The Accurate Reloading Forums THE ACCURATE RELOADING.COM FORUMS Guns, Politics, Gunsmithing & Reloading Bullet Making Why make your owned swayed bullets?Go | New | Find | Notify | Tools | Reply | |
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I like building many things myself because I get personal satisfaction and can control the quality. I don't know anything about swaying my own bullets, but my first impression is that it would be difficult to match the quality (and maybe cost) of even an average mass producer. Any comments or reference books would be appreciated. | ||
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Sorry - my auto-correct spell checker was out of control: it should have read "make my own swaged bullets" | |||
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Nimrod I swage pistol bullets for my 45 acp, 45 Colt and 357. These are all target velocity rounds. I was looking for an improvement over cast bullets. I found the knurling of the rounds to be a major pain in the lower regions. I found the Baseard that Corbin makes does nicely. It's a copper disc with a hole in the center to revit the disc to the bottom of the bullet. I've not tried making rifle bullets. Jim "Whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force." --Thomas Jefferson | |||
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Both Dave Corbin, corbins.com and brother Richard, rceco.com, have books on "swaying", spelled correctly, on their web sites. Richards was not complete last I looked, but Daves is quite lengthy and in later addition, 9 maybe. Bottom line. Buy a box of factory bullets and weigh them, 10, or 50, or 100. Variation is surprising. 4%, 5%, 6%... Yes, if you buy the finest match bullets at additional cost, maybe some less. How much does this matter. The gun decides. We can talk forever but what does the gun like. If you have a good scale and patience... 1%? 2%? Will this make a difference in your gun. Early .30/30 from the 1800s with tired rifling? Probably not. Remmie 40X? MAYBE. What does the gun like... The other point Dave harps on, you buy one set of dies and by the dept setting you can make bullets of many, many different weights. Does you gun want a 54 grain bullet, not 55? Where with casting, the other more common option, you need another set of molds... Adds up. If you shoot a couple of boxes a decade, bad investment. If you really want the flexibility and a number of bullets... .22's with rimfire case jackets... ??? .223 can be made into a .375 bullet handily. Check the book out and see if you have the patience to make a go of it. LUCK. Happy trails. | |||
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If you can get pre-cut cores then the MAJOR advantage of swaging over casting is that you don't use expensive electricity and there's no worry about working with molten lead. I used to both cast, and swage, commercially. My casting used matched pairs of Hensley & Gibbs moulds casting 9mm SWC-BB and 38 Special H & G No 52. Both in pure linotype as it guaranteed no messing abut with getting a correct "mix" from cast to cast. For swaging I use the Corbin CSP-1 and just swaged HOLLOW BASE bullets for .455 Webley using pre-cut cores. FWIW I think that the the other advantage of swaging is that you can make all lead hollow base or hollow point bullets a lot easier than using Lyman's or RCBS's moulds that have a hollow base plug. But unless it is for a niche in the market then I doubt that swaging set up costs (if you buy form Corbin) will ever really be recovered by you. | |||
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You might also check out BT-Sniper. Brian is a good guy and shares his information freely. He was also a lot less expensive for as good or better quality and had fast turn around last time I checked. Happiness is a warm gun | |||
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My younger brother just got his complete swaging set from Brian. He has about $1200 tied up, but that includes four Lee presses and a Lee 20lb pot. He is off work for four weeks, and has, in two five hour days, cast and swaged 3,000 cores. He has also de-rimmed that many 22lr casings. He made samples, 55gr HP .224" bullets, and gave 50 each to three pawn and one gun shop in the area. As a result, he has orders for 10,000 bullets. That will repay his cookie jar in full, and provide him with an eternal part time job. About $90 per thousand after expenses. $$$ aside, you can make exactly the bullet you want at 1/3rd the cost of store bought. | |||
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I have been swaying my pistol bullets for some time and have been very satisfied with the process and the results. I am even using 40 sw brass to make my 45acp bullets. I use Brian's dies which are the best available at a price most can afford. I have been working with my friend at Star Bullet Company to make rifle bullets from 257 up to my 600 OK. He has a pair of Hydro presses which are a must for the big boys. I have used my ammo master for the most part but also have a monster Rock-Crusher for the the heavier stuff. I have a pair of Mighty Mites as well but only a couple of die sets. It is much better to stay with Brian's sets as they are available and much easier to use. Currently waiting on his .308 sets for my 30-30 HP bullets. If you are careful and don't rush the process you will get high quality products to match any of the available products out there. If you are unsure, remember that many of the premium companies started and most still do swage their products. You can always buy some bullets and then decide on how involved to get. Frank | |||
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A good reason to swage your own bullets was demonstrated when Clinton was in office and he created the primer shortage. Couldn’t load your own or shoot when we didn’t have primers. Then the same when Obama created the ammo shortage and we couldn’t find anything on the shelves. So – if you can make your own bullets and another Democrat creates another shortage, as long as you have lead and jackets, you’ll be able to make you own bullets. Have enough powder and cases and you’ll still be shooting when nobody else can shoot! | |||
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When I was a kid( early Pleistocene) my dad used to buy 148 gr. .357 swaged wadcutters from a place called Northridge Bullet Co. (NBC). They looked like cast bullets, ie lube groves etc. but they were cold swaged. As I recall they were very accurate in his K38. So the question is does anyone make a die that will produce such a bullet? Also does anyone still produce cold drawn lead 'wire' for swaging. Having to cast cores would seem to defeat the whole purpose. C.G.B. | |||
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Been there and done it. Much better to buy them. If doing lead core copper jackets bullets, custom cores, jackets, dies, and presses are available. If you are young, shoot a lot, and one caliber, it may be ok. The best way to fight the shortages as always come up from time to time is to buy extra when they are available. I don't worry about shortages as I am in very good shape with reloading components. My Grandson put a dent in my 77 grain 224 Berger bullets this week. He "borrowed" some of them to load 1000 rounds of 223. This corbin thing is for plinking bullets. | |||
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I have swaged bullets on a Corbin Hydrolic machine. We made several calibers, ranging from lead bullets with a gas check for 357 and 44 Magnums, to 22 jacketed bullets with jackets made from 22 rim fire cases. We have also used jackets for larger calibers like 30 to 458. We tried them for accuracy against bullets from Sierra, Hornady and RWS. Our home made shot just as well. | |||
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I just weighted 8mm bullets. Cheap 196 gr S&B SPCE bullets are from 195.2 to 196.0 gr. Premium Norma Oryx are from 195.5 to 195.6 gr. Factory HC coated bullets for 500 S&W are from 404 to 406.2 gr. Are you sure about 4 %? But I don't know american standards. Wait, will weight Sierra and Swift bullets: Sierra 45 FPJ Match: 199.6 to 200.5 gr A frame 375: 299.5 to 300.6 gr What junk do you shoot with 4% variations? Jiri | |||
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Hornady XTP 45: 229.6 to 230.2, most of the bullets 229.9 to 230.0 gr | |||
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Speer TMJ 45: 183.7 to 185.6 Sellier Bellot 45 FMJ: 229.0 to 229.9 Hornady 45 FMJ FP: 229.2 to 230.6 Sierra Sportmaster 45: 184.5 to 185.2 Ares 45 HC coated 248.6 to 250.0 Ares 45 HC coated 201.5 to 203 Woodleigh 500 S&W: 400.1 to 401.7 | |||
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The Accurate Reloading Forums THE ACCURATE RELOADING.COM FORUMS Guns, Politics, Gunsmithing & Reloading Bullet Making Why make your owned swayed bullets?
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