Time to make the donuts....

[jackieschmidt]

Jackie, did you draw any conclusions on your “wet core” bullets?

Joe, Friday, they shot phenomenal. I was shooting my regular load of 30.4 of 133. As you remember, we had a really nice right to left condition that was really honest. I was able to do a head to head with the same bullets made with clean cores. I think the wet core bullets were better.
That evening, that front came through, it rained like all heck. Sat morning, it was cool, with no humidity. Lots of wind, now left to right.
I was stuck on .350+ vertical. I tried about every trick I knew, nothing helped. It was a miserable day.

The next morning at the 200 yard matches, it did no better. I just about convinced myself that the darned rifle was broke.

After the first group in Sporter in the afternoon, I decided to switch to LT-32 that I happened to have. I put 29.0 grns behind that bullet and the rifle suddenly came to life, I nailed a Three, Four, and a small Five to finish up in some really tough conditions.

The wet core thing is definitely worth exploring.

I cored up 300 30 caliber jackets last night, using the same wet core formula. I will point them up and shoot them Sunday.

 

[geo.ulrich]

Joe, Friday, they shot phenomenal. I was shooting my regular load of 30.4 of 133. As you remember, we had a really nice right to left condition that was really honest. I was able to do a head to head with the same bullets made with clean cores. I think the wet core bullets were better.
That evening, that front came through, it rained like all heck. Sat morning, it was cool, with no humidity. Lots of wind, now left to right.
I was stuck on .350+ vertical. I tried about every trick I knew, nothing helped. It was a miserable day.

The next morning at the 200 yard matches, it did no better. I just about convinced myself that the darned rifle was broke.

After the first group in Sporter in the afternoon, I decided to switch to LT-32 that I happened to have. I put 29.0 grns behind that bullet and the rifle suddenly came to life, I nailed a Three, Four, and a small Five to finish up in some really tough conditions.

The wet core thing is definitely worth exploring.

I cored up 300 30 caliber jackets last night, using the same wet core formula. I will point them up and shoot them Sunday.

there you go

 

[JoeDuke]

Joe, Friday, they shot phenomenal. I was shooting my regular load of 30.4 of 133. As you remember, we had a really nice right to left condition that was really honest. I was able to do a head to head with the same bullets made with clean cores. I think the wet core bullets were better.
That evening, that front came through, it rained like all heck. Sat morning, it was cool, with no humidity. Lots of wind, now left to right.
I was stuck on .350+ vertical. I tried about every trick I knew, nothing helped. It was a miserable day.

The next morning at the 200 yard matches, it did no better. I just about convinced myself that the darned rifle was broke.

After the first group in Sporter in the afternoon, I decided to switch to LT-32 that I happened to have. I put 29.0 grns behind that bullet and the rifle suddenly came to life, I nailed a Three, Four, and a small Five to finish up in some really tough conditions.

The wet core thing is definitely worth exploring.

I cored up 300 30 caliber jackets last night, using the same wet core formula. I will point them up and shoot them Sunday.

I was actually shooting some "sorta wet core" bullets as well. I had washed the cores in Coleman fuel and then just let them dry. But I had a miserable match with all sorts of rifle issues starting with a very old barrel and ending up with a broken bolt handle. But I could tell that they shot better than the flat base bullets I had.

 

[AlNyhus]

Not sure how long he's been doing it but Randy Robinett has been preforming the boat tail on his 104 gr 6mm bullets for some time. -Al

 

[Mulligan]

Me, my first year making long 6’s

 

[brcman]

One thing no one has mentioned- "air assist" presses. What info does anyone have on this? Where does one get air assist assemblies? Or, is this a home brew device that one engineers himself? Would be nice on 30's for us old guys.

 

[WSnyder]

One thing no one has mentioned- "air assist" presses. What info does anyone have on this? Where does one get air assist assemblies? Or, is this a home brew device that one engineers himself? Would be nice on 30's for us old guys.

Pneumatic punch press comes to mind. One could be built or an existing likely modified to work. I used to see them used all the time.

 

[tom]

I already don't move my fingers out of the way in time, lol.

Tom

 

[D Coots]

Punches are sharp...I've changed MO since then....naughty finger was a bit slow...

 

[RGRobinett]

One thing no one has mentioned- "air assist" presses. What info does anyone have on this? Where does one get air assist assemblies? Or, is this a home brew device that one engineers himself? Would be nice on 30's for us old guys.

I have and use three pneumatic press actuators which were built by Charlie Hood - mostly use them for core forming (squirting), but also point the long-for-caliber BT bullets on them. Charlie built them to work with the Lee CLASSIC CAST presses . . . they could [probably] be adapted to RCBS (RockChucker, A2, etc.) types also.

The Hood pneumatic assists have been in use for close to 16 years now, and function perfectly. As with anything associated with Charlie, the engineering & fabrication are very well done. Depending upon the task, I operate them on about 60-70 PSI, which provides about 70% of the muscle. While higher PSI would make for less effort - I like the feed-back - tactile judgement (feel) provided by the lower end assist . . . the good news is that just tweaking a knob allows the desired assist level.

