bullet weight

Using your home cast bullets as a ammunition component. Group buys are listed here.
Model 52
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Re: bullet weight

Post by Model 52 »

SInce moving east I've relied a lot more on commercial cast bullets.

As you know, the alloy, the casting temperature and fill of the mould all impact the final weight, and to a lesser extend the final diameter of a cast bullet.

If you control for those things, a good mould will throw very constant bullets and I never bothered to sort my own cast bullets by anything other than visual inspection.

However with commercial cast bullets - the inexpensive bulk variety in 500 and 1000 bullet boxes - I both visually sort them, and then weight them. In .375 Win/.38-55 loads with bullets in the 250-280 grain range, I often see differences in weights on the order of 3-4 grains. I sort them into 1 grain increments and get a pretty normal bell curve type distribution. I use the high and low weights of the range for load development and then use the weights in the middle for the actual put on the shelf loads. It reduces the SD in velocity and seems to improve accuracy at longer range.

I do the same thing with 405 gr flat nose .45-70 bullets that I use for plinking loads in my Sharps. Properly sorted and weighed, they'll still produce 1 MOA accuracy out to the 300 yard range I shoot it here in NC.
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