Coated Bullets ??

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Machinegreen

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I purchased 1000 projectiles of X- Metal 9mm Hi Tek 124 gr. These coated bullets were 30$ cheaper than plated bullets. I'm just wondering if I'm going to regret this.
I've been reloading my own 9mm for 3 years now and the whole point was to be as economical as possible without compromising performance.
I'm interested in any of your thoughts or experience that you're willing to share. Thank you all in advance.
 
I have used them and the other coated offerings. They work fine. Noticed a little less smoke when firing. When my current supply runs out I will order more of them.

Terry.
 
TrevorJ said:
Thanks! I've never done the coating myself. I knew it came in a powder form, I had never read the instructions for application.
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powder gets mixed in acetone from my understanding, then a tumble lube to coat the bullets, spread on non stick cookie sheets to dry
 
I was wondering about these as well , do they use gas checks and can they be loaded at higher than cast velocities?
 
Hi-Tek comes in liquid and powder. The liquid is two part polymer/catalyst. The powder has the catalyst built in. Been used in Australia for about 20 years.

All are cured in an oven

Don't need gaschecks.
 
You'll need to increase case mouth flare so you don't scrape the coating while loading. Crimp, as always with 9mm, should be very light to almost none (.377"-.379" at the case mouth). Also, as with any new bullet/barrel combo you'll have to check that a different OAL isn't required (plunk and spin).
 
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I bought 1000 of the 9mm 124grn, and 1000 of the 45, 240grn. I won't be buying more.

I went through the 9mm bullets, but due to their shape, the OAL had to be laughably short for a shadow. The pointy shape of the bullet also doesn't match the stem of a typical seater, so the OAL is a bit all over the place, so in order to make sure they're all shorter than the maximum OAL for my gun, they needed to be even shorter. Nevertheless, I went through all my 9mm.

The 45acp I pretty much gave up. I bought an automatic bullet feeder for my press, and it specifically says not to use cast or coated bullets with the automatic bullet feeder. I can see why given how the feeder is made. So I'd have to go back to placing them by hand one by one, which slows down the process a lot. I would also have the same problem (mismatched stem-bullet), so I just decided to set them aside, and I'll either sell the 900-something I still have, or use them if/when I go through my huge pile of campros. I don't have much problem with the OAL with the 45 though, my 1911 is a lot more forgiving than my shadows.

So, long story short, if you have an automatic bullet feeder for your press, it's not a good option, otherwise it's a YMMV.
 
VinnyQC said:
I bought 1000 of the 9mm 124grn, and 1000 of the 45, 240grn. I won't be buying more.

I went through the 9mm bullets, but due to their shape, the OAL had to be laughably short for a shadow. The pointy shape of the bullet also doesn't match the stem of a typical seater, so the OAL is a bit all over the place, so in order to make sure they're all shorter than the maximum OAL for my gun, they needed to be even shorter. Nevertheless, I went through all my 9mm.

The 45acp I pretty much gave up. I bought an automatic bullet feeder for my press, and it specifically says not to use cast or coated bullets with the automatic bullet feeder. I can see why given how the feeder is made. So I'd have to go back to placing them by hand one by one, which slows down the process a lot. I would also have the same problem (mismatched stem-bullet), so I just decided to set them aside, and I'll either sell the 900-something I still have, or use them if/when I go through my huge pile of campros. I don't have much problem with the OAL with the 45 though, my 1911 is a lot more forgiving than my shadows.

So, long story short, if you have an automatic bullet feeder for your press, it's not a good option, otherwise it's a YMMV.
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I too will never buy them again; I have not tried 9mm, but in both .45 ACP, and .40 S & W I found that the OD varried up to .005", and all were on the big side to start with. No matter how much I flared the cases, about 1 in 10 would have the powder coat roll or slip off the bullet, peeled by the casing. Once crimped this extra material would result in a misfire. Inspecting them before loading was OK, but even with doing so, the shape would not feed well in my .40; the round nose were OK in the .45, if the bad ones were picked out.

I shoot exclusively Cast lead DRG flat point in my .40 now, and 200 gr. SWC in my .45 and .38 special, and CamPro hollow points in my 9mm Consistent, accurate and no aggravation.

I gave away the last of my .40 bullets for about the cost of shipping, but keep one on my desk to remind me: NEVER AGAIN. The large, well known dealer that carried these, has since dropped all of their products because everyone had issues.

Someone posted that they stank; they sure did!!.
 
VinnyQC said:
I went through the 9mm bullets, but due to their shape, the OAL had to be laughably short for a shadow.
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Can you put a number to "laughably short"? I currently load 147gr CamPro's to 1.085" because of my Shadow.

VinnyQC said:
The pointy shape of the bullet also doesn't match the stem of a typical seater
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In which way exactly? Are you saying that the seating stem wasn't resting on the bullets ogive at all?

VinnyQC said:
I bought an automatic bullet feeder for my press, and it specifically says not to use cast or coated bullets with the automatic bullet feeder. I can see why given how the feeder is made.
Click to expand...

Which bullet feeder is that? Coated bullets aren't new and our friends to the south use them in bullet feeders without any real issues.
 
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Just a note, most die manufacturers will ship you an extra bullet seating face if you need it. I mostly have Lee dies and they wont send me one for free but higginson Powders seems to have stock on all the lee products/parts for a good price and reasonable shipping. Part number breakdown of the dies are on the Lee site.

You can buy just the seating die internal part and use a dremel to form it to you're bullets. In this case with the pointy bullets I'd just drill the internal area out to make clearance for the points. Next I round the edges with one of the eraser like hard rubber attachments on the dremel.

Or, just don't buy that bullet anymore.... I'm a caster so once I have a $120 mold I'm going to make a bullet seat that matches it.
 
Machinegreen said:
I purchased 1000 projectiles of X- Metal 9mm Hi Tek 124 gr. These coated bullets were 30$ cheaper than plated bullets...
Click to expand...
Must have been a sale or clear out. They're usually within $5-10 of plated.

ht tps://xmetaltargets.com/product/paragon-9mm-147gr-hi-tek/
ht tps://www.firearmsoutletcanada.com/campro-bullets-9mm-147gr-fcp-rnfp-case-of-1000.html#.XoDKEnJKhhE

ht tps://www.firearmsoutletcanada.com/campro-bullets-9mm-124gr-fcp-rn-case-of-1000.html#.XoDKnnJKhhE
ht tps://xmetaltargets.com/product/surgeon-9mm-bullets-125-hi-tek/
 
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