Scratching my head over lube inconsistency. . .

[Recluse]

Some time back, I posted about a "Black Lube" recipe I'd been developing. Base lube ingredient was Mobil 1 axle/bearing grease. Had really high hopes for the stuff--should have because it wasn't easy to mix and stunk/stinks to High White House.

Anyhow, I tested it out on some proven .38 Special 148 wadcutter loads--the standard 2.7 Bullseye formula. I had flyers, keyholes and zero consistency. I then shot same loads but with boolits tumble-lubed with my LLA/JPW/MS formula and got one big ragged hole, as always.

I tested some 105SWC that I had sized down to .356 for 9mm, and got pretty much the same bad results--flyers and keyholes.

I was ready to just toss the sticks I'd made up until a funny and mysterious thing happened. . . I fired some .312 boolits with the Black Lube through my Enfield and got touching groups. At 50 yards, and with iron sights.

What the Washington DC was going on?

I rummaged around on my boolit shelves and found a small container with 65 or so .452 200SWC boolits (my number two best boolit) that I had sized and lubed with the Black Lube. On a whim (I have plenty of LP primers), I loaded up 50 .45 rounds using 4.4 gr of Bullseye and some WLP primers.

Took them to the range today and really was expecting them to fly all over the place and keyhole and anything else Bad that could happen.

But I will be Obama'd. . . At fifty feet and handheld through my 1911, I shot 25 rounds at one target and 25 rounds at another. Ended up with two ragged holes. BEAUTIFUL groups! ZERO leading. SHINY bore.

Now I'm REALLY confused. The fps velocity between the .38 wadcutters and .45 semi-wadcutters is pretty dang close. Standard bulleye/PPC load for the .38 and a reduced, comfortable bowling-pin load for the .45.

Yet, one set of rounds with the Black Lube would've caused me two straight hours in confession if I were a Catholic. . . and the other set (.45) had me doing a little jig and dance step in the shooting bays.

I don't think it's a velocity issue, else the .303 loads would've acted squirrelly too. Nor would it be a boolit diameter/size thing either since the .312 boolits were smaller AND faster than the .358wc. . .

But with two calibers (.38 and 9mm), the Black Lube just inhaled something fierce, and with two other calibers (.303 and .45ACP) it pretty much met my expectations and hopes.

ANY ideas what's up?

[stubshaft]

Could be too much lube in the 38? It may be one of those "huh" moments that drive reloaders batty. One thing for sure. You can say that your new lube works!

[Lloyd Smale]

id say stubshalft is on to something. I may just be lubbing so well that the bullet is slipping the rifling. Your shooting at such a low pressure that your bullet isnt going to bump up any so it could be just riding on the lube. Just for grins try just rubbing a litte of it on the bullet without filling the grove and see if it still works. Low velocity low pressure handgun ammo actually doesnt take much lube to work. In alot of muliti lube grove designs like full wad cutters i will experiment with how many groves i fill and 9 times out of ten you get your best accuracy with just the first lube grove filled. especially if you are like me and use a bit harder bullet then most use. I think in the softer alloyed bullets the filled lube groves tend to keep the bullet from colapsing in the grove. If your gun is right you can even get away without lube. You might have a decent lube for high velocity rifle use though.

[cajun shooter]

They have several post about this very thing on different forums. You can have too much of a good thing and cause groups to open up. Back down on the original load that you tried and see what happens. As stated by Stubshaft and Lloyd I'll add to their beliefs.

[44man]

Take a small amount and add some lanolin to make it sticky and see what happens.

[1Shirt]

Never questioned the logic of developing lubes. Did for awhile myself, and for many years concocted a brew of Beeswax/Vasolene/and graphite, and used it for everything. Tried lots of the old formulas out of the old books as well, with various degrees of sucess. Then as I got older, and was able to afford comercial lubes settled for quite awhile on Lyman Orange. Now however, I have settled on Lars Canuba for everything due to the fact that it works so well and is most reasonable. Have a pretty good stock of the stuff, but in todays world, think I probably ought to order out another dozen sticks.

Good luck Recluse!
1Shirt!

[irniff]

my lube consist of;1 part of synthetic grease` 1 synthetic gear oil 1 carnuba 1 beeswax i push all my bullets over 2000 ft. with no lead accumulation

[Recluse]

I think Lloyd may have hit on it. . . .

I prefer a bit harder boolit in just about everything. All boolits go straight from the mould to the (filled) water bucket. The (.358) wadcutters I cast have three lube grooves and I was filling two and three grooves. I noted that those filled with three grooves flew all over the place with keyholes as well (something I hate).

I'll have to go back and recheck the 9mm notes, however, as it only has one think lube groove.

Oh, and I forgot that I also had lubed (with the Black Lube) some 214 gr .430SWC rounds for my .44 and shot them through my Mod 29 in some fairly hot .44 Specials. I checked out my notes and target this morning and the results were unbelievable.

So now I have three calibers with very good results, two without--but a very likely answer to one of those and that being way too much lube for a hard plus low-velocity boolit.

More testing, I reckon.

Thanks for all the ideas.

[StarMetal]

I think Lloyd may have hit on it. . . .

I prefer a bit harder boolit in just about everything. All boolits go straight from the mould to the (filled) water bucket. The (.358) wadcutters I cast have three lube grooves and I was filling two and three grooves. I noted that those filled with three grooves flew all over the place with keyholes as well (something I hate).

I'll have to go back and recheck the 9mm notes, however, as it only has one think lube groove.

Oh, and I forgot that I also had lubed (with the Black Lube) some 214 gr .430SWC rounds for my .44 and shot them through my Mod 29 in some fairly hot .44 Specials. I checked out my notes and target this morning and the results were unbelievable.

So now I have three calibers with very good results, two without--but a very likely answer to one of those and that being way too much lube for a hard plus low-velocity boolit.

More testing, I reckon.

Thanks for all the ideas.

Here's something to test. Take that 38 Special load of yours what shoots well with your regular lube. Chrono it. Now shoot the same load with your Mobile grease lube and chrono it. Remember clean your barrel well between tests of different lubes and give the bore enough shots to let the lube season in before chronographing. Then tell me what the velocities are between the two. I'll reply with something then.

Joe

[jdgabbard]

Thats why it doesn't take much LLA. Too much of a good thing can be a bad thing. Thats why I bought my 358495. Its a button nose WC, but only has 3 small lube grooves. So that will be just about right for use with my Old NRA Lube I brewed up.