Bullet Lube Recipe

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Last Post 17 February 2009

Standard Member

wizzbang posted this 31 January 2009

Anybody have a good bullet lube recipe? I am shooting 38 spc. and 45 colt. I am trying to gather equipment to start with and would like to make my lube also.:idea1:

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CB posted this 31 January 2009

Wizzbang If you are thinking of making your own lube to save money I can give you some advice.. 1) almost anything can be made into bullet lube 2) not everything works well as bullet lube 3) if bullet lube is able to burn as a fluxing agent in your lead pot, it will also burn in your barrel.

I know these things cause I make bullet lube. I spent over 3 years perfecting a formula that does what I wanted it to.

There are a couple of formulas floating around, felix's lube is here on the forum and there are several others around the net. One thing you will find is that everyone has an opinion on the subject, just as I have mine.

To clear the air here is my opinion: bullet lube that contains anything petroleum based is a deterrent to accuracy. silicone, teflon, any thing edible are bad things in a barrel, they tend to gum up and cause excessive fouling. Anything from animals does the same thing.

With that said here is a link with some additional information you can use however you want to: http://www.lasc.us/Brennan5-0BulletLubes.htm

Lastly but not leastly, take what everyone tells you on the subject with a grain of salt.

Good Luck!

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CB posted this 31 January 2009

Jeff Bowles wrote: Lastly but not leastly, take what everyone tells you on the subject with a grain of salt.

Good Luck!

Yep, don't listen to my opinion with any grain of salt, except to say, “if you git into makin bullet lube, it will land you somewhere over the rainbow in the land of OZ".

In other words, it's a lot easier to buy a good lube (they're all moderately priced!) and waste (I mean) spend all your better time casting, loading, shooting (doing the fun things) :fire ...............Dan

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DonH posted this 04 February 2009

almost any lube will work satisfactorily in low pressure rounds like .38 Spl or .45 Colt. I have used a number of different lubes for pistol. Currently I am using Darr lube with a bit of anhydrous lanolin added. It is very slippery with the only drawback being that my current batch is a bit soft. Making a batch of lube like Darr or Emmert's is not much of a chore compared to casting hundreds of bullets.

I took a look at the lasc site mentioned above and noticed one statement that SPG is Darr lube! I have a stick or two of SPG and a few pounds of Darr on hand. By neither consistency nor smell are they even comparable. SPG is much more like my modified Emmert's (substitute tsallow for Crisco and add lanolin).

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R.Clem posted this 05 February 2009

I have been making bullet lube for a few years now and have to agree with what has been said. But the one thing I have found is that a simple mix of beeswax and lanolin seem to work about the best until it comes time to clean up the barrel. I shoot a lot of black powder and substitutes, these are also low pressure and unlike smokeless, create a whole new problem, unburned powder fouling. I have added Ivory soap chips with some success, Neatsfoot oil with about the same success, and Murphy' Oil soap, the latter seems to help in clean up. My black and smokeless lubes are the same, with the exception of more beeswax in the smokeless loads to make it more rigid.
I would suggest, that no matter what lube you use, recover some of the bullets you fire and look for lube remaining in the grooves,if it's still there, it didn't do it's job of lubing you barrel.

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wizzbang posted this 05 February 2009

Sounds like I am better off to just use the lubes that are already produced. I think my wife would appreciate it too.:dude:

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CB posted this 05 February 2009

wizzbang, if you really want to just make a lube, I think the Felix lube looks good. From other lubes I've messed with, it has good ingredients. It is a popular homade lube used by quite a few shooters, but I've never made any, to try myself.

For an off-the-shelf/ around-the-home cb lube, a good wheel bearing synthetic grease and bees wax is good. Mix about 50/50 for soft lube. More wax for something harder. Throw in about a 10% chunk of Johnson's Paste floor wax and let it smoke off the solvent before cooling..............Dan

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CBA Member

JetMech posted this 06 February 2009

Here ya go, wizzbang. This link has about 35 different lube formulas. http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=29683>http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=29683

After you read all them, you'll realize about anything can be made into a lube. Truth be known, though, Glenn Larson's lubes work in 99+% of all applications and you probably can't make it cheaper. http://www.lsstuff.com/index.html>http://www.lsstuff.com/index.html.

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superior posted this 15 February 2009

I use paraffin wax and bearing grease 50/50 in my 40sw. I throw a chunk of it into a small plastic bowl with a lid and tumble lube. Works great and no leading. I clean the weapon after each shooting session. Like the birdie say's, cheep cheep cheep!

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PETE posted this 15 February 2009

As mentioned most anything can be used to make bullet lube. BUT not all bullet lubes will give you the best accuracy at the velocities you want to use.

A while back I did a test with both Emmerts lube and SPG. Both of these are well known and considered good.

Here are a coupla pictures of the results I came up with in my .32 Miller Short.

PETE

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wizzbang posted this 15 February 2009

Pretty impressive groups for Emmerts lube. #1 SPG was good, then the grouping opened up. Can you tell me what velocity. Must be nice to shoot, we still can't shoot due to snow.

