The curiocity never ends

[Kurt]

It warmed up these last couple days so I got out the metal detector and tore the snow pile apart to find my bullets I shot through the new .40-65. And man they look good to go.
I wasn't sure the alloy was tempered good enough for the light load little missy shoots but now I know that all I need to do is load a good load for it.
   

[SgtDog0311]

Kurt, I need to round out my education so I can move on to paper patch. Those look good!

[Kurt]

The important issue with those bullets is the ogive stayed with out change, that is what I want. The bullets shrunk as they should putting the mass to the shank filling the grooves and not taking it by changing the ogive.
I have the alloy balanced for this bullets diameter and weight.
I have two 457-121PH bullets recovered and one of those shows signs of stripping and the other looks good. But the one with stripping has me a little concerned so the alloy needs to be tempered a little more.

[rdnck]

It looks like you have something good going on there. Shoot straight, rdnck.

[Kurt]

I'm happy with them Bill. If they look good after they were fired they will work good.

[SgtDog0311]

Kurt, on the 121s were you 20:1 or 16:1? For my first I'm still debating between the that one and the Postell and my stock is all 20:1 from John Walters is why I ask.

I did mix up a batch of 97-1.5-1.5 last summer. That would be closer to 16:1 if I need to go a little harder for either bullet as a starting point.

[Kurt]

John I have no idea what that alloy was. It was indoor range scrap that I have a bucket full of I use for hand gun alloy. My main interest with these couple loads with the 121 was to see if the .45-70 round would survive gas cuts shot with the .45-90 with the five degree chamber end.
Your 97-1.5-1.5 is the Lyman #1 alloy that is not much mentioned anymore. Harry Pope used to use it a lot and you can find it in the Ideal cast bullet manuals. If you have a lead tester I think you will find it closer to 1/25. It's that small amount of 1.5 % of antimony that will hold the nose so well.

[SgtDog0311]

Thanks Kurt.

[Smokey45]

Thanks for posting this thread

[Kurt]

OK Sgt.

I tested the range lead these 121 bullets were cast with and they test 8.2 on the lee tester. For comparison the way the Lee is set it tests the same as my 1/16 Tin/Lead. As gray as these are I think there is a lot of WW in that scrape.
Here are the recovered 121's I think the two missing must have blown through the pile.
The top two were shot with the .45-70 Shiloh and the bottom two with the .45-90 Shiloh. The camera did not pick this up to good but the third from the top is the .45-90 and it has a little gas cut and it shows slight stripping also the bottom bullet has a increased land when it got slammed into the throat from the large jump but the top shot in the m70 does not look much better. It's hard to see in the picture.