First 38spl reloads - range report

[01SVTvert]

I had 110 158gr rn lead 38 bullets from the cast bullet workshop that I wanted to load and finally did this weekend.

Bullet was a 158gr RNL from a Lee mold that had "tumble lube" gooves. Cast with dead soft lead. Thanks to the cast bullet workshop I cast these on my own then and wanted to give them a try. Cases were mixed. Primers were Winchester SP with a low end load of Hodgon HP-38.
I ended up tumble lubing the bullets with Lee Liquid Alox as I have not yet made my own lube. Left them out overnight on tin foil to let them dry. They were very slightly tacky when handled but nothing seemed to be accumulating on my hands, which suprised me. Very little of the Alox was needed to completely coat all the bullets in a ziplock bag.

Charge weight was at the starting range for this powder and the RNL bullets. I weighed the first 5 charges and then every 6th charge afterward to see about consistency and they seemed to be within .1 to .2 grains of eachother. (I need a better scale IMO)

I first adjusted the expander to give a minimal flare to get the bullet seated and looking back I should have flared them slightly larger (more on that later). Seated the bullets and gave them just enough crimp to bring the flare back to neutral. OAL was set at 1.485. I ended up loading up about 90 rounds I tried the first few as they dropped form the press in the cylinder of the revolver I was shooting and found they were dragging when inserted. Inspection showed that they were still slightly flared so I adjusted the crimp die another 1/8th turn. This seemed to do the trick as the next few rounds were all easily going into the cylinder. From then on I checked about every 5th round in the cylinder and length with a micrometer. Probably overkill but it made me feel better and since I was on a single stage it was not as big a deal.

Once I had all the rounds made I wiped the noce with a rag to get any accumulated lube off. I then found two of them that had cut a very small semicircle of lead from the bullet as they were seated and this also appears to be from not having enough of a flare at the beginning.

Fast forward to today and the range where I test fired them. First five rounds on paper and with a round hole, no tumbling or keyholing noted. Slight amount of carbon flakes / unburned powder?? in the cylinder and barrel area. Slight smoke when shooting also. Mild load in a hammerless 38 and pleasant to shoot. I then found two that appeared to have the bullet put in at an angle which caused it to not load concentrically. The bullet slightly bulged the case more on one side than the other and would not load into the cylinder. I put these aside for later disassembly. Overall pleased with the loads except for the two that didnt chamber, I have not had that problem with the 40 that I load and want to find the cause of it, opinions? Needless to say I tried to place every bullet properly and I am thinking they were just slightly off and contributed to the problem. All in all a good day. Inspection of the barrel showed no signs of leading. I will be properly cleaning it later and will update as necessary.

Total cost per round: 3.2 cents per primer, 3 (maybe) cents for powder, bullets free. total under 7 cents total per round. Box of 50: $3.50 or so.

Comments / critique welcome. Oh yeah, and why the heck cant I indent a paragraph? The editor shows them indented and when I save it they are even with the normal line????

 

[M1911]

I use Berry's plated bullets, 158gr, round nose. I use mixed brass. Currently Winchester small pistol primers, but changing to Federal. 3.8gr of Bullseye. This gives me about a 118 power factor. I load them on a Dillon 550B.

Welcome to .38 reloading. It's a forgiving cartridge to load.

 

[DukeInFlorida]

Congrats on your first .38's.

The bell mouthing that you missed helps with two things:
A) Lining up the bullet straightly, so that it's aligned properly in the case.
B) Prevents shaving any lead.

My test for proper crimp was details in dozens of places, and you should use that as the test for how well yours were crimped. Keep in mind that .38 specials are ROLL CRIMPED, and at the very least, you should see a rolled/curved end to the case, with the brass pressing into the lead bullets.

Are you sure they were "pure lead"??? Pure lead is usually too soft for pistol bullets. A 50-50 mix (50% wheel weights, and 50% pure) might be a better blend for any future casting. If you're a neat freak, you can wipe the lube from the nose of the bullets, but leaving it there doesn't affect anything. When you mix the Alox or Xlox lube, thin it down with mineral spirits (pain thinner) until you can barely see the lube color. That's enough lube. When I do tumble lube (not often any more), you can barely see the lube when the bullets dry. So, I never wipe it off the noses.

As you expand your quantities, you might even see your costs reduce even more. Especially if you get started with casting.

Castboolits,gunloads.com has a group buy running right now with a hollow base wad cutter (148 grains) 4 cavity mold. That's one of the most popular bullets for the .38 special. If you were interested, and jump in ASAP, the guy who makes the molds (Mihec) usually makes a couple of extras, but they (extras) never last long before they get sold.
Here's the link:
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=99991

Congrats, and welcome to the world of reloading cast bullets.

 

[Dirtypacman]

Sounds like you done well.. enjoy reloading.
Since I started shooting more again I have been giving my Dillon I work out again. Nothing better then pressing your own to keep the cost down.

 

[01SVTvert]

Duke,

I thought at the workshop Mark mentioned that one pot was WW and the other pure? lead. I may be wrong but the bullets came from the "not WW" lead pot.

I know now I need more crimp but after reading about too much crimp making the bullet smaller I overcompensated. Most of the cases actually were bulged slightly all around from the seated bullet so I assumed the bullet was not going to move even without a strong crimp. I will be dropping in a better crimp. I am using a 3 die Lee set and just need to play with the crimp I guess.

