HP Alloy

[Lee S. Forsberg]

Need a good alloy for HP cast bullets. Using a handgun, 9mm, 380, 38/357, 45ACP, 45colt, 44 spc/mag. Any ideas?
Thanks
Lee

 

[Rick]

To be fired in what? Your answer could be anywhere from near pure to WW alloy with Sb in it. My 1911 loves SWW+ 2% Sn up to around 1,000 fps.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

100%. Velocity dependent.

What works well in a 357/41/44 @ 1400 will NOT open @ a 380/45's 900 fps and. Conversely whats good for the 900 will double over and tear apart @ 1400 ish.

Basic rule of thumb I follow is:

30:1 = 900 (ish)
20:1 = 1100 (ish)
16:1 = 1300 (ish)
10:1 = 1400 (ish)

Rifles between 1750-1900 will use COWW to Lyman#2.

CW

 

[Brad]

Depends. Alloy needs to be matched to HP size and impact velocity.
My experience tells me that softer is better than harder for HP. Too hard and they will expand but the nose blows off.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

Oops yes of coarse different sized HP "holes" have a large factor in that preformance!

 

[358156 hp]

To carry Brads point out a little further, in my avatar are pics of two different bullets loaded in 357 mag cases. My original 358156HP (Thompson) is on your left, the bullet on the right is my original 358439HP (Keith). Note the different in hollowpoint cavities, the 358156HP is much larger, and would expand more effectively at lower velocities, assuming a suitable alloy and equal velocities. This would likely come at some expense in penetration. The Keith bullet is heavier, and has a smaller cavity. All things being equal, I would expect lesser expansion with greater penetration. Later this spring my friends and I are planning to do more gel tests with cast HPs. I'm in the unique position of also having at 358156HP with a smaller cavity, and a 358429HP with a larger cavity. We'll shoot those side by side and hopefully gain a little more understanding of HP performance.



Also planned is 9mm! I have perhaps three different 9mm HP designs as well, and identical 9mm compact pistols, and a 357 SIG. Straight wheelweights with added tin, 20:1 & 30:1 are on the agenda, along with the 458 SOCOM I mentioned in a different thread. Every combination yields different result, so the only thing to do is to what I should have done all along, try it and find out. As soon as the weather breaks and our schedules mesh on a weekend. I suspect the SOCOM will will prove to be a big challenge with such a light bullet. Maybe I should pick a heavier mould and send it off to Erik.

 

[Rick]

The molds I've sent to Erik for HP'ing I had made to what I call the Fryxell profile HP. Glen had worked this out for his HP bullets.

For my 44 Cal bullets . . .

HP cavity of .150" at the mouth, cavity with a 7-degree taper extended .250" into the bullet with a rounded tip. A flat bottom HP cavity has a sharp edge at the bottom of the cavity and is where the nose will crack first and break off.

 

[L Ross]

Depends. Alloy needs to be matched to HP size and impact velocity.
My experience tells me that softer is better than harder for HP. Too hard and they will expand but the nose blows off.

Exactly one HP experience. Lyman 308291 air cooled older clip on WW plus about 2% tin. Fired in a 26"? barreled Model 94 30-30 with 26.5 grains of H335, should have been tickling 1,900 at the muzzle. Doe at 42 paces slightly quartering away, full penetration with exit much like a Nosler Partition bullet. Looked like a .30 caliber wad cutter punched out the far side surrounded by 5 smaller exits in a halo from pieces of the nose. Substantial internal damage, deer dropped in sight after a short run, perhaps 20 yards?

Old single cavity mould, pain in the patooty to work with, not sure it is worth the bother. I guess, if I had to I could try it again, but I have to many guns I want to try and only shoot a deer or two a year. They actually all do about the same thing. Load, zero, take in woods, shoot a deer usually less than 50 yards away, watch it fall down, process deer, wait until next year. I'm gonna run out of years before I run out of guns to try.

