloh]

You are courting trouble.

It may work for a while, but boolits would have to fit and be quite hard.

There are Bullseye shooters who only lube one groove of .38 WC and SWC boolits.

What about trying Alox lubed boolits with a very light diluted alox??

SHiloh

[lawboy]

You are courting trouble.

It may work for a while, but boolits would have to fit and be quite hard.

There are Bullseye shooters who only lube one groove of .38 WC and SWC boolits.

What about trying Alox lubed boolits with a very light diluted alox??

SHiloh

The smell of liquid alox in the air sickens me, really. I cannot stand it.
Maybe folks who say it is courting trouble are right. I don't have a need to do it, just cabin fever and curiosity getting the best of me I guess!

[oksmle]

Been doing it for years. Mostly in the pistol calibers, .38S&W, .38 Spec., .32/20, .44/40, .45 ACP, .45 Colt, .357 Mag. etc., used in my revolvers & lever action rifles in those calibers. Then, several years ago, I worked up a load for a SMLE using no lube. I fired around 800 rounds through it & then reported about it in this forum. All the loads used shot shell buffer. In the .44/40 I have fired probably thousands of rounds without lube because that was in a SAA that I used in the Military Revolver matches at our club. None of the revolvers or rifles suffered from leading or any ill effects.
There's a bit more to it than just dumping in powder & then buffer & seating a boolit on top. Check the search function for more info.

[9.3X62AL]

Is there an advantage gained by going lubeless? This is another of the many "eye opening" posts on this site that happen every so often.

[Doc Highwall]

Why don't you try the Johnsons Past Wax that has been posted before.

[old turtle]

There is a section in "Sharpe's Complete Guide To Handloading" which describes shooting with no lube. Not pretty. It can foul enough that he recommended using mercury to get it out. This would be difficult to do today. I would not try it but I am faint of heart.

[stainless1911]

Been doing it for years.
famous last words.

[oksmle]

"Been doing it for years. famous last words. "

That sounds like a challenge. All I can tell you is that I don't lie & to please check my posts from several years ago (as I asked in my original post) & you will find several describing my method.

Dick S.

[stainless1911]

oh, don't take it personally.:kidding:

[mdi]

A lot of newer reloaders/casters don't have knowledge of the history and old methods of boolit making, so when a different, "not the every day everybody does it", older method arises, it is at times challanged as a lie. Lead had been used for boolits since just a few years after the gun was invented, and just about everything has been tried (and retried by later generations). Bullet lube's purpose is not only to avoid leading, there are other factors; in black powder days fouling was the major reason for using lube on patches, etc. So, what I'm saying is; listen to the ones with experience, and some day you too may have some experience to share.

P.S. don't take this personally...

[lawboy]

Thanks to (almost) everyone who posted on this thread. I have food for thought, some searching to do here for more info., and some research to do before trying this. I appreciate all of the information kindly shared. I will likely try it but not before I have some more background knowledge. I do believe it can be done effectively as I am already doing so with GCed rifle boolits with no ill effects.
Regards to all.

[cbunt1]

I've read many accounts of folks doing it and having success with it. I would think that a softer boolit that will fill the bore, sized properly (e.g. .001-.003 over groove size) over a proper charge should do the deal.

What's the worst that can happen? A leaded bore and/or poor accuracy? Sounds to me like a small price to pay for experience and knowledge.

Can't be any worse than some of our collective attempts at homemade lubes that turned into nothing than good fluxes!

I've considered the same thing, but just haven't put it high enough in the list of "experiments to dabble in" yet...

[geargnasher]

I've noticed one thing for sure: sometimes (usually?) when using Dacron as a light filler (not compressed too tightly), the need for lube diminishes to nearly nothing. In .30-30 a 1/2 grain of Dacron fluffed on top of 30 grains of 748 will shoot cleanly all day long at comfortable outdoor temps with just the little space between the gas check and the base band lubed. Take the filler out and it requires two full grooves of lube to not streak lead the last 8-10" of the barrel. I've noticed this with the .45/70 and light smokeless loads/pb boolits, and again with my FIL's 45/90 with full-house smokeless loads and 500+ grain pb boolits. With filler, the lube stays on the boolit, and no lube star on the muzzle at all. Remove the filler, huge lube star and splatters on everything just downrange of the muzzle like I like it. Funny thing, accuracy has always been better with the filler. I've used BPI Original compacting buffer in a few things, including .45 Colt, and I would certainly believe that it could eliminate the need for lube in certain applications.

