Long time lurker. I’ve been collecting equipment and waiting for a good time to try my hand at casting. Well last night I gave it a whirl and I’m hooked. I got back inside and now I’m looking at ordering rifles molds! I’d say 98% of them are great. I was swapping between 9mm Luger and 9mm mak. I learned I need to keep a screw driver on hand as my 9mm Luger mold spruce plate got pretty tight.

These were cast with a butane Coleman grill, stainless pot, and hand poured. I have to order powder coat next.

Hi everyone,
I cast my own 9mm bullets and electroplate them with copper at home. When firing them, I notice a small but clearly visible white cloud coming from the muzzle. It looks more like water vapor than typical powder smoke and dissipates quickly. There are no visible residues left on the cases, barrel, or other parts.
Here are some details about my process and observations:
I clean the bare lead bullets with hot water and baking soda for 10 minutes, followed by white vinegar and salt for 2 minutes.
I electroplate them in a bath made with demineralized water, acid, and copper sulfate.
After plating, I rinse them with tap water, dry them, and polish them in a tumbler using citric acid and dish soap, followed by another rinse.
I have tried different powders, including Vectan A1, BA 9½, and Vihtavuori N320. The smoke occurs regardless of the powder.
Factory CamPro Red copper-plated bullets fired with N320 produce little to no visible smoke.
Cleaning my homemade plated bullets with isopropyl alcohol after plating did not solve the problem.
The smoke is visible mainly near the muzzle, only when the shot is fired.
The cloud is not huge, but it is noticeable enough that other shooters have commented on it.
Has anyone experienced something similar with homemade electroplated bullets? Could residual chemicals from the plating bath or the pre-plating cleaning process cause this, or might there be another explanation?
I’m trying to understand the possible cause rather than assume it is a particular chemical or component. Any relevant experience or suggestions for safely identifying the source would be appreciated.

I have a beautiful example of a Spanish 1893 in 7x57 Mauser, dated 1905. As you can imagine, that barrel is worn.

I have shot the rifle after careful inspection, and didn't have any keyholes at 50 yards (shooting commercial .284 jacketed bullets). Obviously, those groups were trash, so now I'm trying to figure out how to tighten them.

Multiple barrel slugs and a chamber cast gave me the following readings:

Throat: .293

Grooves: .291

Lands: .277

I have a copy of Paul Mitchell's 'The Paper Jacket's, and realized after the first testing session that I need to tinker with it more. Bullets were Lee .278 round noses with 2 wraps of ~.004" rag paper (sized to .293 on the driving bands). I had jacket failure and a lot of leading on attempt 1, but I'm far from done experimenting with it. That being said, I'd like to have some other options on the table.

I have a Lee custom push through sizer, and bought several custom over run sizers to play with. Just for fun, I cast some 20:1 .309 150 gr Lee Soup cans, and sized them down to my throat diameter through several sizing steps. They looked like massive smooth sided wadcutters, and slid back into my dummy cases on chambering. I have not loaded any live rounds with these for obvious reasons.

Has anyone had any luck with paper patching for smokeless bottle neck cartridges?

Any recommendations on reasonably priced custom mold makers? I've been looking around, but am always open to recommendations. Powder coated, gas checked bullets look much easier than patching.

Hey all, new to casting and trying to cast some boolits for my trapdoor that I would love to try using this year for deer season and I am trying to figure out why my boolits are coming out like this. I cleaned the mold and preheated it by setting it on top of the lead pot. I also made a temp controller for the pot and had it set to 380C. The 2 pics are of the same boolits just the other side.

Ky Youth rifle season is in session so my and my 11 year old son went the property to fill the freezer. This was shot with a Ruger American ranch Gen2 in 7.62x39 with a AB A10 silencer at 30-40 yards. Using the NOE 310-165 shallow HP powder coated with an aluminum gas check sized to .310 over 25grn Varget I call this my freedom load because it goes 1776fps, he hit a little far back for my liking but he is 11 and got excited and it did the job.

Just sharing my experience so forgive me for my mistakes. But I picked up some 124gr Hornady 3567 cast projectiles and some Minnesota shooters supply 125 cast projectiles from a local reloading store. From my research it seems the Minnesota shooter supply is out of business which is a bummer because these are advertised as hard cast and were incredibly well casted out of the box. Hopefully I can try and find some more in the wild. Any ways I asked the old timer about the age and lube on the Hornadys and he said the were dry lubed and about 10 years old. The Minnesota projectiles had basic blue lube. I did save 5 each to test in their natural form for giggles.

I went through the process of removing the lubes by soaking them in brake cleaner and agitating them. Took about an hour? So not bad.

ADMITTEDLY I’ve read harbor freight black powder coat is less than ideal but I was excited and didn’t want to wait for a restock of red or order Eastwood does blue.

