Swaging bullets - is it worth it?

358Scout

358Scout

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First of all I have a Marlin 1894 Cowboy in 45 Colt.
Years back I had a 38 Special PPC in which I loaded swaged 148gr HBWC. I was on Youtube last night and watched Ammosmith swage bullets using cast bullets instead of wire. I was thinking about it last night and this morning and cant for the life of me see what the advantage is, or how this would make the projectile more accurate. All its doing is reshaping the original cast. You cant compress lead more than when its been cast, and the weights wont become more consistent.

Or am I wrong?
 
The bullets would still have to be dead soft to swage, but may not have any voids that some cast bullets may have, I only see any possible advantage when swaging jackets onto cast lead cores.
 
Swaging is a faster way to produce a lead bullet, than casting, provided you do not need lube grooves. Even if you do, they can be added in processing. I'd figure about all the plated bulk bullets out there are a swaged product, as well as about every plain lead bullet loaded on commercial ammo from the makers that you would typically see in the stores. But that makes it equipment intensive, and pretty much limits that to larger scale makers, or guys that like to fiddle with the stuff. I figure Ammosmith qualifies as the latter.

Swaging an already cast bullet gives you the option to change it's shape and size, from a fairly consistent start point. You would need a die that would bleed off excess if you wanted the operation to add up to developing a consistent weight. But you 'could' change the weight a wee bit that way, along with the shape. Seen some guys swaging cast bullets that were already sized and lubed, without losing the lube grooves, so that is an option.

With a solid enough set of dies, and a big enough press, you can swage solid copper bullets, but it really becomes a question of how much money or time do you wish to spend, and for what return.

Mostly though, I think it amounts to one more way to tinker, if that is your idea of interesting stuff to do as a hobby.

Cheers
Trev
 
Swaging a cast bullet won't do much of anything other thanalter the size of thelube grooves. Unless the bullet is pure lead and the guy is trying to make smaller diameter bullets out of big ones.
"...about every plain lead bullet loaded on..." Nope. Literally big, 'gang' casting machines. If commercial ammo uses a swaged bullet the marketing types use it as part of the advertising.
 
sunray said:
Swaging a cast bullet won't do much of anything other thanalter the size of thelube grooves. Unless the bullet is pure lead and the guy is trying to make smaller diameter bullets out of big ones.
"...about every plain lead bullet loaded on..." Nope. Literally big, 'gang' casting machines. If commercial ammo uses a swaged bullet the marketing types use it as part of the advertising.
Click to expand...

I believe you will find the large ammo companies use swaged pure lead bullets in their ammo rather than cast, usually with some sort of graphite coating plus lube cannelures, the same as most hollow base wadcutters. Some of the small specialty companies use cast, however.
 
I know there are tons of very knowledgeable guys on here, but you can join their forums at the ammosmith website and ask the guys directly anything you like.

There is a podcast called personal armament and they have done at least one episode on swaging with the ammosmith guys as I recall. Check it out if you are interested. They have also talked about making jackets out of .22 brass and other things that I for one have never heard of.
 
Well according to two of the makers, the bullets are swaged.

http://www.canadiangunnutz.com/forum/showthread.php?t=619304&highlight=plated+bullet+comparison

One swages twice, both before and after plating. (CamPro), the other (Berrys) swages before plating, but does not say if the core was cast first, or if it was swaged from wire.

The Frontier are apparently cast to size with a plating allowance, then plated.

Never looked into them a bunch before, so.. There. Some are, some ain't.


Cheers
Trev
 
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