Gear

[Recluse]

Thanks to (almost) everyone who posted on this thread. I have food for thought, some searching to do here for more info., and some research to do before trying this. I appreciate all of the information kindly shared. I will likely try it but not before I have some more background knowledge. I do believe it can be done effectively as I am already doing so with GCed rifle boolits with no ill effects.
Regards to all.

In lieu of alox, you could try a very light swirling of JPW or even some hot boolits and melted beeswax (done ala tumble-lubing method).

I would ask, though, what your specific goal is? Is it to see if it can be done (by you), or is it one of those things I get all too often that I call the "what ifs" as in, "What if I tried this. . . ?"

:coffee:

[HollowPoint]

I couldn't begin to count how many thousands of rounds of 22 rimfire I've shot over the course of my life time to date.

None of them had any lube on them. Of course some will argue that as comparing apples to oranges.

Maybe it is doable and maybe even with all of our collective bullet casting wisdom we really don't know everything.

I say try it and see what you come up with. It would be nice not to have to spend money on lube ever again.

HollowPoint

[old turtle]

I may be mistaken but I thought that most lead .22 boolits had a type of wax lube on them.

[AnthonyB]

I thought .22 ammo was inside lubricated?
Tony

[stainless1911]

the ones I've seen do.

[felix]

Yes, they all have something nowadays. EPA, don't-cha-know. The later ones have some kind of polymer? ... felix

[oksmle]

This was originally posted on January 11, 2007. I'm still shooting the same load in this SMLE. Clean up consists of two dry patches thru the bore & a wipedown.
oksmle

Update On .303 Load With No Lube

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A while back on a particular thread, during our usual wandering away from & eventual return to the main topic, I mentioned a .303 load I was working on in which I used no lube. I received a couple of PMs & a couple of phone calls from folks asking me to report on my findings. I told them I wanted to fire about 800 rounds to satisfy myself that what I was experiencing wasn't a fluke. Yesterday I fired number 770 with the intention of going to the range this weekend & running the last 30 through the rifle. Since it looks as though Oklahoma will be covered in ice this weekend, & I don't have time to get to the range before then, I thought I'd go ahead & let you know my findings.
The rifle is a "scratch-built" No.1 Mk III SMLE I assembled from parts left over from other stuff I had worked on. The barrel is new surplus & instead of simply screwing it into the receiver I took one turn off the breech end & finished the chamber to minimum SAMI specs. Then I eased the throat just a tad to make it easier on cast boolits. After working on the trigger it breaks right at 4 pounds. The first 50 rounds (which didn't count in the 770) were fire lapping rounds.
The Load: NEI #72 cast of straight WWs at .313", & weighing 163.0 grs. Annealed Hornady GC sized at .314". 23.0 grs Surplus 4895 dropped from my RCBS powder dispenser topped by 1.6cc PSB dipped with a Lee dipper. This is a lightly compressed load. Remington 9 1/2 primers & a light Lee crimp. OAL - 2.936". The front driving band just barely touches the throat when chambered. Sixty new Remington cases reamed, turned & prepped then dedicated to this rifle. After the first firing they weren't even neck sized thereafter. Just belled a bit to accept the GC snugly. After 30 or 40 rounds I noticed a leading condition devloping at the junction of the lands & grooves. My cleaning was two dry patches run through the bore after however many rounds I fired that particular day. Sometimes it was twenty & sometimes sixty. But the condition never got any worse & I never picked up lead on my patches. The only way you can see it is to shine a flash light at an angle across the muzzle. And the top of the lands & bottom of the grooves are clean with no lead accumulation at all.... Maybe because of the fire lapping.
The largest ten shot group fired measured 2.772" & the smallest (fired yesterday) was 1.324" (with an internal six round group of 0.635").
I'm not suggesting that everyone who owns a SMLE should try this load, but it will probably be the only load this particular rifle will ever see.

oksmle

[geargnasher]

I couldn't begin to count how many thousands of rounds of 22 rimfire I've shot over the course of my life time to date.

