lead or unleaded that is the question.

[10 acre woods]

So there are many places that say you shouldn't shoot straight lead out of certain types of barrels. They say what kind of barrels but don't say what happens when you do. Can anyone enlighten me on this subject.

[res45]

Are you referring to shoot plain lead bullets with no type of lubricant or patching material applied to the bullet or shooting lead bullets in firearms with Polygon vs. standard rifling.

[10 acre woods]

poly vs. standard

[PawPaw]

You're going to have to be a little more specific, 'cause lots of cautions exist and even among the cast bullet guys, there are lots of opinions. When you say straight lead, we'll wonder what you're talking about, because most of use use alloys of lead that include (among other things), tin and antimony.

I don't know of a single barrel that you can't shoot lead from. It might not be the best projectile for the purpose, but most of us shoot lead almost to the exclusion of jacketed bullets. It might not be a good idea to shoot pure lead in a heavy magnum load, because you'll find that the bore will strip lead from the bullet (leading the barrel) or if the bullet isn't a good fit to the bore, hot gasses will erode lead from the bullet and lead the barrel.

You'll need to be a little more specific before we can help with your question.

[10 acre woods]

non jacketed lead. sorry am a bit new to this.

[huntinaz]

I believe he's referring to lead buildup in poly rifled barrels, causing kabooms. My loose understanding is that the lead builds up faster in poly barrels and in such a way that can lead to enough resistance to cause a kaboom. The majority of experienced shooters say find a good load that doesn't lead much and clean your poly barrel often and you're fine, shoot away.

However I'm sure somebody can explain that better/more accurately than I can. I don't own any pistols with poly barrels so I don't care that much

[PawPaw]

Google is your friend. Here, a Wikipedia article explains most of the cautions.

Those of us who shoot cast bullets are familiar with barrel leading and lead fouling. It's not a big deal and you simply have to clean your barrel. Leading is something to be dealt with and with basic knowledge, it's easy to use cast bullets in nearly any barrel design.

However, opinions run the gamut and there are those that think that shooting a lead bullet down a Glock barrel will immediately result in catastrophic failure, injure everyone within a two mile radius, and cause the ozone to collapse. That's never been my experience, but I haven't experienced everything yet.

[10 acre woods]

so how many rounds would you put though a gun before there might be a kaboom. Theoretically

[chris in va]

Here's my findings having shot a few thousand lead bullets through my handguns and rifles.

The Glock 21sf I had wouldn't lead after almost a thousand downrange. It has a unique polygonal rifling design that is more of a smoothbore with some speedbumps thrown in. The Kahr K9 I have looks more like a stopsign in cross section, and I can't shoot more than a mag through it without buildup.

I shoot lead through my three CZ's that have traditional rifling. They build up some, especially the 9mm, but I just scrub the barrel with a bronze brush when I get home.

Bottom line, put a mag through the gun, carefully inspect the barrel and go from there.

[Rangefinder]

so how many rounds would you put though a gun before there might be a kaboom. Theoretically

Theoretically, there are too many factors. I don't really remember the last time I cleaned my .40S&W barrel. It's had hundreds of cast run through it and it's as clean as it was after the first magazine.