Good morning!
I wasn't sure exactly where to post this question as it doesn't fall under gunsmithing, but here goes.
New to the bullet making process about 6 months now and made ~2000 on 6mm Peinhardt dies .790's and .825's with various amounts of lube on the jackets and cores. Success has been decent, but I really want to settle on one process that is simple and repeatable.
Currently:
Using acetone bath x 2 on Hood cores, and then coleman fuel/white gas as final cleaning on the cores. Stuffed the cores in the jackets which were lubed with 2.1gr of Gary Conaway sperm whale oil and unicorn tears tumbled for 20 min after warming.
I have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to bullet makers in my area and each of them has their own method and opinion - I have analysis paralysis!
Have you experienced a situation where the jackets do not stretch after core seating? I am lucky to get .001 even with the heaviest core seat pressure, but my lead line and boat tail release numbers match up with fairly light (~.004-6 off jacket sticking on the punch). Bullets shoot OK with small lot testing, but I have not made up a large volume of them to see if they will agg. I have tried punches from 2106 to 2112 with similar results. Smaller punch gives me excessive amounts of bleed by and larger gets scraping. I use a specimen type microscope to look inside the jackets for bleed by/scraping.
Is the lack of jacket stretch on core seat an issue?
When I use 64:1 lacquer thinner to ATF on the cores, and 0.5gr/1000 Gary lube on the jackets I get .003-4 stretch on the same lot easily. Then I have to re-lube the jackets prior to point up which I would like to avoid if possible. Tried the coleman cleaned cores with no ATF with 0.5gr lube jackets and some them actually got smaller after core seating!
If I increase the lube on the jackets to 2.1gr/1000 and the 64:1 cores the stretch goes back down again with similar core seat pressure, and if I even try approach that .003 overall length stretch number the jacket is ready to or does pop. I have a case of these jackets and I would like to make a lot of them with one method...creating the best bullets I can in the process!
I wasn't sure exactly where to post this question as it doesn't fall under gunsmithing, but here goes.
New to the bullet making process about 6 months now and made ~2000 on 6mm Peinhardt dies .790's and .825's with various amounts of lube on the jackets and cores. Success has been decent, but I really want to settle on one process that is simple and repeatable.
Currently:
Using acetone bath x 2 on Hood cores, and then coleman fuel/white gas as final cleaning on the cores. Stuffed the cores in the jackets which were lubed with 2.1gr of Gary Conaway sperm whale oil and unicorn tears tumbled for 20 min after warming.
I have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to bullet makers in my area and each of them has their own method and opinion - I have analysis paralysis!
Have you experienced a situation where the jackets do not stretch after core seating? I am lucky to get .001 even with the heaviest core seat pressure, but my lead line and boat tail release numbers match up with fairly light (~.004-6 off jacket sticking on the punch). Bullets shoot OK with small lot testing, but I have not made up a large volume of them to see if they will agg. I have tried punches from 2106 to 2112 with similar results. Smaller punch gives me excessive amounts of bleed by and larger gets scraping. I use a specimen type microscope to look inside the jackets for bleed by/scraping.
Is the lack of jacket stretch on core seat an issue?
When I use 64:1 lacquer thinner to ATF on the cores, and 0.5gr/1000 Gary lube on the jackets I get .003-4 stretch on the same lot easily. Then I have to re-lube the jackets prior to point up which I would like to avoid if possible. Tried the coleman cleaned cores with no ATF with 0.5gr lube jackets and some them actually got smaller after core seating!
If I increase the lube on the jackets to 2.1gr/1000 and the 64:1 cores the stretch goes back down again with similar core seat pressure, and if I even try approach that .003 overall length stretch number the jacket is ready to or does pop. I have a case of these jackets and I would like to make a lot of them with one method...creating the best bullets I can in the process!