None of them had any lube on them. Of course some will argue that as comparing apples to oranges.

Maybe it is doable and maybe even with all of our collective bullet casting wisdom we really don't know everything.

I say try it and see what you come up with. It would be nice not to have to spend money on lube ever again.

HollowPoint

Actually, all .22 rimfire boolits are lubed, and have been probably for as long as they have been loaded with smokeless powder. Sometimes the lube is a wax, sometimes some sort of varnish, sometimes a paint, sometimes it appears like graphite or mica has been applied to them, but I assure you they aren't dry. If they were, the noses would corrode like crazy. When was the last time you saw a .22 boolit growing white fuzz?

Gear

[Recluse]

When was the last time you saw a .22 boolit growing white fuzz?

Gear

I've got a few. . . but they're over 40 years-old, been sitting out in all sorts of elements as they've been moved around from locale to locale. The last bunch of corroded (..22LR) bullets I found was on my boat. I guess a couple of them had come out of the little storage packet I'd made and stayed in the glove box on the helm. Pretty bad shape, but an hour of tumbling them in the Thumler's, and they looked pretty good again. Shot just fine. :)

The old graphite coated .22's. . . now you're bringing back some old and pleasant memories of going out to the junkyard and shooting with my dad and grandad. Always had black fingertips afterwards. Those were good times.

:coffee:

[quack1]

I tried unlubed bullets in my Makarov. I saw that nice, shiney, smooth chrome bore and thought what if..? I used AC wheel weights, loaded as cast from the Lee mold. I'm at work and can't look up the exact powder, weight and velocity, but it is just mild enough to not get a bulge on the unsupported area of brass at the feed ramp. I shot around 25 rounds before lead built up and accuracy went away. Even though the lead pushed out pretty easily with a tight fitting patch and solvent, I didn't see any benefit to not lubing and never tried unlubed bullets again.

[Eutectic]

Actually, all .22 rimfire boolits are lubed, and have been probably for as long as they have been loaded with smokeless powder.
Gear

Basically correct.

For a point of interest though..... when Western first introduced their 'Lubaloy' (copper plated) high speed .22's many years' back they thought lube would no longer be necessary.... Within months leading problems with many complaints developed! Lubricant was quickly added to the 'Super-X' plated .22 bullets. The leading cause was stated by Western to occur because of many .22's still in use with pitted and/or rough bores from corrosive ammo.... Of course it wasn't a design problem!

Eutectic

[Elkins45]

I couldn't begin to count how many thousands of rounds of 22 rimfire I've shot over the course of my life time to date.

None of them had any lube on them. Of course some will argue that as comparing apples to oranges.

Maybe it is doable and maybe even with all of our collective bullet casting wisdom we really don't know everything.

I say try it and see what you come up with. It would be nice not to have to spend money on lube ever again.

HollowPoint

22 bullets are lubed.

[badbob454]

My thought is the lube would help alleviate the wear of the hard bullets on the barrel as well as help the bullets to go faster ?? IF THE SMELL OF THE ALOX LUBE IS TOO BAD , THE REASON FOR NOT LUBING BULLETS,... THEN TRY BEESWAX WARMED UP OR BEESWAX AND CANDLE WAX OR PARRAFIN TO LUBE ,,, ?

[BAGTIC]

The explanation of OKSMIES's success "Annealed Hornady GC sized at .314". " in presented in his post.

Contrary to popular knowledge gas checks do not prevent leading. Shooters look in the bore and it appears clean but it is not because the lead was not deposited in the first place. It is because the follow up gas check scraped it out.

[BAGTIC]

My thought is the lube would help alleviate the wear of the hard bullets on the barrel as well as help the bullets to go faster ?? IF THE SMELL OF THE ALOX LUBE IS TOO BAD , THE REASON FOR NOT LUBING BULLETS,... THEN TRY BEESWAX WARMED UP OR BEESWAX AND CANDLE WAX OR PARRAFIN TO LUBE ,,, ?

Lead is far too soft to wear a steel barrel. Most barrel 'wear' with lead bullets is the result of corrosion and heat. Wear at the muzzle end is most likely the result of a cleaning rod.

