Case lube

W

Whistlebritches

New member
Never thought much about this over the last 40+ years or so til a friend of mine mentioned he had finally decided One Shot was the best case lube.He went on to say he had close to a dozen varieties of case lube,had experimented with them all over a 10 year period and finally decided One Shot was the best.Finally after his 10 minute soap box praise of One Shot he asked,"which lube do you use"?I told him of this natural substance that can be had in any household.........and the byproduct of this natural stuff was quite tasty.He finally chimed in and flat out demanded to know what I was talking about........."Bacon Grease".

Am I the only one?I've never owned nor thought much about commercial case lube.My Granddaddy used bacon or coon grease.........if it was good enough for him.
 
Whatever gets the job done will work i reckon lol. It only takes a little bit anyway. I like rcbs case lube i put it on the rcbs pad and i just have to wipe a case across it real quick and pop it in the press. Works like a charm and is effecient. I freeze my bacon grease for use in later meals, a lot of recipes call for it.
 
To each his own.[emoji106] I use One Shot. Easy to use, no rolling of cases on a pad. Spray some in a container with brass; give it a jiggle and another shot. Up and rolling in a few minutes.


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Use One-Shot for reloading!

I thought everyone saved their bacon grease to making salad dressing on Thanksgiving. Works much better for this than One-Shot
 
Actually one of the best case lubes is a 50-50 mix of lanolin and castor oil.

It is a extreme pressure lube that bullet swagers use when smashing lead cylinders into
bullets.
 
The bacon grease reminded of the Discovery show "Bush People" and in one episode it showed two of the sons prepping for a meat hunt, and poured hot grease straight from a skillet into the action of a rifle. They said it worked good. LOL

I use the RCBS lube & pad when sizing brass in high quantities, due to the ease of application with the pad. I use Unique on the smaller quantities sessions.
 
A while back there was another thread on this subject, if one feels inclined to search for it. I have also used "One Shot" for the last 30 years or so but the thread I mentioned got me experimenting.

I would think the lanolin-castor oil combo would be a bit oily/"greasy." I came up with a 10% mixture of lanolin in 91% Isopropyl Alcohol. The alcohol evaporates, leaving a thin but satisfactory coating of lanolin on the case, which can be removed by tumbling in corn cob media after resizing.

Liquid lanolin is out there but I couldn't find it in my area, so I opted for the solid, which is really just a bit thicker than Vaseline. You can purchase spray bottles of any size and I used a 4-oz size (120ml), so the formula is Lanolin 12Gm, Isopropyl alcohol 108 ml. The lanolin is sparingly soluble in alcohol so you need to shake it before (and during) use. It's much less expensive than One Shot.
 
...a friend of mine mentioned he had finally decided One Shot was the best case lube.
Click to expand...

Your friend needs to have his head examined. Google "stuck case one shot". In the metallic cartridge reloading course I teach, I teach my students to NEVER use Hornady One Stuck on bottleneck rifle cases unless you first buy a stuck case removal tool.

Don
 
Got my first batch of homemade ingredients. Liquid lanolin and 99% alcohol. Straight from the 6.5 Guys. If its good enough for them I'll give it a try. 10 to 1 mix. $25 for more than a years worth of lube.

Bill
 
jugornot, is that 10:1 formula ten parts of Lanolin liquid to one part of alcohol or the reverse?

Usually alcohol can't exist at 99% since it absorbs water from the air - the Isopropyl I use is 91%. What alcohol is it? Ethyl-Methyl-isopropyl??
 
Or you could try just getting a bit of the lanolin on your fingers and rub the case as you pick it up to size it. I've been using Mink Oil Boot Dressing Cream for mebbe 20 years and that's the way I do it. I dip my left index finger tip into the cream and rube a little (a very little is all it takes) on the case when I pick it up. I have never had a stuck case (223, 30-30, 30-06, 308, 303 British, 7.62x54r and even use it for my 44 Magnum brass).
 
One of the early posts on using Lanolin/alcohol is on ARFCOM. It calls for 2 ounces of lanolin to 16 ounces of 99% Iso alcohol. That's 8:1 but I have seen folks call for 10:1 which would be 1.6 ounces of lanolin to the same amount of alcohol.

https://www.ar15.com/forums/armory/-/42-305174/?

There are people who have used OneShot successfully, obviously (and some of them have posted here). It's not at all hard however to find threads, blogs and web pages about how bad the stuff is. When you look at the cost of the alcohol/lanolin mix and how effective it is (I just finished my first session with it and it worked wonderfully), why bother with the spray can?

I've thrown my OneShot in the trash.
 
I've used One Shot for more years than I can remember and I've never had a case stick unless I didn't spray enough on it. Even at that, it was evident when it first entered the die and never got any further than that. But now that I'm using Lanolin/alcohol my One Shot sits in reserve for when I run out of Lanolin and I'm too lazy to stop and make some more.
 
Some pharmacy’s carry the Pure liquid lanolin if not a small bottle can be purchased on line.
The higher % alcohol 91+ the better. Back in the day we used the RED bottle of gas treatment called Pure Heat. It cheep and high content of alcohol.
A Small pump spray bottle at Hobbie lobby store, Wally World,beauty supple will work fine. You will ALWAYS need to shake it up before use as the mix will seperate over time, but will store for years.
I spray 2-3 sprays into a baggy,rub it around, drop in a handful of clean brass and roll it around till all brass feels slippery. You can spray a Q-tip with it to coat the inside neck of rifle brass or you can reach up and wipe your sizer die spindle to help inside case necks.
After sizing my brass I do not clean off the case lube. After loading is complete I may or may not wipe the rounds in a rag as I inspect and spot measure crimps and OAL’s.
Loaded rounds will not tarnish when stored for long periods.
Be safe, Merry Christmas and God Bless
Mike
 
I have used Imperial for most of my reloading time,tried the mink oil substitute then the 99% alcohol/lanolin mix. I prefer the lanolin mix for overall ease of use and effectiveness with Imperial not far behind. Bacon grease makes for delicious corn bread but I doubt I will be using it in my reloading.
 
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