Want to try very very hard cast 44 Mag for Bear protection....

[AlaskanGuy]

Wow... I must say a huge thank you to all of the truly expert advice that i have received in these posts.... What a wealth of information.... This is what i was hoping for. And I received it in spades. Thanks again to all that replied...

Alaskanguy

[fredj338]

Proper water quenched ww are plenty hard but if you want more, try oven heat treating or linotype. I don't think you need a bullet harder than lino for anything, but you can certainly get a sim bullet to the Federal.

[jgt]

I have a mold that cast a 350 grn Keith style gc bullet and have cast air cooled wheel weights with it. These would shoot through a thirty inch diameter tree and about eighteen inches into a gravel bank behind it. The bullets were pristeen except for the nose forward of the driving band being worn off at about the same angle as the gravel banks slope. These were only going eleven or twelve hundred fps if I recall correctly. Today I would be comfortable using a cast 290 grn LBT style gc bullet because they leave a lot of space in the cartridge for powder and still have a lot of weight for penetration.

[jlchucker]

The reason the commercial ones are so hard, they don't want them banged up in shipping. Harder than you need.
If you want to harden your WW boolits more, add a few spoons of lead shot to the alloy when casting, then water drop. The arsenic in the shot will make them harder.

I suspect that may also be why those commercial cast ones are "lubed" with that blue stuff--so it won't smear around in the packaging. "Pretty" store-bought boolits aren't necessarily the best ones. IMO the best ones are those you make up yourself, for the gun that you're going to use.

[44man]

I too just use water dropped WW's in all my revolvers, even the .475 and .500 JRH. Mine vary from 20 to 22 BHN and just won't break on anything but steel plate. I don't think you can stop them in any animal. The penetration of a revolver is just plain amazing. My .44 will do 34" of soaked phone books and that is some tough stuff, nose will not even rivit, still looks as loaded.
Boolit weight is more important then a few BHN and the Lee 310 is a great boolit.

[cbrick]

Water dropping WW's just makes them more brittle increasing chances of breaking up on a bone.

Gabby, I agree with everything in your post except this one line. Heat treating a Pb/Sb alloy by either quenching or oven heat treating will increase the final hardness with very little to no increase in brittleness. An increase in Sb is what will increase how brittle the alloy is.

As for the term "hardcast" used by the OP . . . It is a word invented by commercial bullet casters for the sole purpose of selling their product. It has nothing to do with what is best for their customers, it confuses and misinforms people new to casting and those buying commercial cast. Too hard is the second leading cause of bore leading and inaccuracy right behind poor fit in the firearm they are fired in.

Rick

[44man]

Rick is right! One thing I have found is even WD, WW boolits are far too hard for hunting in several of my calibers like the 45-70 and JRH. Harder works good in the .44 on deer. I would reserve the hard boolits for very large animals from my large calibers.
For small animals even air cooled can be too hard and it is time for adding pure lead or making soft nose.
Now I do on occassion make a harder boolit by adding a small amount of antimony and some tin but it is just for target, never found any need for type metal.
You can shoot pretty soft boolits but I avoid anything that gets near the slump point the same as I stay away from too much antimony.
I say the WW is about the most versatile and cheap lead you can use. It is a good starting point to change then about anything.

[Mk42gunner]

I am not in Alaska any more, and there weren't any bears on Adak anyway.

What I think you should do is test some boolits for penetration and recovery. Who knows, the commercial hardcast might not penetrate as much as your home cast ones.

In a situation such as this, it is better to know for a fact than to guess.

Robert

[AKbushman49]

AlaskaGuy- I don't know if a super hard boolit will get you any more penetration than a softer one.
I was a tech working the high sites in AK for a lot of years (Naked Is, Hinch, Pigot, Cape Gull and others) wasn't allowed anything but a pistol. Mine was a Ruger Bisley 44mag. Load: 330gr JDJ BHN as cast 10-12, WD to 16-18 over a healthy charge WW296. alloy 50% WW, 45% cable sheath, 3% magnum lead shot, and a touch of 50-50 solder. I get a tad more boolit weight with the softer alloy, my mold spec says 310gr with lyman#2. I get 330gr. Veral's rule of thumb 1 BHN for every 100fps was my baseline, recoil is stiff but nowhere near a 454. Accurate, effective, no leading. Every Blackie and one Brownie stem to stern. Just my 2 cents.
AKbushman49

[Lloyd Smale]

ive never shot a brown bear with any bullet so im sure no expert but have shot a bunch of deer, blackbear, boar and buffalo. A bullet 16-20bhn is plenty hard for anything. You dont need tin with your alloy because your lineotype has plenty in it for that alloy. 5050 pure and lino should get you in the 16-18 bhb range air cooled. Ive drove bullets out of alloys simular lenghtwize through 1000 lb buffalo. Ill add one more thing. Its very rare that any alloy bullet no matter how hard or how you got there fractures at handgun velocitys. Ive seen water dropped super hard bullets lose there nose but these were water dropped comercial bullets. Thing is i dont know if they actually fractured because of the hardness or were just cast to fast and were cracked in that area before when they came out of the mold. Ive shot a ton of pure linotype bullets out of handguns and NEVER got one to fracture unless you count shooting them at steal and that will destroy any bullet.

