Powder/epoxy coated lead bullets in Canada?

diananike

diananike

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Having trouble finding an inexpensive, accurate plinking load for my .357 marlin.

I've tried cast, swaged and plated with terrible accuracy results. Almost every jacketed load ive tried has been excellent. I might start another thread about this in the near future.

Suffice it to say jacketed is not the cheapest, thinking of trying the new powder epoxy coated lead bullets, has anyone tried them in a rifle?

Specifically trying to source a couple of hundred in .357 if anyone knows where to get some?
 
Have you tried campro bullets? They are plated but it's very thick and they are well priced. They suggest using jacketed data instead of lead like other plated bullet manufacturers do.
 
I shoot campro in my 9 and .45 to great effect.

However the plated Berry's I tried in the .357 marlin (158gr) 6 different loads shot terrible. With 231, 2400, titegroup, and h110. To the order of 3" at 25yds. Jacketed will put them all in a ragged hole at this range.

It takes a strong crimp on the plated to put them in the mag tube, that may have effected they're integrity, but all the cast bullets ive shot were just as bad so I don't know... Also these loads shot fine in my revolver, better than the rifle in fact
 
I think you might be onto something with these campro cannelured plated. I'm gonna order some and try them out. If they're anything closer to jacketed they should shoot better, I'm having bad luck with lead.
 
The Camaro plated 240gr 44 mag bullets are just as accurate as jacketed in my revolver, don't know about a rifle but I certainly think they are your best bet. Never had much success with Berry's plated.
 
I blasted a few coated lead bullets in my 9mm pistol, some were powder coated and I believe the others were some type of paint or epoxy.
My 2 cents, don't do it.
They shot fine, accuracy wise but they left more crud behind in the barrel than anything I've ever shot before- I don't think you could fire very many (maybe a 100?...) before pressure issues would become a problem...
Plus the powder coated ones stunk like rotten eggs...
Why are you having problems with lead?
Is it leading the bore?
How hard are you driving them?
What's your bullet, load combo?
I get why the plated are not working- your crimp is tearing the jacket off and using one with a groove will fix that but it doesn't explain the lead...
 
wasrupzuk said:
I blasted a few coated lead bullets in my 9mm pistol, some were powder coated and I believe the others were some type of paint or epoxy.
My 2 cents, don't do it.
They shot fine, accuracy wise but they left more crud behind in the barrel than anything I've ever shot before- I don't think you could fire very many (maybe a 100?...) before pressure issues would become a problem...
Plus the powder coated ones stunk like rotten eggs...
Why are you having problems with lead?
Is it leading the bore?
How hard are you driving them?
What's your bullet, load combo?
I get why the plated are not working- your crimp is tearing the jacket off and using one with a groove will fix that but it doesn't explain the lead...
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I suspect your powder coated and or epoxy coated bullets weren't cured properly or they were undersized for your barrel. I don't remember the last time i cleaned my glock outside of a bore snake every 250-400rds or so.
 
I'm not sure why lead and plated have sucked so bad. Leading has not been a problem, and I have looked.
I've tried all range of loads, from light target to magnums with no luck, maybe I just need something a bit oversized.
Wierd thing is almost every jacketed I've shots been great.
The rifle is a pre-remlin Ballard rifled 1894.

I just ordered 400 of these campro 158gr plated with cannelured, so hopefully they work better.

It's been frustrating as its a cool little rifle, but who can afford to feed it xtps when they're 30$ a box lately!!
 
diananike said:
I'm not sure why lead and plated have sucked so bad. Leading has not been a problem, and I have looked.
I've tried all range of loads, from light target to magnums with no luck, maybe I just need something a bit oversized.
Wierd thing is almost every jacketed I've shots been great.
The rifle is a pre-remlin Ballard rifled 1894.

I just ordered 400 of these campro 158gr plated with cannelured, so hopefully they work better.

It's been frustrating as its a cool little rifle, but who can afford to feed it xtps when they're 30$ a box lately!!
Click to expand...

i have read that marlins with the micro groove rifling are a ##### to use with cast, but i figured plated and powder coat should work just fine.
 