I am going to hold off on the molds until I understand better the amount of equipment I need for casting, including some way of lubricating the bullets (besides tumble) and the recommendations on different kinds of lubricating. I figure I can slowly pick up equipment but the cost of lubricating and sizing is an unknown to me.




Just picked up 6k primers and 5 lbs powder as well as a trial run of 1k 115gr lrn 9mm lead bullets so time to get working on 9mm now!

 

[mac1911]

castboolits.com all the info on casting,lubeing,swageing, sizeing, slugging your barrel ect ect ect......it gets late quick reading up on this stuff.
I been casting and loading 45acp with lees 230gn lead round nose bullets. I tried shooting them right out of the mold with just a tumble lube of alox. I have them at the low end of the powder charge. purely for plinking.....

http://www.10xshooters.com/calculators/Handgun_Reloading_Cost_Calculator.htm will help figure out your cost.

I will be doing some 38spl myself soon and even with purchased 158g lead semi wad cutters @ 75.00/1000 cost is just under 10.00 box

 

[DukeInFlorida]

I'd be surprised if Mark and his dad had a pot with just pure lead, but I wasn't involved with that area of the workshop. I would have guessed that one pot would be 100% wheel weights, and the other would be 50% wheel weights, and 50% pure lead (what we call a 50-50 blend). Maybe Mark of his dad will chime in on that.

Pure lead is really only used for black powder bullets and round balls.

You were at the workshop, so you should know exactly what you need for casting equipment..... Just jump in with both feet, and never look back.

 

[EddieCoyle]

but after reading about too much crimp making the bullet smaller I overcompensated.

See? This is the kind of shit that pisses me off. (Not you Mike, I mean Duke).

This is the thread you're probably talking about:

http://www.northeastshooters.com/vb...SWC-reloads-Crimp-issues?highlight=roll+crimp

In that thread, the OP showed a picture of his rounds, and complained about lead shavings. In that thread, Duke indicated that he might be crimping too much.

Anybody that knows what they're doing, look at the picture in that OP. Is he crimping too much? No way.

If you roll crimp a .38 Special enough to reduce the bullet diameter, you will end up with the most ****ed up looking round you've ever seen. Even a dead newbie will look at it and say to himself, "Something's not right".

In that thread, it was plainly obvious that the OP did not over crimp. If anything, those rounds are under crimped. Yet, with no regard to the OP's question or the actual picture of the rounds he posted, someone's got to go and say that he might've over-crimped.

Now, that thread exists for all eternity, and some newbie will read it, look at the picture, and think those rounds are over crimped. 01SVTvert did, and where did it get him?

If you're not going to give good advice, keep your mouth shut.

Another thing, Duke's 'famous' "not-enough-crimp-test" is going to get someone in trouble. Try it with a light load of Power Pistol or Unique in .45 ACP. There is nothing you can do to the crimp to totally eliminate unburned powder. Try it. Then try steadily increasing the taper crimp to see if you can make it go away.

On second thought, don't. If you have a sloppy extractor, you'll launch the case mouth into the rifling before you make it all burn.

Anybody want to guess what happens when you do that?

Will your trick work most of the time? Maybe, but there are a number of cases (like when someone uses a light charge of medium or slow burning powder) where it won't.

Let me know the next time you're going to HSC and I'll take a look at them and tell you if anything is wrong.

 

[Marcus5aurelius]

Duke,

I thought at the workshop Mark mentioned that one pot was WW and the other pure? lead. I may be wrong but the bullets came from the "not WW" lead pot.

Hey Mike, there was a 100% wheelweight mix in one pot and a 50/50 wheelweight to range/pure lead mix in the other. We had a third pot that we used to bring for "pure" lead, but nobody used it so it was just wasting energy. A 50/50 mix of wheelweights to range lead is plenty hard for most calibers except the really high velocity stuff. We mix it mostly just to double our supply of wheelweights which always seems to disappear too quickly. We tested the hardness of the pure wheelweight mix when I started casting after I got home and I noticed it had impurities in it so I had to empty it and refill it again. I don't know if it was during our trip to the hospital, or a mix up in the ingots themselves but it wasn't a big deal. It was to be expected.

 

[01SVTvert]

Thanks for the info Mark. I must have heard the part about the pure lead in it and not listened to the other part about being a mix, makes sense. For anyone else following, these were also water dropped.

 

[DukeInFlorida]

No one ever around to slap E/C's wrist, delete his nasty posts, or lock threads when he goes over the edge.

1) A roll crimp has a curved edge to it. A tapered crimp does not. If you over crimp either one, on a cast lead bullet, you could conceivably damage the driving bands, as confirmed by Gammon, a commercial caster of many years. As long as you see the edge of the brass digging slightly into the cast lead bullet (crimp groove is present, or otherwise), you should be all set with the crimp.
2) Yes, there are some nasty sooty powders that will spray all sorts of black crap everywhere, even if crimped correctly. However my crimp test is very valid for powders which do not do that. 2400 powder, in a lot of circumstances is notorious for spraying black crap everywhere. The OP did not specify the powder used, so my comment was a general sort of comment.

Finally, no where did I say that fellows rounds were over crimped. Here's my quote:

Overcrimping isn't good either. If you crimp too tight, you'll reduce the diameter of the cast bullet to the point where the bullet won't seal the barrel correctly, and you'll have horrible leading.

All that says is that over crimping is at the far other end of the spectrum from under crimping, and could have an equally undesirable consequence. We can disagree about whether that is so, but in your moment of fury, you didn't read my post properly.

General comment about crimping: You want crimps "just right".... Not too loose, and not too tight.