Sta-moly jackets

sta moly jackets

That,s a good question Joe.
I've used J4 in that length they were very good but pricey. I did try some Sierras only shorter for 90 gr pills.
I haven't had a chance to make any with the Hines though. Both of what i tried were very very good.
THe longer ones seem to be pretty expensive
 
Randy,

So how does the Hines 6mm 1.150 measure up against the others?

My opinion - compared to J4, the bases are excessively thick, requiring "extra" measures to produce what, to me, is an acceptable boat-tail.:( With my original tooling, they "want" to make ball-tail, counterfeit rebated BTs - not to my liking at all. After investing many hours/weeks, of trial and test, I developed a sure-fire repeatable process, which I have shared with George Ulrich (initially a skeptic of my views), and that guy called Charlie Hood. I must confess that I awoke from a rare spate of sound sleep one night, and recalled that one Bill Niemi, long ago, had supplied me, indirectly, with solution.:cool: If you are not preforming the BT into the jacket, and using a preformed core, you're working against the fluid dynamics, and making, "less than the best", which your tooling will make. As another frequent poster states: Opinion by The Ballistic Idiot.

That said, the wall uniformity, on the Hines 1.150" long 6mm, which I have obtained, are exceptional: at worst, 0.0001" wall-thickness variation.:D When made as stated above, the Hines jackets make, what I consider, excellent BR quality bullets. There are lots of variables in bullet crafting.

Also, just because I believe extra steps are necessary, does not mean that, "business as usual" doesn't work well - simply that I refuse to ship what I do not believe in. :eek: Bullets do not leave my shop, until they meet my anal expectations - I'll go belly-up B4 I ship anything I would not shoot myself. RG

Oh, and I didn't even broach [the subject of] annealing (Ok, drawing back to, "reasonably", malleable) . . . probably won't - don't have enough time - and besides, regarding some of this stuff, I'm sworn to secrecy.:p
 
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Wall thickness uniformity

It seems that great effort is placed on jacket wall thickness uniformity and with good reason I can understand that. But has any manufacturer given thought to a better way to achieve it. Perhaps hydraulically using extreme pressures as a thought. I am sure these days it would be possible to achieve tolerances so small no one could measure them. Essentially eliminating such things as a bad batch of jackets.
 
sta moly jackets

Andy the problem is the thickness of the coil stock that the produces get.
Its hard for a lot of them to get uniform thickness from lot to lot of the stock, even though they set rigid specs,
 
Coil stock

Andy the problem is the thickness of the coil stock that the produces get.
Its hard for a lot of them to get uniform thickness from lot to lot of the stock, even though they set rigid specs,

By coil stock do you mean flat sheets of metal that is rolled up or material that is already in a tubular form ?
 
sta moly jackets

Coil stock is wire that is made into a ribbon and on a roll. From what I was told the rolls are very heavy 500 to 1,000 pounds.

One supplier has show,s it as wire being sent thru rolls to become flat Some flat stock is use on pistol bullets .

That material is used for a different set up. Several blanks are stamped out at the same time. It depends on how the transfer press is set up.

As to Sierras set up the coil stock is the best they can get with a very high spec. The say it's 95% copper 5% zinc. IT is .028 thick and other thickness for different calibers.
 
My opinion - compared to J4, the bases are excessively thick, requiring "extra" measures to produce what, to me, is an acceptable boat-tail.:( With my original tooling, they "want" to make ball-tail, counterfeit rebated BTs - not to my liking at all. After investing many hours/weeks, of trial and test, I developed a sure-fire repeatable process, which I have shared with George Ulrich (initially a skeptic of my views), and that guy called Charlie Hood. I must confess that I awoke from a rare spate of sound sleep one night, and recalled that one Bill Niemi, long ago, had supplied me, indirectly, with solution.:cool: If you are not preforming the BT into the jacket, and using a preformed core, you're working against the fluid dynamics, and making, "less than the best", which your tooling will make. As another frequent poster states: Opinion by The Ballistic Idiot.

That said, the wall uniformity, on the Hines 1.150" long 6mm, which I have obtained, are exceptional: at worst, 0.0001" wall-thickness variation.:D When made as stated above, the Hines jackets make, what I consider, excellent BR quality bullets. There are lots of variables in bullet crafting.

Also, just because I believe extra steps are necessary, does not mean that, "business as usual" doesn't work well - simply that I refuse to ship what I do not believe in. :eek: Bullets do not leave my shop, until they meet my anal expectations - I'll go belly-up B4 I ship anything I would not shoot myself. RG

Oh, and I didn't even broach [the subject of] annealing (Ok, drawing back to, "reasonably", malleable) . . . probably won't - don't have enough time - and besides, regarding some of this stuff, I'm sworn to secrecy.:p

Randy; Can you explain the Extra measures that you take to form the Boattail on these Jackets?

Thanks,
Ed
 
sta moly jackets

I think what he was referring to was having a core forming die that matches the bt seat die.
Thats what i got from his post.
 
Different perspective

Coil stock is wire that is made into a ribbon and on a roll. From what I was told the rolls are very heavy 500 to 1,000 pounds.

One supplier has show,s it as wire being sent thru rolls to become flat Some flat stock is use on pistol bullets .

That material is used for a different set up. Several blanks are stamped out at the same time. It depends on how the transfer press is set up.

As to Sierras set up the coil stock is the best they can get with a very high spec. The say it's 95% copper 5% zinc. IT is .028 thick and other thickness for different calibers.