Anyways I learned a lot. And am set up for success on the next batch. Here are some of the good ones. Yes they have a thick coat but I was learning and if it seat’th thou shall yeet’th. I had some glob monsters which got thrown in the melt pile.I can’t wait to try these out. Before I forget these result are from three light coats while using a brass tumbler. I tried a #5 plastic container but it didn’t seem to work. Maybe I’ll try adding airsoft BBs?

Again not perfect but I’ve been waiting to try this process for months now and finally got around to it. And the Eastwood ford blue is on order as we speak.

Lee 401-145-SWC --> 5.0gr Green Dot (40s&w) 6.6gr Bullseye (10mm) Great for hunting rabbits.

How many grains should the bullet weigh with 16:1, 20:1, 30:1 and 40:1

I recently got 100 lbs of lead alloy that I do not know what exact alloy it is but it pours bullets that weigh around 541 grain with this mold

CartridgeKits sells their 3d printed customizable pan lube punches, but I didn't feel like paying and waiting for the lead time on another one for my big bore bullets. So I took a fired 45-70 case, expanded it an extra couple thou, and drilled through the primer hole. A lot of pan lubers already do this trick, but here's where I got crafty. I took a previously buggered RCBS decap threaded rod and turned it down, rethreaded the end for an expanding rubber nut, and then chopped it for a proper length thumb-button. Total cost: under a dollar.

I'm casting some 32 cal semi wadcutters for my .327 and some .270" torpedoes for the carcano. I think I got a decent price for the 50/50 lead/ww. I think it came to $1.49/lb.

Hehehe had a late night run of 235gn .45 lrn and 247gn fp 308.

This is the lee .358" 158 round flat nose, sized to .356" and 2 layers of Eastwood powder coat. God i hope they shoot good. This is a fantastic profile for my ruger Americans.

Looking for places to buy Lyman 311041 173gr for 30-30. Only found one place so far, montanabulletworks.

Any help would be greatly appreciated

I'm trying to recreate an accurate load for my original M1888 Springfield trapdoor rifle and real black powder has been hard to find in my area

Anyone have the Lyman 4th edition data for RCBS 10mm-200-SWC? I have the older data for 401633 and wanted to compare the two.

Looking for a 550+ grain .459 bullet mold. Looking for a round nose or flat nose without lube grooves- essentially the shortest bullet for the weight.

NOE has one that is about what I need but they're out of stock.

Suggestions?

Can anyone tell me the length of the bullet that Saecos 356 mold makes? 200 gr .358...

Or will this cause leading?

First time trying to bake on their sides, normally I take the time to set them upright
Not sure what I should try next, just trying to make this easier

I was always curious how translucent would work. Turns out, not that great. I quenched immediately after pulling them out and got these results. The coating peels off almost like paper. Gonna try a non-quench batch.

Figured I'd share in case anyone else was wanting to try translucent colors.

What recommendations do yall have? Corbin is smoking crack.

Finally quit after thousands of rounds cast, 3 Quigley matches and use for over 2 years

Went out quiet, like a cowboy

F in the chat please lol

I started IPSC and realized that my ammo consumption went up "a lottle" 😄
A normal training uses about 300 shots of 9mm, I am sure, for some here these are rookie numbers, but this quickly adds to quite some quantity.
Overall I would estimate 10'000 shots a year including matches and target practice.

Is this an amount of bullets that you would feel comfortable to cast yourself?
So far I only casted with Lee Double Cavity moulds for my .44mag and .45ACP. There a few hundred shots last a year for me, so it was a no brainer. These I powder coat.

The required accuracy in IPCS is low (we are 90% indoors, so distances are super short), my main focus is speed for casting and speed for coating/lubeing

I would cast a heavier bullet, 147gr minimum and get a minimum 6 cavity mould. My lead melter is a Lee Production Pot 20lbs with bottom pour. I get free lead from the airgun range (pure lead) or from the indoor range (various scrap).

With my dual cavity Lee molds, I would NEVER even thinking about casting these amounts, but you guys are some crazy dudes, so I really hope someone can let me know if this makes sense or not. (not financially or so, just if this is even remotely realistic or not)

How many bullets are you able to cast with your highest production molds in an afternoon, lets say 4h pure casting time (so preparation of lead ingots, heating up of melter and mould and cleanup time not included) and what is the fastest way to lube or coat these bullets?

Thank you very much for your help!

Hello, I do Powder coat my pistol rounds, have a new Lee 309230 on the way and was thinking it may be easier to tumble lube them than PC them. I do see people PC them and use a mini ice cube tray to bake them. Any tips out there for alox tumble lube? Thanks

It says that using cast bullets in a glock may give poor results but would using cast bullets in a glock be unsafe?