 

[358156 hp]

I have a terrible confession to make. If I'm seriously bored, I prefer to cast with single cavity hollowpoint moulds. Yup, and I'm proud of it. It is slow, but it's interesting to watch the pile grow, and see each individual bullet take form. And I cast them only with a ladle. Sometimes fussy work is actually fun. I can only cast this way with a maximum of two moulds, and they have to be nearly identical or my timing gets messed up. It's quite a feeling of accomplishment to knock out a couple of hundred bullets this way.

 

[Lee S. Forsberg]

Thanks to all for the responcese. Hope to see more.
My question is a result of an experience I had with HP cast bullets in a .357 Mag rifle, 20" barrel. Using Lyman 358156 HP mold. Bullets cast of wheel weights, sized to .358", lubed and gas checked. Loaded with 16gr of 296. The Rabbits that day were all dead. However, upon inspection all the holes were the same size entrance or exit. So I lined-up on ceder fence post. After retrieving the bullet I could have loaded and shot it again! No expansion and the nose did not separate. As time consuming as they are to cast and no expansion I abandoned that HP mold. The solids were, and still are, killing everything I shoot with that rifle.
Time has past hopefully bringing some improvements with it's passing. HP bullet molds are much faster to cast with and more accurate. Some basics seem to be the same, alloy, velocity, and cavity size and configuration. One other advancements is Powder Coating, not nearly as messy bullet lube. As to it's effect on HP expansion, I don't know.
Looking forward to more comments on this subject.

 

[popper]

20:1 is 5%. 30:1 is 3 something %. Shot some 1% Lee 401 180 (?) TC. Undersized, some hit target (7yds) sideways and were rectangular (LLA'd)! Others shot fine with rnd holes. IIRC I added 1% Sb and used in 30/30 GCd. ~ 1/2" dia exit on gut - nothing in shoulder. None recovered. Don't play with soft anymore, never done HPs. Don't have the target anymore but range uses 3/4" celotex(?) backer that is soft. 6-7 yrs ago, 1% Sn, than added 1% Zn, then 1% Sb. Sb increased the dia. some. 5.5 unique IIRC. IMHO the nose slumped some. No L.G. that I can see, maybe some of the TC nose. Harder alloy left smaller holes.
edit: 1% is greater than 50:1. Load was ~ 1k fps. Celotex is probably about the 'toughness' of rabbit. I don't see a need for expansion on rabbit anyway.

 

[david s]

I basically cast pistol bullets or for pistol sized rifle cartridges with the exception of the 45-70. My soft or hollow point alloy is a basic 20-1 mix and with this I try and not load above 1200 FPS or so. I use 20-1 for about 900-1200 FPS. Below 900 FPS I tend to use straight lead down to about 650 FPS. Not worried about expansion at the lowest velocities. The lower velocity loads tend to be wadcutters. 358156hp's post made me think of something, I'm down to one single cavity hollow point mould a Lyman 429421 SWC. I do have some 4 cavity hollow point moulds. As 358156 mentioned casting with the single cavity can be somewhat relaxing as the pace is not hurried at all, there's a rhythm to it. With the four cavity moulds trying to make sure the hollow point pins are back in place and settled before closing the mould and refilling the mould quick enough the pins don't cool off takes some of the pleasure out of it.

 

[fiver]

P/C has zero affect on what the bullet does or doesn't do.


CW's numbers above are what i would consider the upper end, and some of them will need a gas check to do their best most efficient work.

 

[JonB]

I currently only have one HP mold, A mid weight 41 cal SWC (advertised as a Keith type) by NOE.
I use 97-1.5-1.5
My theory is that a alloy with Sn & Sb balanced, that it's tougher and less likely to fragment.
I've never really done any testing, but I have recovered a few bullets from our pistol pit back stop, they did expand quite a bit.

