Some time ago, I tried making aluminium bullets.

Had a bit of a problem, as there are many different types of the alloy.

Finally managed to get a type that will actually machine correctly.

I am making some in 308 caliber, and different weights.

I am using the same design as my copper bullets, therefore the weights are roughly 30% of the copper.

Made a pointed bullet that weighs 39 grain, a HP at 41 grains, and will make other weights.

Any guess how they will perform?

I would think they would have poor performance and be very erratic in flight.

The way aluminum tends to gall against steel I would think that just a few shots will leave a lot of aluminum in the bore; be careful of raised pressures due to a restricted bore.

308 41 grain aluminium bullet

I am going to spray them with TUNGSTEN to stop galling.

Most interesting, can aluminum be swaged?
Watching you video maybe copper driving bands, like WWII artillery rounds to keep the steel projectile from wearing out the barrels prematurely.

We still use copper bands on artillery projos; and our tank rounds use nylon bands, and travel at 4850 FPS. And also they use aluminum sabots. For the M256 120mm tank cannon.

Our bullets do have driving bands, and the total surface in contact with the barrel is relatively small.

I will keep an eye on fouling and see what happens.

I'd be tempted to try powder coating instead of tungsten on the coatings, but in either case you won't know until you try!

We used to use moly paint coating on cast bullets. I don't know what tungsten coating is. But tungsten is very hard and brittle isn't it?

I have used Molly for years, and love it.

Someone suggested Tungsten, so I am trying it.

It is a spray on.

Apparently it is more slippery than Molly.

https://www.nanoslicklubricant...tungsten-ammunition/

.

Looking forward to the velocity and accuracy results. And maybe expansion video?

fast muzzle speeds and 50 fps by 100yds.
have fun.

I am cleaning the barrel of a Robler Titan 6 rifle right now.

It has a long barrel, just over 27 inches long.

I will keep track of any fouling with a bore scope.

First episode is a resounding failure!

A 50 grain aliminium bullet, with a case full of H4895 - 50 grains.

Velocity was 3727, 3 shot group is over 18 inches!

I figured the velocity would be higher but the accuracy is about what I expected. A different power may help but it's going to take a lot of different trys. I know you are toying with. 308 bullets but I missed which cartridge you were trying your bullets in. I wonder if a hollow base design might work slightly better with your powder charge. I'd try that first and see if accuracy improves.
You should be able to at least duplicate Remington accelerator balistics and accuracy. I'm sure you know what those were, not match grade but they were fairly accurate for a saboted bullet.

Alum bullets have been tried before.

When it comes to firearms what is old is new what is new is old.

quote:

Originally posted by p dog shooter:
Alum bullets have been tried before.

When it comes to firearms what is old is new what is new is old.

I am sure they have.

As the old saying goes, there is nothing new under the sun.

But, being curious and have the capability, I thought I will try it myself.

Tried lots of things I have read about.

Lots of my own experience turned completely different!

I have 3 more bullets weights to try, and will let you know the results.

Perhaps an aluminum core bullet with a copper jacket?That might get enough mass to stabilize the bullet. Much like a gyro.

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:
I have used Molly for years, and love it.

Someone suggested Tungsten, so I am trying it.

It is a spray on.

Apparently it is more slippery than Molly.

Dip them in a grease, any grease. I prefer vasoline to industrial greases, this white grease was very old Lubriplate 130A. This is a before and after greasing a 30-06 and shooting the cartridge.





that grease completely flows down the case, floats the case, and comes out in the chamber.




I do it all the time to keep the cases from gripping the chamber when fire forming, or when shooting new brass.



the thing is, I see the "grease plum" in front of the barrel once the cartridge is fired. Blow enough grease up the barrel and this will prevent jacket contact with the barrel.

Prior to WW1, cupronickle jackets were the state of the art, but the things jacket fouled something awful Shooters learned to dip their bullets in grease to prevent jacket fouling.



In the same period, steel bullets were being issued by the Russians, Italians, and Austrians. These bullets were intended to penetrate the shields on field artillery. To prevent steel on steel contact in the barrel, these bullets were greased.

The Swiss used a grease ring on their ammunition up to the 1970's. This ring has the texture of thick beeswax.





Just dip and twist!





shoots good too!

I tried the 39 grain bullets.

Non touched the target.

Loaded a couple of 168 Sierra MKs and fired them.

Hit the point if aim exactly.

Looked inside the barrel.

Some aluminium streaking.

Wow…accuracy much worse than I thought it would be.

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:
First episode is a resounding failure!

