Powder coating always a good idea?

[Charlie Horse]

What Would John Moses Browning Do?

Ha. I thought I was the only one who said that to myself.

[sundog]

For the sake of discussion, do we handicap ourselves by powder coating, before we test with a standard lube first? Leading shows us problems or potential problems, that may be hidden by powder coat. Without knowing the problems, how can the most accurate loads be developed?

Ric, 'always' (or 'never') is a word which should be applied with great discretion. I 'assume' that a correct answer could be a "briefs or boxers" kind of thing where a meaningful response might be: Depends.

Empirical evidence can be a great trump card. For example, I have fired thousands of rounds in military bolt matches (same 'as issued' 03A3 and several different loobed boolits) and found stuff that works very well for me. I PC now and results are still as good as ever - in this application.

One great advantage of PC is that large quantities of a particular boolit can be prepared and stored long term with no detrimental effect such as loob drying, flaking or cracking. Cast and prep in the winter for two to three years worth of good shooting.

I now PC just about all of my handgun boolits. It's cleaner and the results are the same or better, and a couple of undersized molds are now usable.

I still have and use my loobsizers using my favorite FWFL, tried and liked Ben's Red for a couple of things, 45/45/10, and BLL (as well as couple different loobs for BP). I even have a setup for Orange Magic - gets mighty warm here in the summer and sometimes a hard loob is appropriate. Getting there is half the fun. The other half is taking full advantage of the results.

[tmanbuckhunter]

I can't answer your question in the order that you asked it, but I can answer it backwards. I started PCing a few years ago, and had guns that I found shot better with a traditionally lubrisized bullet vs their PC'd counterparts after starting with a PC bullet first, and then later testing traditionally lubrisized. Now keep in mind, the accuracy was still "acceptable", but I like to split hairs. Not only that, it's just faster for me personally to lubrisize than to sit there and shake and bake, fight with standing them up, and all that crap. When I started out casting I was shooting a lot of 30 caliber and 32 caliber catridges. These days it's rare if I grab anything, even a rifle, under 40 caliber, and thus the benefits of PC for me are even less.

[Winger Ed.]

Powder coating is just a fad and will fade away like moly coating did.

[Shuz]

[QUOTE=sundog;5327006]Ric, 'always' (or 'never') is a word which should be applied with great discretion. I 'assume' that a correct answer could be a "briefs or boxers" kind of thing where a meaningful response might be: Depends

Now.. Corky, that was really funny!

[white eagle]

My test with cast boolits never start with traditional lubing since I don't load them anymore
when I cast I pc and do my tests any problem I run into will have those parameters in the start

[johnho]

I only started PC'ing in my 40's. No matter what I did I couldn't stop them from leading. Those are the only ones I PC. No need to spend more time than needed, I still needed to size them and PC is just one more step as nothing else leads up for me. But they are purty.

[reddog81]

Which problems are we talking about? Undersized bullets causing leading and not being as accurate as possible?

I would say that you should either slug your barrel, measure your throat or otherwise figure out what bullet will best for you. I size all my bullets to .357 for 9mm, .453 for semi auto 45 ACP, .358 or .359 for .38 special, and .311 for 300BLK or .30-06. This works well for me PC or lubed.

[376Steyr]

Powder coating is just a fad and will fade away like moly coating did.

And then we can get rid of this silly newfangled ALOX and beeswax and go back to beef tallow and bear grease!

[45DUDE]

You need to have a good gun and the ability to bench pistol 1 1/2'' or better 10 shots at 25 -50 yards to tell the difference unless you have a Ransom Rest. . Do people win bullseye matches with powder coated? I have almost given up on some molds but learned to try a different powder or speed before I sent it down the road.

[reedap1]

To comment and try to reply to the OP question:

For the sake of discussion, do we handicap ourselves by powder coating, before we test with a standard lube first? Leading shows us problems or potential problems, that may be hidden by powder coat. Without knowing the problems, how can the most accurate loads be developed?

First I think we have to make some assumptions:

1) The bullet is appropriate weight and design for the intended cartridge...ie. we are not trying something "experimental" like a long 100-grain bullet in a .223.

2) The bullet that we cast is a well-formed, sharp-edged, uniform (no voids) composition, with a flat smooth parallel base of an appropriately hard alloy for the intended shooting requirement.

