Round Balls

[Gote Rider]

If someone shot only round balls made from wheel weights how long do you think the rifling would last in their gun?

 

[Darkgael]

A very long time. The wheel weight alloy is still way softer than the barrel steel.
WW alloy, not heat treated, has a Brinell hardness of 8.9. Heat treated, it can be made as hard as Bhn 27. Mild steel has a Bhn of 120. Other steels, such as ordnance steel found in firearms, are much harder.
Why would one want to shoot RBs cast from WW alloy? Availability of the alloy, perhaps?
Pete

 

[rebel727]

All I ever shoot out of mine are ww. I do use the stick on weights instead of clip ons. They're softer, almost pure lead. I read somewhere they're 98% pure lead.

 

[DanChamberlain]

Wheel weight lead is pretty hard. It won't hurt the barrel, but keep in mind, if you're shooting a Colt syle open top revolver, you are going to be putting a lot of strain on the cylinder pin where it screws into the recoil shield of the frame when you seat the balls. You will also stress the little pins that allow the ram lever and ram to seat the ball. There is no advantage to wheel weights other than they're cheap.

Dan

 

[Blizzard of '93]

I think you should use as pure lead as you can get to make your RB's. they will do better on game for sure and likely shoot better.

 

[logan]

where can you buy pure lead that is relatively cheap?

 

[Gote Rider]

Dan I see what you mean about the stress on the gun parts. I shot some in my 1851 navy they were alot harder to start in the cylinder than soft lead. But they sure did shoot good.

 

[Blizzard of '93]

lots of scrap yards will have scrap lead sheeting used on roofs and other building parts as well as pipe - careful with the pipe it may be full of ??? so check it first. sheet lead is dead-soft, I have good luck with it be sure to beat the crud off with a hammer before you weigh it to buy. flux will bring the crud up to skim off.

 

[HarborMaster]

I agree about the stress to the guns lever. Pressing the WW balls is a little tougher. Personally I purchased a loader (Press) I load 3 cylinders then shoot. The loader is well worth the money Dick Dastardly's web site You can get it here.

 

[Frank44]

The Dentest use soft lead to back up the film for Xrays. My dentest gave me a garbage bag full. Enough to cast 300 230g conicals for my old army. :thumbsup: He has to pay to have it recycled. :hmm:
Frank

 

[bingo1952]

Remington style revolvers dont have a problem with stress on the cylinder pin but the loading lever will fail pretty quick ramming wheel weight balls and forget conicals. I had one pull through the screw that it pivots on 15 or so years ago.

 

[Dphar]

If someone shot only round balls made from wheel weights how long do you think the rifling would last in their gun?

Lead alloy is not going to effect wear of the bore. There is gas blowby at the breech with PRB loads and this will cause wear.
The high temp, high pressure gas will actually add some carbon to a molecule thick layer of the bore and this can result in bore erosion as the higher carbon "layer" is scrubbed of by they blowby. Ball size might be important in this but alloy is not. The use of hardened balls may require a reduced ball size or a thinner patch depending on the rifling form.

Dan

 

[Blizzard of '93]

I've had 3 different Rem. '58 .44's, shoot 'em so much that 2 of 'em snapped the small pin holding the ram to the lever. I replaced both with a carefully fitted stub of drill bit.
methinks some (maybe all) of the cause was using slugs made from other than pure lead.
wheel weights are a no-no for these projectiles. use as pure lead as possible.