A 50 grain aliminium bullet, with a case full of H4895 - 50 grains.

Velocity was 3727, 3 shot group is over 18 inches!

Heck . . . I can achieve that accuracy without using aluminum bullets!

Saeed, your experiments are always interesting.

Can you tell if the bullets are fracturing, or are they holding together? They are not being stabilized, or so it seems.

How does one remove aluminum fouling from a barrel?

What's next, depleted uranium?!

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Robinson:
Saeed, your experiments are always interesting.

Can you tell if the bullets are fracturing, or are they holding together? They are not being stabilized, or so it seems.

How does one remove aluminum fouling from a barrel?

What's next, depleted uranium?!

Mike,

Stability is not the problem.

Bullets go in all sorts of directions except the ones you wish them to.

I will post the photos I took of the inside of the barrel.

Update.

Someone asked if the bullets broke up.

No they have not.

I have found them in the sand backstop.

I also thought would try something else.

I made the same bullets in copper - exactly the same, except the weight of course.

Just fired 5 shots with a random load of 44 grains of VVN140 powder.

I have not measure the groups but they are all in one hole!!

Saeed
I doubt that a lightweight aluminum bullet could be driven at a useful velocity to be of any use.
There has to be a fair amount of density to get them to behave in flight.

Doesn't the military use aluminum sabot practice rounds in the Abrahms main gun? Perhaps if the projectile was made as a flachette and sabot launched it would behave better?

http://i.imgur.com/I0DRhGH.jpg

Where do you get your sand for the backstop?
Just asking.

Glad you asked about the 120mm Sabot training round; the M865 TPCSDS-T. M865 Target Practice, Cone Stabilized, Discarding Sabot-Tracer. The combat sabot round is fin stabilized and has a DU penetrator. With an aluminum sabot.
One of my jobs was managing tank ammo for a year. Just like hand loading, only I had to buy the components separately and have Milan AAP LAP them; Load Assemble, and Pack.
The M865 uses a steel penetrator, and has an aluminum nose cone, and an aluminum cone to stabilize it (the cone also limits the range because a sabot round will go out of most range fans); the 120mm M256 Cannon used on the M1A1 and M1A2 tanks is smooth bore. We do not want HEAT rounds to spin and Sabot rounds are fin stabilized.
However, the sabot sections (3) are made of aluminum. Tank ammo also operates at 72K to 98 PSI; using screw in steel electric primers. We could make rifles that way.

Saeed, heavier and denser is better.

Speer made the best solids ever manufactured. They had tungsten cores.

But they were too expensive.

Only a few discerning buyers were in the market.

So, they stopped making them.

It would be interesting to fire a few of the aluminum bullets into a water trap to inspect and analyze the pattern of rifling engagement on them.

I suspect that the bullets having much less mass than a bullet of standard material is much more susceptible to spin drift and they lose stability quickly due to rapid decay of rotational velocity.

Rifling on the bullets is normal - I have recovered some.

Not really sure why they shot so badly.

The exact same bullet design in copper shoots very well.

slow them down.

quote:

Originally posted by Lamar:
slow them down.

That will be defeating the whole point.

Velocity is not the problem, I think.

As I have copper bullets, shot at higher velocities, shoot very well.

Saeed, Are the bullets slipping the rifling?

That is, is aluminum fragile compared to copper? Or is it that heavier bullets moving slower might grip the rifling a bit better? Or, perhaps, copper is just less fragile (a bit more malleable?) during the firing process and holds the rifling better?

Are the bullets consistently going in one place? Or scattering all over? If it’s the later, it seems to say the bullets aren’t stabilizing for some reason.

I respectfully disagree with the idea that slower velocity to see if it stabilizes defeats the purpose. One could postulate that the real question is “at what velocity does an aluminum bullet work as intended”? Of course, it could be too low to be useful…but what is that actual number?

Really interesting experiment!

quote:

Originally posted by DavidReed:
It would be interesting to fire a few of the aluminum bullets into a water trap to inspect and analyze the pattern of rifling engagement on them.

I suspect that the bullets having much less mass than a bullet of standard material is much more susceptible to spin drift and they lose stability quickly due to rapid decay of rotational velocity.

A heavy flywheel will spin/turn longer than a lighter one.

Saeed
Have you given up on your aluminum bullet?

I think a very lite bullet would require a very slow twist. Right?

I have recovered some from the sand backstop.

They are in tact and do have rifling engraved.

But somehow they went in all sorts of direction.

My original intention was to see how fast I can drive them.

But these results show me that any further shooting is just a waste of effort.