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What Other Material Is Suitable For Making Bullets?
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quote:
That is what Jay Shroeder of S&H used for solid bullets that out-performed the GSC copper monometal solids.
This is true if performance is measured by only the ability to penetrate.
 
Posts: 2848 | Registered: 12 August 2002Reply With Quote
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Thread resurrection. Quoting me on brass for FN solids instead of copper.

OK, Gerard, you got me on that one. Your copper FN with flat-nose is shorter and more stable for weight,
and the larger resulting FN after impact imparts more trauma, while penetrating more than enough.
Brass only edges it out on one parameter: By a few inches of extra depth of penetration,
to be expended on trees beyond,
which the GSC FN will usually do anyway, with a wider wound channel in the trees beyond also.
I have verified this using cape buffalo and umbrella thorn trees in Botswana.
That was with .416/380gr GSC FN at +2500 fps MV in .416 Rigby. tu2

Also compared in the IWBB:
.395/340gr GSC FN at just under 2800 fps (copper)
vs.
.395/330gr S&H FN at just over 2800 fps (brass)
both using same powder charge,
about same momentum for each.

100" long IWBB with 10 compartments, each compartment 10" deep, containing 9" of water in thin, flat-sided plastic buckets,
and two half-inch plywood boards.
Gutted carcass of Iron WaterBoard Buffalo,
used for bullet interrogation:



The necropsy details showing depth of penetration:

GSC copper FN:



S&H brass FN:




Recovered solids, GSC copper FN and S&H brass FN:


 
Posts: 28032 | Location: KY | Registered: 09 December 2001Reply With Quote
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Big Grin
 
Posts: 2848 | Registered: 12 August 2002Reply With Quote
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The first smokeless cartridge in the world, the 8x51MM Lebel in the second configuration, used a lathe turned bullet made of brass "Balle D". They made these by the millions and millions. Each bullet was marked by the maker on it's base. They shot very well.
My test on 5/8" cold rolled steel plate at 500 meters was very impressive.Many went through the plate when fired out of the full length rifle.
While we don't like the French as a people, they did and do make some very interesting and well thought out weapons. They have set many a first in the field of small arms.


Gulf of Tonkin Yacht Club
NRA Endowment Member
President NM MILSURPS
 
Posts: 440 | Location: Albuquerque | Registered: 28 March 2013Reply With Quote
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There are some good photos here.

Balle D
 
Posts: 2848 | Registered: 12 August 2002Reply With Quote
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Zinc is supposed to make nice cast bullets. I have seen several articles about casting Zinc bullets over the years. I won't use it because I do not want to contaminate the Lead supply.
 
Posts: 29 | Location: SE Michigan | Registered: 05 September 2004Reply With Quote
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Zinc is prone to cracking because it is so brittle and it corrodes quicker than most other metals.


Speer, Sierra, Lyman, Hornady, Hodgdon have reliable reloading data. You won't find it on so and so's web page.
 
Posts: 639 | Location: SE WA.  | Registered: 05 February 2004Reply With Quote
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I'm having a bit of crs at the moment, but the gentleman from Denver shot a then cast bullet record group at 200yds that measured about .750" in the 1890's with a Pope breech-muzzleloading rifle. He had a cottonwood (iirc) chunk that was about 4 feet in diameter set up as a backstop with the target(s) attached and cast his bullets out of pure gold. Need;ess to say, they carefully sectioned and burnt that chunk at the conclusion of the shooting.
 
Posts: 23062 | Location: SW Idaho | Registered: 19 December 2005Reply With Quote
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Zinc has to be very pure or it is subject to intergranular corrosion. When it corrodes internally it will literally crumble.

quote:
Originally posted by PaulS:
Zinc is prone to cracking because it is so brittle and it corrodes quicker than most other metals.
 
Posts: 13978 | Location: http://www.tarawaontheweb.org/tarawa2.jpg | Registered: 03 December 2008Reply With Quote
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The vanished photo returned to the post above:

Iron WaterBoard Buffalo interrogations of a copper .395-cal/340-gr FN solid by GSC
and a brass .395-cal/330-gr FN solid by S&H:



Both entered torture with same momentum of +/- 2800 fps MV.
 
