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HAWKEN
Posts: 1,720 Senior Member
Just a curious thought?
HAWKEN
Posts: 1,720 Senior Member
Several of us push the envelope with lead bullets, by one method or another, ie: gas checks, moly coating or powder coating. Has anyone thought of, or tried, gluing a paper, or other material disc, to the bottom of a lead bullet? It seems like it might help, especially in a revolver. I would think that anything that would protect the base of the bullet from melting from the hot gas would be beneficial. Inquiring minds want to know.......Robin
I don't often talk to people that voted for Obama, but when I do I order large fries!
Life member of the American Legion, the VFW, the NRA and the Masonic Lodge, retired LEO
Life member of the American Legion, the VFW, the NRA and the Masonic Lodge, retired LEO
Replies
I've used gas checked bullets, and I've used a homemade punch to punch out discs from the back of legal pads and other extra heavy card stock to protect the back of pistol bullets in hot loads. The paper discs weren't glued on; just used as a wad of sorts to protect the bullet base from hot gases. The heavy paper wads worked well, and accuracy improved. Some of the bullets I recovered with and without the wads showed that those without the wad had some serious gas cutting on the bullet base, and the ones shot with paper wads did not have the gas cutting on the base.
Other than gas checks, I'd not recommend gluing anything to the bullet base. It could cause imbalance in the bullet and cause accuracy problems.
As an aside, there are felt wads made for several calibers of black powder revolver, notably .36, .44, and .45 caliber. They are also available in card type wads for muzzleloading rifles from .32 cal. up to .58 cal.; there may be more, but I know that they are available from .32 to .58. Those wads could be used for smokeless loads, also, but loads would have to be reduced and worked back up as the wads take up case space.
I was going to coat some bullets today but it was too cold this morning to work on the front porch, and this afternoon I got distracted with some other stuff that I needed to do winterizing the house.
― Douglas Adams
Rather than glue stuff to the bullet, I'd prefer to fill the available space in the case with an appropriate thickness of felt wads. This will stabilize the powder charge, giving more consistent ignition and - hopefully - better accuracy. The key thing to remember here is that you have to treat loading with fillers as a completely different load workup than without. Your manual data figures loads with whatever empty space is allowed by the given charge and bullet. That empty space is now gone, and the powder will burn differently - proceed with caution!
"Nothing is safe from stupid." - Zee
I remember reading about and hearing about Duplex powder loads where a couple different powder charges were used and felt wads/cardboard being used 30-40 years ago.
All things considered and even today unless you are willing to be very cautious and take the extra time and effort, I'd just buy hard cast or make my own to achieve the velocities/accuracy I was trying to achieve. I don't remember shooters/reloaders/gun writers or any reloading manual recommending messing with it and most of them just experimented with a few batches and then not much more on the subject.
Sometimes special articles on shot-shell loads fer handguns would mention cardboard or felt, but that's about it anymore that I've seen. Or maybe paper-patching bullets for reloads for obsolete or nearly forgotten calibers like my Martini Henry .45/.577 or Snider Conversion .577 rifles.
I guess I'd just buy some jacketed bullets for optimum velocity/accuracy or gas checked cast ones.
I think in almost every instance that jacketed factory bullets have proven to be mo better performance wise (less clean up/ more velocity/ and usually better accuracy especially in magnum calibers or using gas checks which mimic the bases on jacketed bullets ) in modern calibers designed around them/ guns able to shoot them, but they cost more than lead bullets to reload.
At least in my opinion. However, I've had some amazing 25 yard groups from handguns with hard cast bullets. Rifles, I dunno I shoot jacketed from except whatever the .22s I have O/H happen to be.
Words of wisdom from Big Chief: Flush twice, it's a long way to the Mess Hall
I'd rather have my sister work in a whorehouse than own another Taurus!
Hard cast bullets will let you do things loading that aren't too shmart with jacketed bullets.
Speaking of paper patching, I've got a mold around here somewhere for a 425 grain .458 patched bullet that's just odd. The bullet it casts is like a heeled bullet with a super long heel that stops about a 1/16" behind where the bullet ogive starts. I never messed with the bullets enough to get a good accurate load worked up for it. That was back when I had a fling with loading .45-70 with real black powder. I was shooting them out of a rolling block rifle, and at 11 pounds the rifle was pounding me like a hammer after a nail. I couldn't stand it! :tooth:
I'm making my own gas checks, and have the drawings to make the dies for more calibers. Something to do this winter. So far, the aluminum .357 gas checks are shooting well, and so are the .308 gas checks. But I'm not pushing them to jacketed velocity.
Never messed with duplex powder loads; I read about it way back when and decided that was living too close to the edge!
― Douglas Adams
Words of wisdom from Big Chief: Flush twice, it's a long way to the Mess Hall
I'd rather have my sister work in a whorehouse than own another Taurus!
Rolling block rifles, and to pretty much the same extent, Sharps rifles, suffer from the same malady as lever action rifles like the Marlin and Winchester. The bore line is high above the heel of the buttstock, and that's a recipe for felt recoil enhancement. And a checkered steel butt plate makes it worse.
― Douglas Adams
From shooting several thousand rounds down range in various bpcr rifles, both grease groove and paper patched bullets, the one thing that you do not want to have is something stuck to the base of the bullet. Unless as in the case of a properly fit and crimped gascheck , something that isn't perfectly aligned with the axis of the bullet can be an accuracy killer.
Revolvers compound the problem as what ever is on the base of the bullet has to be able to make the jump from the cylinder mouth to the forcing cone and not come loose.
The base guard gas check is alive and well if you swage your own bullets. I have a die set for .38-55 and .45-70 that use those copper discs. They work just fine, and the dies are also available to swage pistol bullets.
http://www.corbins.com/design.htm
It is a niche product, to be sure, but it is still there for those that swage their own projectiles.
― Douglas Adams
I do full jackets for swaged rifle and pistol; the ones I've seen that are half jacket I don't like. I prefer a gas checked hard cast bullet over the dead soft core half jacketed bullets. Pushing a soft core half jacket bullet at anywhere near full jacket velocity causes problems.
― Douglas Adams