[Bullshop]

Lead is far too soft to wear a steel barrel. Most barrel 'wear' with lead bullets is the result of corrosion and heat. Wear at the muzzle end is most likely the result of a cleaning rod.

What about antimony?

[Reg]

Does Hoppe's #9 sell stock !!!!!!!!!!!!



[smilie=w:

[MT Gianni]

In the 90's when Felix posted his lube formula on the now defunct Shooters site, I bought enough ingrediants for 30,000-50,000 bullets as a guess. My cost ran about $18. While someone might shoot boolits without lube I can't see why.

[HollowPoint]

Holy Cow!

I seemed to have touched off a potential fire-storm by bringing up the subject of of 22 Rimfire
bullets.

Lubed or not, corroded or not, I've shot literally thousands of them. Wether it's true or not in every case, it's difficult for me to believe that everyone of them was lubed.

At any rate, I wish folks could post such things as shooting cast bullets unlubed and not get as much flack over it as they do.

I'm slowly drifting over to paper patched bullets just to avoid buying as much lube. Of course, here to one will encounter those "Yea-But" rebuttals.

To each his own. My apologies to those who were rubbed the wrong way by my 22 caliber rimfire remark. In my case, ignorance was bliss. If I had worried about if they were lubed or not I probably wouldn't have shot nearly as many.

HollowPoint

[Ben]

MT Gianni :

What you've said....ditto....ditto

Ben

[flounderman]

22 bullets have a coating. the old experts were so greasy they stuck together. they shot as good as the mark 111s and ezxs. I shot flies off the target at 100 yards with them, in still conditions. I wish I would have bought them all. you think something will be around forever and once it is gone, you realize what you should have done. your fingers got greasy handling them and some of them went crack and some went splut, but they all shot in the same hole. I don't know why they quit making them.

[fredj338]

I may be mistaken but I thought that most lead .22 boolits had a type of wax lube on them.

Yeah, I have never seen a 22lr that didn't have some kind of film or wax based lube on them. I am sure it has been done, probably w/ lube wads or such, but lubing a lead bullet is pretty darn easy by tumbling or luber/sizer & cheap too, so?

[nanuk]

I've noticed one thing for sure: sometimes (usually?) when using Dacron as a light filler (not compressed too tightly), the need for lube diminishes to nearly nothing. Gear


Gear, do you think that is due to the dacron acting like a gas barrier?

seems to me, when you guys are discussing someones plight with leading the issue of gas-cutting comes up.
Dacron eliminates the gas-cutting?

another thought I had.... don't some applications use babbit as a bearing? and it can last a long time, especially if lubed. But lead by nature is lubricating, isn't it?

so lead on relatively smooth steel doesn't seem to cause the leading, and lube only relieves the symptons of gas-cutting?

IIRC I think it was Layne Simpson writing in the Hodgdon reloading manual that stated it is Best to not lube the first muzzleloader conical shot from a cleaned bore.

[geargnasher]

I suspect that Dacron relieves some pressure on the basen band and might act as a dynamic leak-stopper. One telling thing is target paper. Shoot identical loads with and without Dacron using plain-based boolits, you'll find that at 25 yards the Dacron loads will splatter the paper with shreds and ribbons of almost clean lube, whereas without the lube the targets will be clean but the boolit holes will have dark black rings. Neither boolit recovered at 50 will have much lube on it, but the Dacron-free boolit will mist the chronograph screens with tiny black specks and there will be a significant lube star. Draw your own conclusions from that one example, it may not be a rule but it is at least an instance.

Gear

[x101airborne]

In the oil field, when looking for leaks in the string, we take a foot of hemp 3/4 rope and frey it out into indvidual strands. Put it in the top of the pipe, connect the kelley, and pump it up to maximum pressure of the mud. When you pull your pipe string, the rope strands will be hanging out of the side of the connection or seam. Very noticeable. I wonder if this is how dacron, etc. works in principal.

[x101airborne]

Oh, I dont lube the Lee 255 rfp's i shoot in my S&W 325PD. I cast them of pure lino and shoot them as sized. The barrel is 2". These are the only ones I do not lube.