Posts: 28032 | Location: KY | Registered: 09 December 2001Reply With Quote
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Originally posted by SmokinJ:
Depleted uranium would be very hard to come by. It's also maybe too heavy. There's much criticism of the military using it for armor piercing applications. Might be legal issues being it it considered armor piercing.


Lots of DU in Iraq, somebody just left it laying around everywhere. Just send Walter up with a couple of bushel baskets. Might want to wear a mask while machining it. Bullets would be very heavy for caliber.


"If you’re innocent why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?”- Donald Trump
 
Posts: 9337 | Location: Tennessee | Registered: 09 December 2007Reply With Quote
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Just a bit more thread necromancy to address a few points.

As for silver, aside from it's expense, if you complain of "copper fouling" now wait until you try relatively pure silver,
there are distinct reasons why Brazing alloys contain silver....

as for osmium, palladium and the other "platinum metals"
(Iridium, palladium or rhodium) they are inconveniently hard...in addition to being as expensive, if not more expensive than gold...

Gold would be ideal except for it's expense...

I was once asked the ideal material to make a high temperature gasket in a reactant turbo-pump my instant answer was commercially pure (99.9%) gold as it as soft enough to be formable and had a high enough melting point, and no brittle temperature.. meaning it could tolerate cryogenic temps as well as 1800F



Oh and BTW there is a scientific quibble: while Osmium is generally considered the densest element the difference in density between Osmium and Iridium is less than the margin of error for measurement.


If I provoke you into thinking then I've done my good deed for the day!
Those who manage to provoke themselves into other activities have only themselves to blame.

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35 year Life Member of the NRA

NRA Life Member since 1984
 
Posts: 4601 | Location: Pennsylvania | Registered: 21 March 2005Reply With Quote
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Whatever you have and whatever works !

I read an interesting article about searching a battle zone in Mexico .They found Copper cannon balls !! Spain went into Mexico for the silver. Silver is often found with copper .They removed the copper and looking for a use for copper , they made cannon balls !! dancing
 
Posts: 7636 | Registered: 10 October 2002Reply With Quote
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quote:
Originally posted by afro408:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by RIP:
Saeed, Ol' Pal,

Bronze and brass: No difference, except two names for the same thing.]

No difference eh.
Brass is an alloy of Copper and Zinc.
Basic Bronze is an alloy of Copper and Tin. It can also contain Nickel, Aluminium, Silver etc, depending on use.


Corinthian bronze contains Silver AND Gold

quote:
Originally posted by mete:
Whatever you have and whatever works !

I read an interesting article about searching a battle zone in Mexico .They found Copper cannon balls !! Spain went into Mexico for the silver. Silver is often found with copper .They removed the copper and looking for a use for copper , they made cannon balls !! dancing


The Spanish actually had problem smelting silver ore from some mines because the silver source they were trying to exploit lacked copper, which their smelting technique requires.
SO they had to actually had to import copper to extract the silver from some mines!


If I provoke you into thinking then I've done my good deed for the day!
Those who manage to provoke themselves into other activities have only themselves to blame.

*We Band of 45-70er's*

35 year Life Member of the NRA

NRA Life Member since 1984
 
Posts: 4601 | Location: Pennsylvania | Registered: 21 March 2005Reply With Quote
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Jubal Sackett mentioned using silver on occasion. The Lone Ranger used it all the time.
 
Posts: 8169 | Location: humboldt | Registered: 10 April 2002Reply With Quote
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quote:
Originally posted by craigster:
Jubal Sackett mentioned using silver on occasion. The Lone Ranger used it all the time.


BUT, as I pointed out earlier If you think copper fouling is a problem Wait until you try to shoot and modest amount of Silver bullets.


Silver is a more reactive metal and Sticks to nearly Everything, why do you think brazing alloys contain silver?


If I provoke you into thinking then I've done my good deed for the day!
Those who manage to provoke themselves into other activities have only themselves to blame.

*We Band of 45-70er's*

35 year Life Member of the NRA

NRA Life Member since 1984
 
Posts: 4601 | Location: Pennsylvania | Registered: 21 March 2005Reply With Quote
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quote:
Originally posted by Allan DeGroot:
quote:
Originally posted by craigster:
Jubal Sackett mentioned using silver on occasion. The Lone Ranger used it all the time.


