Home Forums Reloading Bullet Casting Bullet lube question

I just bought 500 bullets from a cast bullet manufacturer. The lube grooves don't appear to be completely full. Is that something I should be concerned about? Sorry for the newbie question but I don't have much experience with cast bullets.

Probably not. Try a few and see how they work.

most bullet grooves contain way more lube than is necessary, so if half is missing you still have enough

I feel much better, thanks guys!

Cast all my own and use SPG for everything.

Good shooting.

best, Larry

Did you even read the question the OP asked? He isn't asking for bullet lube suggestions.

Yes, just trying to offer some experience based advice should he decide to cast his own.

best to you and your, Larry

I wonder how many people get led down the rabbit hole of bullet casting by starting out buying commercially cast bullets? I bet a lot do.

My very first casting experience back in the late 60's was laughable (now). I bought a Lyman 311241 mold (155gr. RN plain base) to feed my $40 Krag carbine with, along with a can of 2400 powder. I cast a big handful out of god knows what soft alloy, sized them to .311 in a Grampaw-made push through sizer, and skipped the lubing part because, well, I didn't have any and thought "what could possibly go wrong?" Powered by a fairly stiff charge of 2400, the first couple shots went smack dab into the bullseye. By the twentieth shot god only knew where those bullets were flying, because I sure didn't. A peek through the barrel saw little evidence of the presence of rifling- those grooves were packed solidly with lead. A lot of cussing and several bronze brushes later I had it back to normal. Then I broke down and bought a stick of lube, and some Red Dot to replace the 2400.

With 500 bullets costing less then $90 to my door for sized, lubed, and gas checked bullets I don't see a reason to bother. But I also don't have a reliable source of lead or any appreciable free time.

Thats pretty much the way it went for me in the beginning. At the time the only firearm I shot cast in was my Ruger BH. I bought LazerCast 158 gr. SWC bullet at the LGS for I think at the time was around $25 for a box of 500.

I ended up getting a couple of molds an at the time wheel weights were easy to get for free. I cast all my bullets at the time by hand,no pot an also had a RCBS lubsizer. Got married kids came along and all that goes along with that so all the fun stuff went by the wayside for a number of years. I sold the molds and lubsizer.

Fast forward 20 years and I've been back in the game for the past 15 or so and haven't looked back I own 15 molds of various makers both plain base as well as gas check version. I lube all my bullets using Alox and JPW lube and all the gas checks and sizing are done with Lee push through sizers just to keep things simple. I've stashed up enough free lead and lead based alloys over the years not to have to worry about bullets for awhile. I shoot cast lead in all my rifles and handguns nowadays although I have a decent stash of J bullets for all calibers I load that I stuck back during my non casting years they just stay in there boxes waiting for a rainy day.

Biathlonman those bullets shouldn't be a problem unless there are just large voids where there is no lube at all. A simple fix would be just to give them a light coat of Lee Alox thinned down with mineral spirits if they give you any problems.

No free time is a killer. But the inexpensive, mass produced variety of cast bullets generally suck compared to well done home cast bullets. They have hard lubes whose primary virtue is withstanding handling and commercial loading machines, not doing the best job as a bullet lube. They are often too hard for the mild to mid pressure loads a lot of handloaders want cast bullets for. They are often undersized for best results, and have bevel bases, and these things exacerbate leading when the too hard bullets don't obturate under the pressure of a mild load. The bullet designs are better for mass production than they are for in gun or on target performance.


Commercial:




Not mine, but not commercial either:

I got mine from Carolina Cast Bullets. Got the Ranch Dog 190-358, sized .359 for my barrel and gas checked. Having a heck of a time finding appropriate jacketed bullets so thought I'd try cast.

there is quite a few folks out there that are skipping the lube altogether and powder coating. I plan on trying it sometime down the road.

Time marches on in that respect. I'm sure powder coating is all it's claimed to be, and probably more. The thing is, I'm nowhere near done exploring the art of traditional cast bullets and lubes so I'll keep at that. I'll leave the new technology to others, and cheer them on from the sidelines. Besides, the odors drifting up from a hot gun firing grease lubed bullets to me are like Hoppe's, pipe tobacco smoke, and bacon frying. Some things I just don't want to change! I'm just another (sort of) old fart who's steeped in tradition and find comfort in it, and who knows where to draw the line...

Hard lube missing anywhere makes fliers. Lube must be even all around and must all leave at muzzle exit or you have counter weights on your boolits. It is like casting with air holes in your boolits.
Most store bought will have a hard lube with half in the bottom of the box. Do you REALLY want to shoot them?
I have made more lube tests then anyone and you can go from a shotgun to one hole with a lube change.
Powder coating still scares me because what will be long term barrel wear. Are there any abrasive things in the paint?
here is a hard lube and a soft at 50 yards.

Not that I can see. I got 4 4oz ziplocks of 4 different colors to play with along with some plastic BBs to try the "shake and bake" method. A Harbor Freight gun is $50-75 if it doesn't seem to work well the cheap way. I've got less than $30 invested in this "experiment" so far so I don't have much to lose.

Worth a try, many claim good results.
I would be interested in accuracy testing.
Maybe I just old fashioned!

Avoid the flat powder coat colors, as they may have abrasives in them, but the glossy powder coat seems good to go. I haven't used bullet lube in quite a while now.

tmax, try it without the plastic BB's, just bullets and powder in a plastic margarine or yogurt tub. If you have good powder, they are completely unnecessary. Best I can figure is some people just have to complicate things; don't know why else they'd use them.

Thanks for heads up. I got gloss black, JD green, purple and a blue. Thinking I'll use different colors to separate calibers.

I use two colors to separate subsonic vs supersonic, and have settled on just two powder colors (after testing a lot of them) for their different attributes. Every powder I've tried works a little differently, some are slicker, some are tougher, some stick the bullets together too hard, etc.

My subsonic powder is a cobalt blue that is not tough enough for high pressure loads, but is very slick, and the bullets break apart easily without leaving bare spots.

My supersonic powder is a yellow/green that is very tough and slick, and doesn't stick bullets together as badly as some others.

The candy colors have been the worst for sticking bullets together, and being a little grabby in the bore.