Casting Rifle and Pistol Bullets.

[Adam Helmer]

I like cast rifle and handgun bullets and make all I can in the time alloted for this lifetime. I have a nice 3-bay tractor shed that faces East and I can cast bullets therein despite wind, rain or snow. I have an old hay wagon in the end bay which is the perfect workbench for bullet casting. I set my Coleman stove on the wagon bed and cast merrily until I run out of bullet metal.

I get free wheelweights from the local tire shop, but be careful of recent wheelweights. The new WWs are shiny and cannot be bent like the long grey WWs of past years. The New WWs have cadmium, aluminum, or whatever in them and they will spoil a pot of Old WWs and will NOT cast good bullets.

Besides faulty wheelweights, the price of Tin is now about $20 per pound here. I pay the $20 and go on casting fine, Hard Pennsylvania Bullets because ALL fall from the mould into a bucket of water. None of my bullets ever lead a bore.

Adam

[Rapier]

Adam,
Casting adds several layers to the pleasure of shooting whether you cast to shoot cans or win title or trophy in world cast bullet competition, yes there is such a thing.

Back years ago I shot in competition, long range silhouette, with jacketed bullets. When I started shooting perfect scores at every match, I decided things were getting boring in my hobby. So I switched to shooting cast only in competition. I had been casting bullets for over 20 years at the point where I started to cast for competition at long distance and became a "reborn caster" with a purpose and goal, the perfect cast bullet.

Casting adds to the sport of shooting from several directions, it allows for some savings, in money, but adds time, it allows more appreciation of accomplishment as you are rolling your own. But it does add frustration as it is impossible to tell if the weight of your bullet is because it is 100% filled out or is a heavy bullet with an internal air bubble. However, that is the idea in the first place.

After 25 plus years of casting for competition I can tell you that when you shoot a perfect score in competition with your bullets, you know every one was done correctly, cast, sized, GC'd, and lubed. Plus you meet some pretty interesting characters in the cast competition world of shooting.
Ed

[PJgunner]

I first started casting bullets in 1954 to feed my new (to me anyway) Smith & Wesson pre-number 38-44 Outdoorsman. That gun sadly was sold off during one of my times of unemployment but I now have a replacement that will never be sold. For those who have never seen a 38/44, it's just a very hot factory loaded .38 Spl. that was the predecessor to the .357 magnum. A pretty potent round in it's own right as I did a number on a 250 pound Black bear with mine.
I've used cast bullets in the 30-30 to take quite a few deer as it's not too difficult to duplicate facory velocity with cast. Mostly I used the Lyman #311291 cast strictly of wheel weights and a smidgon of tin to take 15 deer ovr the years, but lately, I've been playing with the RCBS #30-180-FN which casts a 190 gr. bullet in my alloy. Loaded to about 1900 FPS, it duplicates the old .303 Savage rounds and the two deer I've taken with that bullet were solidly smacked down. A very popular bullet for the 30-30 is the Lyman #31141 noq called #311041 but I have two molds for that bullet and a clone by NEI and none of them shoot worth a damn in my rifle. damned if I know why because most of the people I've talked with on cast bullet sites all say they have great results using that bullet.
Currently I cast bullets for cartridges running from the .22 Hornet to the 45-70 andquite a few in between although my favorite cast bullet gun is a Winchester M70 Youth Ranger in .308 Win. I won in a raffle and restocked with a Ramline so it would fit me. On a fairly calm day, I can get 1.5 to 2.0 MOA groups from the bench at 200 yards. If it get windy though, I'm lucky to hit the paper.
I figure I'll cast bullets until I either no longer have the strength to lift a mold or a dipper or I drop dead, whichever comes first.
Paul B.

[Mr. 16 gauge]

I've been casting for a number of years.....mostly for handgun, but for .30/30 as well, and maybe .35 Remington in the future. Took a pig off a hunting preserve with a 245 grain LEE cast GC.....porker didn't far at all (probably could have measured it in feet, not yards!)
Haven't casted much lately......can't find the time to shoot up what I've already reloaded.
I really enjoy casting roundballs for my muzzleloaders......that's the way it was done, and that's the way it should be done.