I believe Charlie quit making them due to people not understanding how to set-up and operate safely - lack of mechanical aptitude and [UN]common sense could - no matter how careless/clueless the operator - lead to liability. Ya gotta be aware of where yer fingers are! And to remain on the straight & narrow, unless Charlie says otherwise, I will not post pics, as his concepts are widely pirated - I do not want to contribute to that. I'd guess that, if the pirates would credit the origin . . . the concept pilfering probably wouldn't bug Charlie . . . as much . . .

A LONG time ago, Bill Neimi offered plans/drawings for a hydraulic assist to work in conjunction with the various RCBS type presses - except in photos, I never saw one.

The BIG benefit is extreme uniformity of all measurable/meaningful attributes . . . not a bad thing when making BR quality bullets. RG

 

[AlNyhus]

Having seen Randy's Hood pneumatic assist actuators in operation many, many times...they are impressive. Heck, even girlz could use 'em!

 

[jackieschmidt]

I lubed up 350 30 caliber cores exactly the same way I did the 6mm and core seated the jackets yesterday evening.
I just pointed them up this afternoon.

Just like the 6mm, they came out .0002 larger on the shank than the squeaky clean cores.
They went in the die find, no different than before. But the extraction stroke was definitely more difficult. Almost aggravatingly difficult. I even stopped after a few and re lubed them, adding about 2 more grains of lube. Nothing changed.
You can see from the two sectioned bullets that the core did progress further up in the jacket. The one on the right is the lubed core bullet.
One other thing. The lubed bullets have a faint shadowy ring just above the base. I don’t know what that is all about. The base is about .0002 larger than the shank.

I don’t wish to be pessimistic, but that ring just above the base bothers me. It’s the first time I have seen it on our bullets.

I’ll test them Sunday.

 

[AlNyhus]

Jackie, that 'ring' area is likely the area of the ejection issue. If you compare those to the dry cores, do the wet cored bullets have a sharper edge at the pressure ring...a little less radius?

 

[geo.ulrich]

Jackie can you take a picture of a jacket not core seated right by the base

 

[brcman]

I think that ring around the base is the "lubed" core not adhering to the jacket and slipping forward when the pressure of the core seat punch pushes the bullet into the die.

 

[jackieschmidt]

Jackie can you take a picture of a jacket not core seated right by the base

 

[Phys86]

Can I convince someone to make me some 115ish grain 6mm?

 

[jackieschmidt]

Jackie, that 'ring' area is likely the area of the ejection issue. If you compate those to the dry cores, do the wet cored bullets have a sharper edge at the pressure ring...a little less radius?

Al, if you blow the picture of the two sectioned bullets up, you can see that the radius at the base is just about the same on both.

 

[RGRobinett]

Often, J4 jackets have "ghost rings", which I believe are vestiges of the deep-drawing process (pic below).
In Jackie's post (#673), I believe that the draw-ring was exacerbated when, upon point-up, the core squirted forward, and the jacket collapsed on the "ghost-ring". That the core moved forward is obvious. Still, it is likely that the bullets will shoot well.

Way back, when I was "testing" the bullet length/weight/stability, to get a handle on the reality of real-world vs "book" twist rate results, making very light (short core) for length bullets produced this type of ring(s) - sometimes, in spades - up to three collapses before the jacket base caught back up with the core base! I won't bore everyone with the whole story, except to say that the Robert McCoy and William C. Davis gyroscopic stability formulas both produce reliable, repeatable and predictable results - Sg is all about bullet length and twist rate . . .

The accompanying pic has appropriate info and decently displays the "ghost rings" (burnish marks, or, nanno step in draw die??) - both prior to and following core-seating. I'd bet that better lighting would show this "ghost-ring" on Jackie's J4 jacket, and that it was exacerbated by core slippage.
RG

P.S. Of note: during core seating, and again at point-up, the jacket material is, both radially and longitudinally stretched, thus emphasizing the "ghost-ring(s)".

 

[J.J. Coe]

I lubed up 350 30 caliber cores exactly the same way I did the 6mm and core seated the jackets yesterday evening.
I just pointed them up this afternoon.

Just like the 6mm, they came out .0002 larger on the shank than the squeaky clean cores.
They went in the die find, no different than before. But the extraction stroke was definitely more difficult. Almost aggravatingly difficult. I even stopped after a few and re lubed them, adding about 2 more grains of lube. Nothing changed.View attachment 1658971View attachment 1658972View attachment 1658973View attachment 1658974
You can see from the two sectioned bullets that the core did progress further up in the jacket. The one on the right is the lubed core bullet.
One other thing. The lubed bullets have a faint shadowy ring just above the base. I don’t know what that is all about. The base is about .0002 larger than the shank.

I don’t wish to be pessimistic, but that ring just above the base bothers me. It’s the first time I have seen it on our bullets.

I’ll test them Sunday.

I had the same thing happen on my 6mm flat base dies. Same ring at the base, same issue when ejecting from the point up die, and they shot like chit.
They simply picked up to much diameter from using to much lube on the cores.
It's important to measure the atf/solvent mix......7ml atf to 16oz solvent is max on my fb dies but 5ml to 16oz is what I've settled on.
It takes a little tinkering to get it right.