[AlaskanGuy]

Thanks guys, good discussion..... And lots of cool info.....

[MtGun44]

Avoid linotype, it is very brittle and shatters with hard impact. Hit a lino boolit with
a hammer if you doubt it.

Bill

[jgt]

I have been casting nearly forty years and I still learn a lot each year. I gained a lot from reading "Jacketed Proformance From Cast Bullet" BY Veril Smith. Then came the most comprehensive book on casting I have come in contact with "From Ingot to Target" by Glen Fryxell. What is even more remarkable is Glen put his book on line for everyone to benefit from free of charge. Look him up and read his book and I believe you will consider it time well spent. I'm sorry I don't know much about computers, but if I can find it I would bet you can too. Good luck.

[old beekeeper]

JGT

That book can be found by going to the Las Angeles Silhouette Club. http://www.lasc.us/ArticlesFryxell.htm
It is a great group of articles and can be downloaded. I keep a copy of it on my loading bench and give it a look from time to time. Also, I can tell you that a 300 grain bullet over a stiff charge of Lil Gun will take down a Virginia Bear with no problem, said bullet ranging about 15BHN. Bear charged got about 20 yards, shot at 19 yards, dropped at 15 yards after doing a final roll over, don't know about those Alaska Bears, they may be tougher, but it would probably give them food for thought. Of course, I was using a .44 mag Marlin 1894 which may have given a little more muzzle velocity, but I bet not all that much. This particular bear was tearing up my bee hives and he didn't like me taking exception to his task, turned, showed me his teeth and I showed him my Marlin. Case closed.

Beekeeper

[MT Gianni]

Avoid linotype, it is very brittle and shatters with hard impact. Hit a lino boolit with
a hammer if you doubt it.

Bill

I hope you mean to avoid using only linotype as a bullet metal. In an alloy of 50-50 Lino is fine.

[MtGun44]

yep, just straight lino is brittle, 50-50 is great, but I often add a bit of tin, too.

Bill

[W.R.Buchanan]

AKguy: not to change the subject but, do you carry Bear Spray with you?

IT seems like that would be a more effective way to deal with a charging bear.

I have read that NO Bear has ever gotten past Bear Pepper Spray.

If this is true, then it would make sense to use that option before a pistol that would be difficult to hit with under that much stress. Also consider that if you do hit the bear, you must actually kill the bear, which may or may not happen even if you get full pen.

IN order to experience full penetration you must first hit said target. I personally like guns, but also think it would be much easier to hit the moving target with an aerosol can that shoots 30 feet!

Pretty sure you would get full pen with strait wheel weights. In any event you could practice with them and then maybe buy some Beartooth Boolits for your defensive rounds since you probably won't shoot up 100 of them at real bears in your lifetime, or you could buy more if you ran out. They aren't that expensive.

I find that this is the best and most efficient way to cope with low usage things you want to use. You make what you use most, and buy the stuff you use infrequently. That way you don't have to set up for something you're only going to do once in a while.

I recommend this way for people who want to shoot +P ammo in their defensive guns. You load midrange loads for most shooting and if you need to shoot a hot rod load you just buy a box and use them as needed . Much easier and safer than pushing into unknown territory that you aren't going to visit very often.

My.02

Randy

[waksupi]

AKguy: not to change the subject but, do you carry Bear Spray with you?

IT seems like that would be a more effective way to deal with a charging bear.

I have read that NO Bear has ever gotten past Bear Pepper Spray.



Randy

Jack Hannah nearly got his butt ate by a griz up here.

Wind, doncha know?

[AlaskanGuy]

I do hand out pepper spray to the clients, but once a can accidently went off in our suburban... Couldnt set foot in the suburban for weeks... And i once saw a test video of a brownie rolling in a patch of ground that was sprayed with bear spray... I dont know, i like the ability of lead spray better, and the customers like it better too...

[W.R.Buchanan]

You could use the gun as a back up and it would probably be easier to hit the bear if he was writhing in agony on the ground in front of you?



Randy