Why "Soft" Lead"

[Idaho Ron]

Ron, i'm sure you've covered this before, but can you quickly tell me what twist your 45 and 50 cal barrels are?
Thanks.

My 45's are a 1-30 twist and the 50's are 1-28.

 

[Idaho Ron]

Soft lead, even from a 58, will not reliably penetrate the shoulder of big game, many times flattening out like a quarter and not penetrating, leaving a long tracking job or wounded game.
A harder lead won't "pencil thru" because it starts out larger than most modern boolits end up.

You are right. Soft lead Like in the Hornady Great plains bullets pancake. These bullets are the 50 cal 410 grain that was discontinued.

They were both shot through the ribs and were found under the skin on the off side. Both had lot a lot of weight, over 50 grains each. This was on this deer.

I really liked the 410's but I saw this kind of over expansion on flat tipped bullets. When they discontinued the 410 there was no way I was going to use the 385. I had made up my mind that the 410 was not a bullet I would use on even deer, and the 385 in my opinion was a varmint bullet with the hollow point.

 

[TFoley]

The way I know that the lead I shoot in my Musketoon and ROA is soft is that

a. It is usually from recovered H&N airgun pellets - I get given around fifteen/twenty pounds at a time by a local airgun club. The packaging, and the product is sold, as purest soft lead, and being German, it had better be nothing less.

OR

b. It is spare lead recovered from our local parish church. Having been robbed of its lead at least three times in ten years by 'removal and redistribution specialists' from the regional 'travelling community', the whole roof was re-covered with the otherwise worthless fake lead look-alike, and all the genuine stuff offered to anybody who wanted it. I ended up with about a 1/4 ton, which I spread out among my fellow ML-ers. I have enough to keep me going until sometime in 2148.

 

[Idaho Ron]

The way I know that the lead I shoot in my Musketoon and ROA is soft is that

a. It is usually from recovered H&N airgun pellets - I get given around fifteen/twenty pounds at a time by a local airgun club. The packaging, and the product is sold, as purest soft lead, and being German, it had better be nothing less.

OR

b. It is spare lead recovered from our local parish church. Having been robbed of its lead at least three times in ten years by 'removal and redistribution specialists' from the regional 'travelling community', the whole roof was re-covered with the otherwise worthless fake lead look-alike, and all the genuine stuff offered to anybody who wanted it. I ended up with about a 1/4 ton, which I spread out among my fellow ML-ers. I have enough to keep me going until sometime in 2148.

If you ever want a hardness test on any of it let me know I would be glad to test a few bullets.

 

[TFoley]

That's a very kind offer, Ron, but sadly for me I live on the Eastern side of England.

 

[Eterry]

You are right. Soft lead Like in the Hornady Great plains bullets pancake. These bullets are the 50 cal 410 grain that was discontinued.

They were both shot through the ribs and were found under the skin on the off side. Both had lot a lot of weight, over 50 grains each. This was on this deer.

I really liked the 410's but I saw this kind of over expansion on flat tipped bullets. When they discontinued the 410 there was no way I was going to use the 385. I had made up my mind that the 410 was not a bullet I would use on even deer, and the 385 in my opinion was a varmint bullet with the hollow point.

That's a very impressive muley, imagine how much penetration a soft prb weighing less than half the weight would've been.
For smaller game it might work, but not bigger tougher game.

 

[Tb54]

A harder lead won't "pencil thru" because it starts out larger than most modern boolits end up.
.

My thought too, but no practical experience yet.

 

[Egonz67]

What about using fishing weights?
Is that soft enough?
We live near the beach and always have some we find. Plus it the end of the season so a lot of weights are on clearance

 

[TFoley]

What about using fishing weights? Is that soft enough? We live near the beach and always have some we find. Plus it the end of the season so a lot of weights are on clearance

1. Welcome to the forum!!

2. Fishing weights are usually pretty good - in this country [England] I found that sounding depth line weights were pretty decent quality lead - six had been donated for our use for bullet making, but dive-belt weights were way too hard.

 

[FishDFly]

So what am I missing?

Wonder why the manufacturers of traditional guns and the makers of molds all recommend pure soft lead?

Must be a reason.

 

[Idaho Ron]

So what am I missing?

Wonder why the manufacturers of traditional guns and the makers of molds all recommend pure soft lead?

Must be a reason.

Pure lead balls give when pushing them down. A hardened REAL bullet may never get to the bottom without a hammer.
But the fact is they want to cover their butts. In all actuality lead that is 40-1 all the way to pure is all very soft and can be called soft.

 

[Old Hawkeye]

So what am I missing?

Wonder why the manufacturers of traditional guns and the makers of molds all recommend pure soft lead?

Must be a reason.

If the mold is for a muzzleloading projectile it is designed/sized to throw a certain diameter bullet or ball using pure lead. If you use wheel weights or a lead alloy the bullet/ball will be a different diameter than what is called for. Bullets shrink when they leave the mold & cool, so what you put in the mold can determine what size bullet you get. Molds for hard lead cast bullets used in cartridge guns are a different animal & are built to use the harder lead alloys & the bullets are then "sized" to what you need for a particular bore, if your alloy doesn't "throw true". Using pure lead in a mold designed for it eliminates the need to size after casting & that's about all.

 

[old ugly]

35 years ago i was told by supplier, who i bought the manufacture recommended size ball mould from, that the lead had to be alloy. and he sold me some, i made a bunch of balls, i fought with them trying to load them. broke ramrods.
so off i go to my first shoot. the shooter there saw me trying to load and he gave me some of his balls....... wow guess what down the barrel they go and guess what........... pure lead. its soft and conforms easy to the rifling.
Don't bother with anything except for pure lead for your round balls and the world will have less grief.
conical? i don't know, no one cares about conicals.
ou
tom

 

[oldwood]

Trade the harder lead to someone w/smooth bore . Will work fine for that. Hard lead balls work good using sling shot for catch and release squirrel control @ the bird feeder. Fun..........oldwood

 

[stink koat]

What about using fishing weights?
Is that soft enough?
We live near the beach and always have some we find. Plus it the end of the season so a lot of weights are on clearance

Just buy the darn balls already!

 

[TFoley]

This is the Lyman 535451 cylindro-conoidal multi-groove bullet, made with wheel-weights, recovered from the backstop at 500 yards, having been fired from my P-H Whitworth with just 70gr of 2Fg.

It is foreshortened, but not by much, as you can readily see. It is, however, quite hexagonal...

 

[Egonz67]

Just buy the darn balls already!

I agree but we also metal detect on the beach. We have at least 25lbs of sinkers
I need to buy a couple of mold and make balls for my rifles