Hard cast lead velocity/leading

N

nhyrum

New member
So I'm getting a 454 casull revolver(Taurus raging judge) for them big hairy toothy man eating critters, and most non expanding bullets are hard cast lead. Now, I know that hornady had to make special xtp's for the 454 and 460 because of jackets separating. And I know in my 22lr if I get lead bullets going too fast, they shed lead in the barrel(pretty sure they aren't hard cast though)

What are the velocity limits on hard cast lead boolits? Can one home cast hard cast easily?

Also, until recently when I recalled some of my college physics, velocity is much more a factor in kinetic energy than mass (ke=1/2mv^2) so I'd gather a 200 grain solid copper projectile going an extra 3-400 fps faster would have MUCH more kinetic energy than a 350 grain(ish) Hard cast buffalo bore boolit going slower. But that's just on paper, how does that work in practice?
 
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Its less simple than your question implies.
There are things you can get wrong that will cause leading at 800 fps.
Of course,alloy matters.Dead soft lead...leads! Easily.But I have found gas checked wheel weight full power .44 magnum loads of various weights do not lead at any velocity I have been able to achieve in a rifle.

Bullet fit(to preclude gas leakage past the bullet) is critical.

Bore and forcing cone alignment and surface finish matter. At higher velocities,gas checks matter. Lube groove design and type of bullet lube matter.


If you get everything else right,you will be good with any velocity you can achieve,at least with 250 gr plus bullets.
 
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HiBC said:
Its less simple than your question implies.
There are things you can get wrong that will cause leading at 800 fps.
Of course,alloy matters.Dead soft lead...leads! Easily.But I have found gas checked wheel weight full power .44 magnum loads of various weights do not lead at any velocity I have been able to achieve in a rifle.

Bullet fit(to preclude gas leakage past the bullet) is critical.

Bore and forcing cone alignment and surface finish matter. At higher velocities,gas checks matter. Lube groove design and type of bullet lube matter.


If you get everything else right,you will be good with any velocity you can achieve,at least with 250 gr plus bullets.
Click to expand...
So.......... Half of it is having a correctly made firearm, the other half is having a well made mold/lead.

Hoping that Taurus correctly made my revolver, what would be some good quality boolits that could handle 1600fps+?
 
#1 is FIT. This might mean using a lead bullet that is 0.002" over actual measured groove diameter and the bullet must be a tight slip fit in the throats of the cylinder, though usually, a slightly larger bullet can be used.
#2 is Lube. Carnauba Red would be a good start
#3 might well be a gas check bullet, depending on what you find.

So, if the cylinder's throats are smaller than groove diameter, you probably have to stick with jacketed bullets, but, again, you'll have to test and find out.
 
I have the 8-3\8" Raging Bull in 454. With mine I have found "nothing" that walks in our woods that will stop the Lee 452-300RF gas checked poured from straight wheel weight then sized to .452" and loaded to 1550fps.

That said, it is like has been noted, fit is King, lube is Queen, and pressure is the wild Jack in the deck. No difference between the caliber being used. It is all a highwire balancing act where if you get one thing too far out of line things can get squirrelly in a hurry.

I have tried cast in weights from 250-325grs in mine all cast from the same batch of lead. Some were plain based and some were GC'ed, but all shot good enough to hunt with at 25-50yds. That Lee however trumps them all in both accuracy and impact. The big wide nose makes a very distinctive snack when it slams into the shoulder of a hog out at 75-80yds and the resulting slam dunk is pretty impressive. This is one hitting a 6gal bucket full of water at 50yds...
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Visualize a fat hog soaking that up.....
 
1. You MUST have cylinder throats that are at least as large as the barrel's groove diameter.
2. You MUST size to that diameter/maybe a thousandth over
3. You don't want "super hard/cat-scratch bullet. NO.
4. You DO want ordinary/everyday Lyman #2/BN~15 (which is easy to get from RotoMetals....
5. Gas checks are nice, but not absolutely necessary until you start approaching/exceeding Mach 1.6

See http://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/cast-lead-and-the-ar-15.812126/#post-10388319
 
The only thing I can add as you have received excellent advise, especially from mehavey, so far is that I learned my lesson regarding "hard cast" long ago.

I do not cast anything harder that a BHN 14.

Hard Cast is crap. Nothing else.
 
The highest velocity cast bullets that I shoot have been chronographed at 2,175 fps in my 30-30 Winchester. No barrel leading in my Winchester. I mostly shoot cast bullets in 45 Colt at half that speed. Since reaming the cylinder throats a long time ago, there has been no leading issues.
 
Physics dont play as much of a role as one might think when it comes to shoving a cast lead bullet through a sack of meat, bone and blood. Now we are talking LEAD, not jacketed, the info does not exchange. For a hard cast lead bullet to be used against a big bad critter you actually DONT want to push the bullet to fast. A heavy for caliber, semi wa cutter with a big meplat is ideal. Running say a 300 grain projectile with properly matched lead hardness at about 1100-1200 fps will push said projectile three, four, even five FEET into a big animal. If you push the lead to fast you actually counteract this effect and loose penetration which is very important on large dangerous game. Gotta get down to those vitals.

As mention, jacketed is another ball of wax.
 
To mirror others, there are a lot of factors that play in to shooting lead. Fit and bullet lube are important. Pressure and velocity are important factors. A slug about .001 greater than bore diameter, heavy for caliber, is in order.

You also will want to use a powder that is pretty stable and keep pressure within what cast is capable of handling. Gas checks make this a little more forgiving. Velocity shouldn't give you any problem if you use heavy for caliber pills. Pressure leading can be mitigated with fit, powder choice and loading, and using a gas check when you simply havemto drive it hard.
 
Lead cast bullets

I shoot Hardball 430 gr cast bullets out of my Encore 460 over 26 gr of 4227.
I started powder coating them before sizing and seating gas checks. These are fast, heavy recoil loads, but I am getting no leading at all in a 15" barrel.
 
Most of the bulletsI have used have been wheel weight.Sized and lube right,it works great.
I have also had great result with LaserCast.They are pretty hard.Same rules apply about fit.
For my SBH,I buy .431 bullets. If my local shop or Midchez stockd .429 bullets,I might not like them. 200 gr .451 Laser Cast showed some leading in my brother's 45 ACP Kimber,probably 850 fps.I'd bet .452 bullets would not.
 
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