Mines not microgrooves, but I'd heard the same thing.
Only thing I can think of trying to get cast to shoot is going oversized. I think the hard cast cactus plains bullets I tried were .358, and my Lee cast tumble lube, and the hornady swaged were .358 too. I shot these with every combo I could think of unique, 231, 2400, titegroup and h110, but to no avail!

She's a weird beast, I've been able to literally out shoot her with cast, offhand out of a revolver! But she'll put xtps on top of each other as far as I can see.
 
I would try for 0.359 or even 0.360 if you can fit it into the chamber. From the few years I've been casting, bullet size is the biggest issue with leading over anything else.
 
Switched from Berry (thin plated) to Campro that are thick plated and OK for full magnum loads on both my 357 and 44 mag. Have to tight crimps, with even medium crimp after the 5th full load shot the 6th bullet has slide off the crimp.

6gr for 158gr
24gr for 240gr
 
I have had success with 180 gr lead and a max charge of H110, but in a different rifle. Jacketed are still more accurate, but these were good enough to use with open sights at 100. Report back about the CamPros. I've been wanting to try them at rifle velocities.
 
While you do want a good crimp when loading for a revolver, for the lever action you may be able to get away with next to none.
 
MBJ said:
While you do want a good crimp when loading for a revolver, for the lever action you may be able to get away with next to none.
Click to expand...

One would think
but in actuality you need a strong crimp as the force in the tube on the bullets tip is pretty strong and will cause bullet setback. This has caused a few kabooms in leverguns over the years.
I found without a strong crimp forced into the plating on the smooth sided plated Berry's this setback occured consistently with more than 3 shells in the tube. A cannelure or crimping groove with the case mouth rolled in eliminates this.
 
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This is a weird one, my experience with a dozen or so Ballard rifled Marlins is that they shot whatever you feed them to clover leaf groups at 25 yrds. at 50 yrds the jacketed start to show a little better consistency but cast are usually still "adequate".

The wife uses one of her .357 Marlins for her lever gun sillywet and does very well with it on 100 yrd rams with hard cast. Her cowboy loads are at around 650 fps and the sillywet loads are at 1100 fps. The cowboy loads are all .38 sp brass and the hotter loads are .357 Mag.

You say you already use the heavier plated bullets in a 9 mill. I would try some of those in yours before making a big order, they may work just as well. If I run out of cast .358 FN bullets for the wife's Marlin, we have used hard cast 9 mill SWC with no noticeable difference in accuracy or bore leading.
 
fingers284 said:
You say you already use the heavier plated bullets in a 9 mill. I would try some of those in yours before making a big order, they may work just as well. If I run out of cast .358 FN bullets for the wife's Marlin, we have used hard cast 9 mill SWC with no noticeable difference in accuracy or bore leading.
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I seem to remember loading a few plated 9mm bullets years ago with reasonable results, that being said the Berrys RN .357 sucked in a few loads. I would have to crimp these 9mm bullets quite heavily as well to prevent setback. The crimping may be whats messing with them, but my Ruger revolver loves them even with the heavy crimp soooo....
The campro 158gr FN plated bullets just arrived.
I'm planning a big article style thread on reloading for (my) marlin, as soon as I get crackin on a few test loads. It will have lots of pics, loads, chrony data and results. Coming this weekend.
 
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I have heavily crimped many thousands of Hard Cast on the shank, half way between the front driving ring and first grease groove with no evidence that the accuracy was effected by doing that. The reason for doing it was, from a test of OAL length and feeding in the 94 Marlins with .38 sp cases, that is the length I found that every Marlin (and there have been lots of them)I tried them in worked flawlessly.
 
I shoot PCed cast for both pistol and rifle in several calibers from 223 up to 45/70
Under 1600fps is no problem for any of them but if you wanna push higher a good quality copper gas check makes it happen.
300wsm pushing a 180gr @ 2400fps gives me a 2" group at 200yrds
 
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