I am thinking from a physicists perspective not from an engineers here. Could jacket wall thicknesses be maintained to tolerances so tight it would be difficult to measure variations if the jacket material was forced into a forming die from sheet material hydraulically using extreme pressure say a million psi. Make it flow and fill a cavity to a specific level aka thickness. Some sort of innovation like this could solve batch to batch variations and one of the problems associated with competition bullet manufacture.
 
sta molly jackets

That,s an interesting prospective'''
I suppose it would be a good experiment that is expensive to try.
The draw is based on volume , so its not rocket science. That would be a very expensive way to make jackets due to most
die makers etc don't really work in millionths of an inch, Your taking space age machine skills , and more then likely NASA engineering to make it happen.
Its an interesting idea though. It might work if one had unlimited resources. Right now the jackets are running in the .0001 of an inch That would be trying
.00001 of and inch,
 
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I am thinking from a physicists perspective not from an engineers here. Could jacket wall thicknesses be maintained to tolerances so tight it would be difficult to measure variations if the jacket material was forced into a forming die from sheet material hydraulically using extreme pressure say a million psi. Make it flow and fill a cavity to a specific level aka thickness. Some sort of innovation like this could solve batch to batch variations and one of the problems associated with competition bullet manufacture.

Andy, a few years ago, when I was recovering for a serious problem, and had very little in the way of short-term memory, thus I cannot provide a name, I had several conversations with a gentleman who was setting up to make jackets using the same process by which he formed soft-drink & beer 'cans'! ;) I had told him, that when he had jackets, I'd take some . . . somewhere along the time-line, he developed cancer, and that project didn't come to fruition. He assured me that if I'd open some beer cans (aluminum), and measured the thickness, the variation would be substantially less then 0.0002"! So, maybe there is a new way . . . but, all the jackets we (BR competitors) use, collectively, don't add up to much incentive. I cannot recall how the beverage can walls are formed. :( RG
 
sta moly jackets

RG we'll never know just how he did that. Maybe with the new water hydraulic process, I'm not sure either if he had his material in coil stock or sheet stock.
I know some cans are drawn like bullet jackets, But then again he was working with aluminum, not copper, zinc.
 
But probably doable

That,s an interesting prospective'''
I suppose it would be a good experiment that is expensive to try.
The draw is based on volume , so its not rocket science. That would be a very expensive way to make jackets due to most
die makers etc don't really work in millionths of an inch, Your taking space age machine skills , and more then likely NASA engineering to make it happen.
Its an interesting idea though. It might work if one had unlimited resources. Right now the jackets are running in the .0001 of an inch That would be trying
.00001 of and inch,

If my memory serves correct it cost NASA about 1.7M bucks to develop the first microwave. Now you can get one for $90 at wallmart. To my way of thinking the dies need not be any more accurate with their internal dimensions. Just let the laws of physics control what thickness the material can line the walls of the die with at a given temperature and pressure. Imagine a set of die cups that looks like a loading block. A sheet of jacket material laid on the top. Then another plate fitted with a fluid injection system clamped on top of that forcing the copper into the die to line the cavity with a specified thickness of copper. You could probably make more in less time this way also. Any engineers out there with a few hundred thousand lying around they don't know what to do with ?
 
Andy, a few years ago, when I was recovering for a serious problem, and had very little in the way of short-term memory, thus I cannot provide a name, I had several conversations with a gentleman who was setting up to make jackets using the same process by which he formed soft-drink & beer 'cans'! ;) I had told him, that when he had jackets, I'd take some . . . somewhere along the time-line, he developed cancer, and that project didn't come to fruition. He assured me that if I'd open some beer cans (aluminum), and measured the thickness, the variation would be substantially less then 0.0002"! So, maybe there is a new way . . . but, all the jackets we (BR competitors) use, collectively, don't add up to much incentive. I cannot recall how the beverage can walls are formed. :( RG

I have opened a few beer cans and can relate that to the wheel that may be re-invented again, of course using govt money.

Not directed to you Randy. Just an observation.

Later
Dave
 
I have opened a few beer cans and can relate that to the wheel that may be re-invented again, of course using govt money.

Not directed to you Randy. Just an observation.

Later
Dave

Not ducking, or feeling threatened, Dave! :p The man was serious - he had done some prototyping, but was not "production - ready". I do believe it was a draw process - his company made(makes?) millions upon millions of beverage cans - he was dead-serious - don't think it was a reinvention, just an outsiders view of a potentially new application for his process. He had gotten into making his own bullets, and was disenchanted by the inconsistent and variable supply. RG
 
That,s an interesting prospective'''
I suppose it would be a good experiment that is expensive to try.
The draw is based on volume , so its not rocket science. That would be a very expensive way to make jackets due to most
die makers etc don't really work in millionths of an inch,

So what are a gagemakers tolerance if I may ask all the plug and ring gages being produced are not being held to .00000x tolerances, your kidding right. As for short range jackets being annealed at factory, well none we use are being done l.r. is a different story......just to save you looking up on google tolerances for gages are 10% of gage tolerance ie. if a pin is -,0002 you have ,000002 tolerance seems somebodies doing it. And remember don't get STA-MOLYED those that were there know, this is not a remark on Hines jackets......
 
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the bullet assembly

Im gonna ask a dumb question. What kind of bullet draw and bullet assembly machines do they have now? The only kinds I was ever around were the old punch and die machines at Lake City. The old toolsetters always said there was an art to making the bullet. Doug
 
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