Henry Rifle Forums

Today ive been to the range trying my new bullets out in my Ruger Gp100 4"

My Revolver and some of the cast bullets


A picture ofthe same bullet coated:


Bullet are casted from a Lee 358-158-RF 2cavity mold dropped .360 and sized to .357, alloy is 1part linotype and 2parts of stainedglass lead. Giving a Brinell hardness aircooled around 15. Since I needed these bullets to work with 357 loads I suspected the alloy to be to soft without gascheck and I was right. I got alot of leading in the barrel after only 5rounds and the grouping opened up the more that I was shooting. I forgot all kind of shootingrest so result would probably be better in a shooting rest but I got the picture. Took some support against a bench and shot at 25meters.

This is the group (25meters) with leadbullets with ordinary lube well it didnt work out, ran it through the chronograph and got 1338fps, severe leading in the barrel so I stopped and went to my powdercoated ones. Image is upside down but you get the picture


This is the group (25meters) with the powdercoated bullets, they also ran at 1330fps and gave no leading at all barrel was completely clean and the group was fine even though the support on the bench was not the best. Image is upside down but you get the picture


Conclusion is that the alloy is to soft for 357 magnum veolocity without gaschecks since its a nongascheck bullet I tried powdercoating them and it worked out fine. This is a bullet and a load that I can use.

More reading about my casting and powdercoating: https://henryrifleforums.com/viewtopic. ... 130#p94130

Barney bullets!
I've seen black, blue, red, green, yellow, orange, I've even seen white powder coated projectiles, but those are the first purple ones I've seen.

As long as they work I guess.
I am a fan of powder coated.
I can push them to plated speeds without concerns of leading.

I have quite a few in the heavy for caliber .32's for my .327fed/mag BBS.

What size are the uncoated vs coated.
I have the same mould and find it throws .357, if the powder coating is adding a few thou it may be why you are seeing a improvement.
My 357 shoot best and give the least leading with .358 or larger bullets.

220 wrote:What size are the uncoated vs coated.
I have the same mould and find it throws .357, if the powder coating is adding a few thou it may be why you are seeing a improvement.
My 357 shoot best and give the least leading with .358 or larger bullets.

My bullets with my alloy casted at exactly 400degrees celcius drops at .359-360 from the mold so I got lucky with the mold dropping big bullets, weight is about 158-159grain, bhn around 15 aircooled, havent measured after coating but they are probably about .001 more but I do size them down to .357 (same as the lubed ones), because my cylinderthroats in my revolver is tight its not letting through bullets sized to .358 its completely stuck it will probably work with .358 but in the end I guess its bad for the endshake of the cylinder. The cylinder would probably benefit with a reaming of the cylinder throats. I use this same allow in my 44 pushing fullhouse loads with both gaschecked lubed and powdercoated and have no leading at all at 1500fps both from revolver and rifle, so my qualified guess is that normal lube bullets need a gascheck or other load with different powder/lower velocity, gonna check if I cast with a gaschecked mold with the same alloy if it works later.

Once I learned how to powder coat, I never touched the lube again.

RP