Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Mule Deer John

I just thought of something MD, perhaps you could help.

I may be retiring to that "Western" state that has instituted an upcoming statewide ban on hunting with lead projectiles. I will therefor have a need for a lighter weight non toxic (except to the critters I shoot?) bullet than is currently available in .25 caliber (calibre for the Canuckians). There are loads of jackrabbits, a goodly number of cottontail and coyotes, Belding's ground squirrels and other game right out my back door and I'd love to be able to take my guns for a walk in the woods. It's much more fun to be able to bring them loaded and not having to worry about running afoul of the law.

I'll be using them, hopefully, in my 25-20 and .256 Win Mag firearms. My thoughts had been to get a mini-lathe and cut down some Barnes bullets (I think they have 110's and 117's?). I discussed this on Marlinowners a couple of years back and got lots of good input on their 25-20 thread.

Perhaps, in your next conversation with him, could you speak to Mr Emary about the feasibility of developing a flex-tip mono (or a flat tip?) in the 60-90 grain range? It would seem to be a good fit for a lot of lever guns, and in my case a revolver too.

There's going to be a great variety of fine firearms made useless in that state. I do understand the business end of things, if they can't sell enough to cover the tooling costs etc, it ain't going to happen. For all I know, Hornady has already looked into it.

If you can talk to Dave, it would sure be appreciated. A modern bullet for 25-20 might make sense to some folks down south for hogs too? And maybe re-invigorate the .256 (was it ever invigorated?)

Thanks,
Geno

Barnes sells a 80gr TTSX. I'm getting over 3350 FPS in a 22" .257 Rbts.

The 80 TTSX isn't going to even come close to stabilizing in the twist of a .25-20 or .256, since they're normally 1-14 or 1-16, even if it wasn't too long to function through their magazines.

The ban takes effect, in the area you most likely are mentioning, July 1 2019.

I am hoping to shoot most of my ballistic tipped Skippy ammo by then, but I need lots of help, lol.

From the title of the thread, I was expecting a letter from a horse/donkey cross telling her boyfriend that it was over.

Geno,

Will mention it and not just to Hornady, as non-toxics are eventually going to be required in more and more places.

In the meantime I thought of a couple alternatives. One would be to swage down Ballistic Products ITX non-toxic buckshot or roundballs to .25, since it's pretty dense stuff and while not as swageable as lead might work. If it would work, it would probably have to be taken down in 2-3 stages, but Lee Precision swaging dies are pretty cheap.

HA HA,

But you fail to recognize, John and I are not like the majority of 'fire members ................. we can SPELL!

Had I intended that kind of letter I would have titled it
"Mule DEAR John"

Geno

PS, sometimes I even get the punctuation correct.

Thanks for the support John.

And thanks for that idea about the BP ITX swaging possibilities. I imagine that could be accomplished on a single stage Lee press?

Geno

What state?

Most likely CA.... It is a cross we have to bear.

Geno,

Yep, I've used a single-stage Lee press to swage lead buckshot to use as bullets. But I've always started with buckshot just slightly larger than needed, so dunno what might happen.

Geno, If you're willing to go to the trouble of milling down Barnes bullets why not just start with over size copper rod and swage down( or turn on your mini lathe) to .256 and mill from there?

Could be a new career for your "retirement".

Geno, I appreciate the spelling and punctuation accuracy; it was just too close to pass up. Best, John

I'm with John on this idea, I had considered it but even at 4000 feet elevation I won't be launching them from the right rate of twist.

The Marlinowners thread I mentioned had some of the members showing how they might shorten a Barnes to work in the standard 25-20 barrels, it involved making a flat hollow point out of them by substantially trimming back the nose, and it might even involve trimming off some of the base to get them short enough. Then comes the experimenting to see what terminal ballistics might look like.

Thanks for the idea though,

Geno

Yes, as smithrjd surmised,Cali.

But a part of the state that really is about as far from SoCal/LA LA Land as one can get, physically, politically, mentally, etc.

Geno

PS, please don't hate me, like some others on here who can ONLY see bad about California. I refer to it as Kommiefornia myself sometimes, because they are SO out of touch with reality/logic in the legislature there. I grew up there, saw them attempt to legislate away "gun violence" since the early 60's and so on. I actually am glad about some of their regulations, if they hadn't passed stringent air quality rules people there would look like the Chinese in masks all day. The rest of the USA is reaping the benefit too.

PPS, there I go, trying to hijack my own thread!

SBTCO,

good ideas, and I might check out the cutting down copper rod one. Swaging though, of something as hard as copper rod might get expensive. I looked into some equipment a while back and was shocked at the price of something for that purpose.

Cutting bullets with a lathe from copper rod might be fun, but I'd have to figure out how to come up with a nose cavity that works, or perhaps some kind of jig to score the nose so it could expand some.

I'm not a machinist (I'm a fish dude) so the learning curve for just trimming some Barnes bullets will be somewhat steep. The cost of a mini lathe is reasonable, but If John can work his magic with the bullet mfgs, I may be able to get away from buying one of the lathes even!

Thanks for the ideas folks,

Geno

John,

I appreciated your humor too,

Geno

I claim no useful suggestions but my first take is that bumping up is always better than swaging down.

Maybe a Varmint Grenade or other commercial non-toxic could be used as the core with a jacket whether precision or even improvised Rock Chuck Bullet Swage style from cartridge case necks?? to bring the diameter up with a short OAL?

Geno,

Another possibility that occurred to me is paper-patching the .243 Cutting Edge 55-grain Raptor bullet. The Raptors are brass bullets that have a big hollow-point on one end and a flat nose on the other, so can be used either as expanding or solid bullets simply be reversing them. (The hollow-point can also be filled with a press-in plastic tip to increase BC, but that wouldn't apply here.) They're supposed to expand down to 1500 fps, and the 55 just might stabilize. If you're interested, I could send you a few if you'd like to try.

Cutting Edge also makes a 70-grain .257 Raptor but it probably wouldn't stabilize in the twists of your rifles. But the 55 .243 might, according to the old Greenhill Formula, which is more appropriate for blunt bullets at moderate velocities than the modern computer formulas, which are primarily designed for very long and streamlined high-BC bottails.

Valsdad, you must have some amazing deal cooking to consider moving to a place so at odds with what you think and enjoy. I just couldn't do it (or likely afford it with the new gas tax, astronomical real estate prices, and the new single-payer health plan they're cooking up). Think long and hard my friend, and not just about your bullet problem.