I'm in pretty much the same boat as you. I have a small fortune in equipment. I'll just stay with what I have.
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Lube here.
45/45/10 tumble lube. Love it! I even have my recent Accurate molds made up in tumble lube design./Chris
Both. Have always lubed. But wanted to try the PC to give my kids a little excitement.
Poll: Do you lube or powder coat the cast boolits
yes
I marked "other" because some I lube with liquid tumble, some I lube size, some I patch, some I powder coat. Non discriminating shooter here.
prs
I have bottles of Lee Liquid Alox, they work just fine. I also have a Magma/Star Lube-Sizer (WITH A LOT OF DUST ON IT), and Harbor Freight Red and Eastwood Ford light blue, and I prefer the Eastwood blue more than anything else. It is so easy and darn near goof-proof. I know, opinions are like noses.......... I cast 225, 357 for my .380 and 9mm and .45ACP, and some 155 RFN for 300 Savage and 30-06. and now they all slide down my barrels with no left-overs. SSAAWWEEEETT!
These days it's a combination of both ... conventional lube and size with or without gas checks and PC'ing by the tumble coating method. I had a very large quantity (10,000 ish?) .45 ACP 200 SWC boolits with a bevel base and got sick of conventional lube /sizing them since the lube would squirt into the bevel base and made a heck of a mess. I decided to PC them all instead and then size them dry. It was the bullet that tipped me "over the edge" and make me decide to try powder coating.
https://i.imgur.com/zJBm1hC.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/deSPVbD.jpg
(And that is just what remains in the top box of 2 boxes full of those .45 200 grain SWC's ... I still have many, many more to do ...)
I do both. MOre and more powder coating.
I would change but my Lyman 450 was paid for in 1972 and powder coating doesn't seem to be any quicker , easier , faster or cheaper than lube/size . I have never had any leading problems and the Lithium beeswax lube I use doesn't smoke ...or smoke enough for me to notice.
Pull handle down, tweak lube pressure wrench, pull handle up...TA-DAH boolit is sized, lubed, gas check crimped on, done ...ready to launch ! It doesn't get any faster or easier. I sort of enjoy sitting at my bench , being alone, no phone , wife, kids, me just doing my thing with my cast boolits... quite time therapy ...it's nice .
For me...there is nothing gained by it.
Colored boolits is not something I need or want.
Gary
I powder coat time consuming but worth it.
Attachment 214356
LLA and Lee sizer for the rifles. Simple work for a simple guy. Just the LLA for the handguns. I've tried PC boolits that I bought and traded for and in my view they hold no advantage and the smell offends me. That's saying something for a farm boy.....
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Used a lot of Alox and my own mixture. Cookie cutter. Bought Hi-Tek Gold small jar for $8.00 plus. I make up a measured amount of the Gold, but add a little extra Acetone. Put 400 Lee 308 170 LFN in a bucket, add enough of the mix to make the bottom of the bucket wet and shake the bullets round and round until the Acetone is evaporated, pour out into stainless steel fine screen trays. Shake the trays until all the bullets are lying flat. Let dry and bake. Minimal sticking. If there are some stuck together, they come apart easily with no damage. Best thing I learned on this site was about bullet size/barrel size. Cured more leading problems when bullet size is right. Sure feels good when looking down the shining barrel of my Marlin 336C with only a few grains of residue. Little SCCY 9MM likes the Hi-tek Gold. I might even try pressure lubing with BLL when the chance to get one comes along.
I was leery of powder coating for a long time. I had several lube sizers, lots of size dies and top punches, good lubes. I'm not young anymore, I'm pretty traditional, and I thought I had this boolit thing figured out fairly well. If it isn't broke...
I finally did try powder coating, got it figured out to where they come out pretty nice. After a time I realized that I really liked the slick, smooth, non-sticky bullets, a lot. I got rid of most of my lube-sizers. I've been holding the best one back just in case but eventually it's going to go down the road too since I just don't use it anymore. It's obsolete for my purposes, as much as I hate to say it.
Maybe an explanation of the percentages discrepancy could be if a scanner/counter was used that picked up on the needed words then run all the information through. Sample scan, " Lube! no, I never used Lube, Lubrisizer! I never owned a Lubrisizer. besides Lube stinks, Lube gets all over everything including dies. I PC everything". Ok the the scanner sees six votes for Lube One vote for PC! LOL Better than having to read and count all all the #175 posts. Nawww we gotta givem more credit than that.
PC & HiTek Have a lube-sizer and alox but didn't like the mess
https://i.imgur.com/wzDIrYE.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/v00UWvo.jpg
I do both, and find myself doing PC more and more. Im not a big fan of the smoke from LLA.
I lube, pan lube, lubesizer, or tumble lube. Keeping the tradition alive.
From all the talk I thought me and Bazoo were the only two who still lubed our boolits, the poll says most do not powder coat...that's surprising!
I just don't care to change now that I got the old lube-sizer and lubricant recipe perfected.
Just because somebody has a new way to skin a cat that don't make it better.
Them High Tech Coating fumes might cause cancer or stupidity or something catastrophic !
Gary