3)The bullet is PC coated or traditionally lubricated in a reasonable amount of time from the casting session as we know that alloy hardness changes over time

With those points in mind, I really think we are talking about a fundamental difference in bullet production, accuracy loading, and two different worlds now that PC has been around for a number of years. I think in many cases what we have learned with traditional lubing does not apply to PC. We are seeing some "rules" develop for PC'ed bullets such as oversizing has a negative effect and the fact that we are starting to see molds being produced that are smaller in diameter than traditionally cut to allow for the increased thickness of PC. I know that the next mold I have made will fit this requirement...how much smaller is still to be determined but I think PC adds about 1-2 thousand to diameter depending on the powder, the number of coats, etc. We have always known that "fit is king" no matter what type of bullet is being made. PC (depending on powder) appears to have a higher lubricity factory and we know that it produces almost no smoke and generally does not deposit in the bore and build up like lead will.

So in response to the original question, I think we are making an assumption that we are hiding accuracy issues with a bullet by powder coating. In my mind, I don't think we can make that assumption without doing extensive testing of traditional bullet testing and PC coating the same bullet. I have just moved into the PC world, will stay there going forward, and will experiment with accuracy techniques (size, PC type, etc) within that world to find a load combo that meets my requirements and just stay in that world due to the advantages of PC. I think the cast bullet world is in transition and we will see a "transformation" into almost 100% PC in the future as more adopt the technique and experiment with accuracy techniques. Thanks for the opportunity to ramble my thoughts.

[johnho]

I guess if you size before you PC then an undersized mold would make sense. I size after I PC so this does nothing. I get the exact same diameter after I PC and size as I get with a normal sized lead bullet.

[sundog]

I guess if you size before you PC then an undersized mold would make sense. I size after I PC so this does nothing. I get the exact same diameter after I PC and size as I get with a normal sized lead bullet.

That may be okay if the boolit is round to begin with.

[PAndy]

I can't think of a way to know which method delivers more accuracy with your loads and guns unless you try both. As others have noted, even if there is a small difference one way or the other, it may not make a difference depending on your shooting activities. Try both have fun.

[johnho]

That may be okay if the boolit is round to begin with.

After sizing the bullet is perfectly round. PC doesn't prevent the bullet from being sized to shape.

[megasupermagnum]

All I can say for certain is that if I had started coating from the beginning, I would never be where I am now. People seem to have the opinion that leading is in itself a problem. No, leading is a symptom. By coating, assuming you do it right, you have eliminated the possibility of leading. You can shoot an undersized bullet, and it won't lead. It won't shoot great, but it wont lead, and you would never know it was undersized. You could shoot a pure lead bullet, and it wouldn't lead. If it were a really strong cartridge, it probably wont shoot good, but you would never know it was too soft if it was coated.

Of course you could keep tweaking things until you get the accuracy you want, but you are flying blind. Most of us can figure out some of this, simply because we learned these things shooting lubed bullets. If you never learned that, you have no frame of reference. You'd end up shooting hardball alloy bullets sized to jacketed bullet diameters, and what happens, happens.

So I think the answer to your question is that the more experienced you are, the more you can deduct based on results on target. The less experienced you are, the more you are going to be handicapped by coating. Despite coating being a barrier that completely stops leading, it is not structural at all like a copper jacket, and all the nuances of a cast bullet still apply. You still need decently strong alloys to stand up to higher pressure. You still need gas checks for higher velocities. You still need to have the sizing so that the bullets are aligned in the throat and bore.

At the end of the day, I have yet to see the rifle shooters going for best accuracy to get that with coating. Even in pistols, I've not been able to get a coated bullet to match the accuracy of a lubed bullet. You can argue all you want of what you "need" or how great anything is, but to directly answer your question, "Do we handicap ourselves by powder coating, before we test with a standard lube first?", I'd have to say that yes, we are handicapping ourselves in regards to accuracy. If you are ok with 3 MOA rifle accuracy, or don't care to shoot pistols past 15 yards, that's fine, but why are you even on this forum?

[charlie b]

Just an FYI. My rifle bullets shoot less than 1.5MOA powder coated. About the same as what I got with lubed bullets.

[zymguy]

never say always , ever

[Finster101]

I think Ric is just trolling us.

[megasupermagnum]

Just an FYI. My rifle bullets shoot less than 1.5MOA powder coated. About the same as what I got with lubed bullets.

And I don't doubt you one bit, but the guys like Larry Gibson, Waksupi, Dan Lynch (Mountain molds), and others that actually push a cartridge all universally use lube. Yes I realize Waksupi uses coating sometimes. Dan's Mountain molds forum had a ton of great info on his testing, and it is a shame it is now gone. These are guys who truly are getting great accuracy at extreme speeds of 2500 fps, 2600 fps, sometimes past 3000 fps. Once you get to those levels, tons of factors matter. Even in your case, who's to say that if you worked with a lubed bullet, you couldn't cut your groups down? You might be happy with that accuracy, I'm happy when I get that level of accuracy, but the question as asked was are you handicapping yourself with coating? I believe the answer is yes, even if you are fine with that handicap.