Plated Bullets - Question

[WessonOil]

Just a question. Are the lead bullets you are using from J&K? I use them in my 41 mag at full magnum loads without issue.

As do I.

I'm running Mitch's .44 at the high end of the scale for a hard cast bullet, with no leading.

 

[Mitch H.]

Our lead bullets are good to 1300fps. There's a reason we stopped being a Berry's distributor and became an Xtreme distributor.

 

[Werewolf]

If you are getting severe leading from a revolver, you need to have the chamber throats checked for diameter, they should be matched to the bore diameter. There have been several studies done on leading in revolvers and the most common cause is a mismatch of bullet diameter to chamber throat. Find a gunsmith or machinist who has the set of measuring inserts for measuring hole diameters and see if they are all one size or of varying sizes. If they are all one size, match your sized bullet to the chamber throat and you will probably find that your leading is greatly reduced. For a number of years I believed that the harder the bullet the less leading you would experience, but tests show that is not necessarily true. I have shot some pretty soft bullets with the proper lube and sized to the throat of the chamber and had very little leading even at higher speeds, and had some bullets cast so hard that they disintegrated on impact even at slower speeds that leaded badly. Lots of neat things to experiment with here..

I had to get throat diameters on both my old style Ruger Vaqueros opened up years ago. They both came out of the factory at .4505. Push a lead bullet that's .452 thru that hole and gues what. Opened the cylinder throats up to .4525 and no more leading. Called Ruger, even spoke to the chief engineer who swore up and down, sideways and backward and forward that .4505 was in spec. Haven't bought a Ruger since and probably never will again.

Lots of good info in this thread - especially about crimps. Been reloading for 10 years now and still learn new things.

Thanks fellas!