I've been playing with powdercoating pistol bullets for a while and have just recently started powdercoating rifle bullets. So far I've done bullets for 32 mag, 41 mag, 45 ACP, and 45 Colt for handguns and 30 WCF, 7.62x54R, and 45-70 in rifles. I've got some 38-55s loaded but haven't gotten a chance to shoot them yet. Why powdercoat? No leading- True with properly fit regularly lubed cast bullets but PC is more forgiving. Add diameter- PC adds about .0005-.002” depending on how heavy a coat you do or number of coats. This can help fit bullets to odd size bores. You can increase nose diameter on nose riding designs and still size the body to your regular diameter. Clean handling- The bullets are actually slick to handle, they go through bullet feeders like poop through a goose. PC totally encloses bullets- I've been told some indoor ranges do not allow cast bullets but do allow PC cast. Never been to an indoor range so this is hearsay. PC anneals the bullets- The bullets are baked at 400 degrees for 20 minutes and they end up around 8 bnh. I'm going to make a wire casket and try quenching the bullets after they bake.
In handguns most loads shoot as well or better with PC than conventional lube, not all though. There is also generally a slight increase in velocity for any given load, usually 20-40 fps. In 30 WCF and 7.62x54R I had to work up new loads for PC bullets but once I did they shot as well as the conventionally lubed loads. Both rifles have open sights and loads did about 2.5” which what these rifles will do with me behind the sights. Both cartridges needed a slight increase in loads. The 45-70 has not needed a change in load. So far I've only shot the Gould bullet over 22gr. 2400. This is a mild load that shoots well in my Marlin 1895. I think the low pressure may be why it is less picky but this hypothesis needs more work.
I did not innovate anything shown here, I've just been playing with what other people have figured out. I bought my powder from Smoke4320 on the “Castboolits” webpage.
First step is to cast a pile of bullets. These are Gould bullets cast of 4:1 wheel-weights:20/1.
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Pull them out to cool and size if you want/need to.
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