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PETE posted this 15 February 2009

Wizz,

Sorry! I can't give you the MV. That's one of those “one of these days” projects that hasn't happened yet. I would suspect that it will be between 1400 - 1500 fps since most PB breech seated bullets seem to work best in that range.

Yes. The SPG #1 is a reasonable group, but the way the groups enlarge made me suspect that the lube might be at fault. The bullet is a strictly custom job made by a friend and weighs 205 grs. out of a 1-25 alloy. It shoots similar groups as the Emmerts in a High Wall with SPG. But as you can see not so well in the .32 MS. You'll also notice that none of the Emmert's groups are even as large as the smallest SPG. So for that gun Emmert's was better. As they say YMMV!

The point I was making was that lube can be very important and what works in one gun won't work in another. Shooting BP Schuetzen I wouldn't even think of using anything but SPG. It's proven itself time and again in matches.

Trust me! :) Those groups weren't shot this year. The snow finally left the ground last Thursday and Friday nite we got 5". That's about 1/2 gone but the weatherman is talking like rain changing to snow on Tuesday. Temp.s have barely gotten over 50 so it'll be a while yet before we can get out shooting. Getting the itch real bad too. Got an AR & a Garand I want to try with cast bullets, and also need to get a .25/20SS ready for our club shoots.

PETE

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wizzbang posted this 15 February 2009

I am looking at a Garand myself. Have a Mauser I need to work with and see if CB's will work in it. Bore is ok made in '44. We still have quite a bit of snow. I hope to shoot postal match so i want to get to a range.

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CBA Member

JetMech posted this 15 February 2009

Pete, were those groups shot consecutively without cleaning in between? I ask because shooting a 45-70 Browning with Goex 2F and using SPG, I get about 1.75” 10 shot groups, then clean in between strings. Another shooter suggested another lube he makes himself, saying that he doesn't have to clean between strings. His groups are considerably better than mine, but he's also much more experienced with black powder.

I guess I'm asking if the way to determine which lube will work best in a particular application is to shoot long strings rather then to base choice on 5 or 10 shot groups?

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PETE posted this 16 February 2009

Bill,

Yep! The groups were shot consecutively, and the gun was then cleaned between lubes. Both tests were also shot on the same day within a coupla hours.

There are some who advocate shooting long strings to give a better idea as to potential accuracy. The Statistical Analysis (SA) folks say the more samples the better the chances of finding the result with the highest percentage. Most of us however are lucky to put in 5 shot groups during a test.

What I do on most occasions is to shoot five shot groups, of several test loads, on at least three different days, trying for approximately the same conditions. For me this has thrown out that fluke group we all get. For the test above tho I really wanted to test the lube and I felt that required that I shoot at least four consecutive groups of each lube under the same conditions as it was possible to get. My experience has been that temp., humidity, and possibly a few more conditions have an effect on accuracy........ Like your gun shoots great in the morning but seems to fall apart in the afternoon.

Something I could, and maybe should do, is to overlay each lubes groups and see if they wander much from a common center and then measure that overall group. This would give, in effect, a 20 shot group which ought to satisfy most anyone. :)

Hmmmm! Lets see if I can find some time this afternoon to do this and then post a picture of each.

PETE

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PETE posted this 16 February 2009

Bill,

Ok Here's what I came up with when I combined the groups together. Kind of amazed me. I was sure that the Emmerts Lube would be better, but not that much.

PETE

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Outcast123 posted this 16 February 2009

Are we talking about the basic Emmeret's lube of 50/50 beeswax and crisco?

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PETE posted this 16 February 2009

Outcast,

Here's the original formula that Buck Emmert put out. 50% pure natural beeswax, 40% Crisco Shortening (the no flavor variety), 10% Canola Oil. I haven't tried it yet but Charlie Dell suggests adding 5% Anhydrous Lanolin.

PETE

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Outcast123 posted this 16 February 2009

Canola oil, used to be called rape seed oil, and lanolin. Key ingredients in many BPCR lubes. I had Emmeret's lube down in my note book wrong. I had 10% crisco oil, but canola, that could make a difference. I had tried the formula as I had recorded it some years ago but didn't have any luck with it. This could explain it. Thanks, Pete. I think I'll try it as you have suggested, then maybe a little lanolin later to see what it does.

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PETE posted this 17 February 2009

Outcast,

Not having known Buck Emmert personally I'm going by hearsay that the formula I gave is his original one. I've seen several variations using different oils....... like peanut, and Olive oils.

Plus as I mentioned each gun seems to prefer a specific lube, altho those like SPG and Emmerts work well in the majority of cases.

The thing to remember is that Emmert's Lube is not a high MV lube. It was designed for Schuetzen shooting with PB bullets which work best in the 1400 - 1500 fps range. When I go above this, as in CBA Postal Competition, with GC bullets I switch over to Javelina's NRA formula.

PETE