BUT, as I pointed out earlier If you think copper fouling is a problem Wait until you try to shoot and modest amount of Silver bullets.


Silver is a more reactive metal and Sticks to nearly Everything, why do you think brazing alloys contain silver?


I don't think Jubal or the Ranger were too worried about it.
 
Posts: 8169 | Location: humboldt | Registered: 10 April 2002Reply With Quote
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quote:
Originally posted by Allan DeGroot:
quote:
Originally posted by Alberta Canuck:
Bronze is also suitable sometimes, and for very light plinkers some of the zinc alloys work okay on occasion. (IF you use cast zinc, don't contaminate your lead bullet casting equipment with it.)

I have often wondered about pewter, but have never seen any reports of that specific mix being tried.

I suspect alloys of the precious metals would also work, but I am not at the socio-economic level to be testing that out.


I just LOVE to see this come up...

Lead and Zinc don't mix.

Are you aware that if you ever buy pure lead it has been processed, in it's molten state with molten Zinc?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkes_process

ALL lead is so processed from the mine.

Why? Because Led is almost never found in nature without some "contamination" of SILVER
and frankly out of lead ore the Silver pays the cost of mining and smelting the lead!


Thus the "Lead" often ends up being pure profit.

The way they get the silver out is to use Zinc, because Silver is 3000times more soluble in Zinc than it is in lead.

Lead and zinc are easily seperated by simply letting them stratify and the Zinc turns solid on top of the molten lead.

What often IS found in scrap lead and is often erroneously believed to be zinc is metallic Calcium or Strontium (or other intermetallic compounds containing them) which are common additives in "Low Maintainance" battery plates.

For the record "Brass" is an alloy of copper & Zinc, while "Bronze" is an alloy of Copper and Tin.

Pewter is predominantly Tin and thus almost as expensive as copper.

I recently found a load of scrap that contained what were believed to be "Lead tubes" 1/2" in diameter, several hundred feet of the stuff coiled up that was stripped out of an old tavern that was being renovated... it was commercially pure Tin tubing that was often used for "Beer line" for the old school keg tapping systems.

Basically I got 172lbs of food grade tin
tubing for $0.15/lb. current market price is just shy of $9/lb so that tin is worth considerably more than I paid...

I decided it was not my job to educate a scrap dealer.

If he wants to be "insistantly ignorant" about what things are, domonstrated by his selling me Titanium and Hastelloy as though it was stainless steel I'm gonna let him.


You seem knowledgeable. I have a question:
When folks anneal cartridge cases they heat them up then quench them.
Every other metal that I am aware of, even non-ferrous metals like lead, are HARDENED by quenching.
Why does brass soften with quenching?
 
Posts: 633 | Registered: 11 March 2001Reply With Quote
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quote:
Originally posted by CDD:
Zinc is supposed to make nice cast bullets. I have seen several articles about casting Zinc bullets over the years. I won't use it because I do not want to contaminate the Lead supply.


I heard it is difficult to fill out the mold. I've found fishing weights cast from zinc and they are always poorly filled-out. People make zinc weights for snagging spoonbills.
I find them at low-water below the dam.
 
Posts: 633 | Registered: 11 March 2001Reply With Quote
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quote:
You seem knowledgeable. I have a question:
When folks anneal cartridge cases they heat them up then quench them.
Every other metal that I am aware of, even non-ferrous metals like lead, are HARDENED by quenching.
Why does brass soften with quenching?


It doesn't. Brass softens when brought to just on the point of colour change to dull red. Quenching has no effect whatsoever on the annealing process, it is just used to stop transfer of heat further up the case towards the head. Some don't quench and just let the case naturally cool or stand the case in a stream of cool air.
 
Posts: 3821 | Location: Nelson, New Zealand | Registered: 03 August 2009Reply With Quote
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What is wrong with bronze?
I mean something like CuSn5Pb20?

Why are not bullets made from this?

Jiri
 
Posts: 2067 | Location: Czech Republic | Registered: 22 May 2002Reply With Quote
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Lead is used in steel , brass and bronze to form a " free machining grade " and appears as small spheres which cause the metal to break easily when machining. These grades are used when maximum physical properties are not needed since the lead particles reduce those properties .
 
Posts: 7636 | Registered: 10 October 2002Reply With Quote
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