I recovered some of my handload bullets

Monkey · April 25, 2006, 10:33 PM

This past February, we were Up North, small game hunting. The two feet of snow meant we didn't get much hunting action. It also made it very hard to find my spent shells from the plinking I did.

Last week, we went back for Turkey hunting. The snow is all gone and oh my, there was a whole pile of brass. The wood pile yielded a couple handfulls of slugs as well. I recovered a bunch of 9mm, .22, & .45 slugs. The .45 were a mixture of factory and handloaded hardball, as well as handloaded SWC's.

All of the .45's recovered measured a consistent .450 diameter on the high spots. The SWC's started out at a consistent .4515. Can I skip a step and consider this as having slugged my barrel?

Other than the rifling marks on the SWC's, most looked like they just came out of the box. What concerned me though was that about 1/2 of them still had most of the lube in the groove. I've read that the lube should about be used up during the trip down the barrel. Any thoughts on that?

Leftoverdj · April 25, 2006, 10:56 PM

Yeah, I'd consider the barrel slugged. Don't worry about remaining lube. That happens a lot, particularly with the hard lube the commercial casters favor. It might make a very slight accuracy difference, but not one you are going to see with a .45 pistol.

April 25, 2006, 10:33 PM	#1
Monkey Member Join Date: January 12, 2000 Location: Waterford, Michigan Posts: 58	I recovered some of my handload bullets This past February, we were Up North, small game hunting. The two feet of snow meant we didn't get much hunting action. It also made it very hard to find my spent shells from the plinking I did. Last week, we went back for Turkey hunting. The snow is all gone and oh my, there was a whole pile of brass. The wood pile yielded a couple handfulls of slugs as well. I recovered a bunch of 9mm, .22, & .45 slugs. The .45 were a mixture of factory and handloaded hardball, as well as handloaded SWC's. All of the .45's recovered measured a consistent .450 diameter on the high spots. The SWC's started out at a consistent .4515. Can I skip a step and consider this as having slugged my barrel? Other than the rifling marks on the SWC's, most looked like they just came out of the box. What concerned me though was that about 1/2 of them still had most of the lube in the groove. I've read that the lube should about be used up during the trip down the barrel. Any thoughts on that? __________________ Monkey

April 25, 2006, 10:56 PM	#2
Leftoverdj Senior Member Join Date: October 15, 2004 Posts: 934	Yeah, I'd consider the barrel slugged. Don't worry about remaining lube. That happens a lot, particularly with the hard lube the commercial casters favor. It might make a very slight accuracy difference, but not one you are going to see with a .45 pistol.