 

[Bret4207]

Thanks to all for the responcese. Hope to see more.
My question is a result of an experience I had with HP cast bullets in a .357 Mag rifle, 20" barrel. Using Lyman 358156 HP mold. Bullets cast of wheel weights, sized to .358", lubed and gas checked. Loaded with 16gr of 296. The Rabbits that day were all dead. However, upon inspection all the holes were the same size entrance or exit. So I lined-up on ceder fence post. After retrieving the bullet I could have loaded and shot it again! No expansion and the nose did not separate. As time consuming as they are to cast and no expansion I abandoned that HP mold. The solids were, and still are, killing everything I shoot with that rifle.
Time has past hopefully bringing some improvements with it's passing. HP bullet molds are much faster to cast with and more accurate. Some basics seem to be the same, alloy, velocity, and cavity size and configuration. One other advancements is Powder Coating, not nearly as messy bullet lube. As to it's effect on HP expansion, I don't know.
Looking forward to more comments on this subject.

To get expansion on something as light as a rabbit you're going to have to go pretty soft and fast I would opine. Are these eating bunnys or varmint types? A wood post isn't going to equate to flesh either. I have yet to find anything that mimics flesh based on tests I did on livestock carcasses in years past.

I think I'm trying to say you need to decide what your bullet is going to be expanding in when it matters and work from there. IME expansion is not the same across different materials and in fact varies widely.

 

[Winelover]

The molds I've sent to Erik for HP'ing I had made to what I call the Fryxell profile HP. Glen had worked this out for his HP bullets.

For my 44 Cal bullets . . .

HP cavity of .150" at the mouth, cavity with a 7-degree taper extended .250" into the bullet with a rounded tip. A flat bottom HP cavity has a sharp edge at the bottom of the cavity and is where the nose will crack first and break off.

The following is my experience with Rick's RCBS 44 caliber 300 SWC mold that was HP-ed by Eric.





Cast out of three parts pure to one part lino. No tin added. BHN is 14-15. Shot out of my Marlin 1894 carbine. Load is 18 grains of 2400 powder. Velocity averaging 1581 fps.



Shot into beach sand a tough substrate.......... they didn't come apart.

 

[RBHarter]

I just spent 20 min looking for several 45-200 with an impact speed of about 800 fps in green oak . They lost 3-5 gr , swelled to .875-1.25" , cast in 50/50 WW and flashing . I may have added tin .

 

[Petrol & Powder]

I always consider bullet expansion to just be the icing on the cake. The first factor, and the critical one - is penetration. Above all else, the bullet must travel deep enough to get the job done. After that goal is met (and only after it is met), it would be nice if the bullet presented a larger frontal area (expanded).
However, expansion brings with it additional issues. First, if the bullet expands too much, too early; that expansion can limit penetration. Second, if the bullet breaks apart, the resulting fragments will each have less mass than the original intact bullet, and that can limit penetration.
Depending on how much weight, diameter and velocity we started with, expansion and fragmentation may be a good thing, if we had enough weight and velocity to start with. However, if we were just barely meeting the minimum required penetration to start with, lots of early expansion or any fragmentation will only serve to reduce penetration.

And, of course, it depends on what the bullet is impacting. A white tail deer is different from a Cape Buffalo. And trying to stop the 140lb, tee shirt clad guy with the knife is different than trying to stop the 300lb. armed guy wearing a leather jacket, two flannel shirts and a tee shirt.

Goal one - get the bullet deep enough, in the right place.
Goal two - it would be nice, but not nearly as critical as penetration, if the bullet expanded.

 

[Rockydoc]

I like 2 bullet holes from each bullet. In and out.

 

[358156 hp]

P/C has zero affect on what the bullet does or doesn't do.


CW's numbers above are what i would consider the upper end, and some of them will need a gas check to do their best most efficient work.

One of the things I want to test with hollowpoints is if powdercoat could possible slow initial expansion of hollowpoints is soft media. I'm not talking a big difference, just an itty-bitty tiny amount. I suspect any possible difference would be unmeasurable.