Has Anybody Ever Tried Tumble Lubing Round Balls?

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Foto Joe

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I recently gave up on finding store bought boolits for my smokeless guns and started casting my own using wheel weights. Unfortunately nobody other than on eBay has 454 Lee round ball molds and I'm not about to pay double retail when I can actually still buy the things for a reasonable price around here. I do have about 20+ pounds of lead from tape wheel weights that appears to be pretty much pure lead and one of these days when and if Midway or Cabela's actually gets the 454 molds in I'm gonna use that lead for round balls, but on to my question....

I've been tumble lubing my smokeless boolits with a formula called 45-45-10 and I've fallen deeply in love with this quick and easy method. The 45-45-10 isn't suitable for Black Powder as it is Lee Liquid Alox and Johnsons Paste Wax along with about 10% mineral spirits. I'm wondering if anybody has ever made an attempt to mix up a special concoction of maybe beeswax, paraffin and olive oil or maybe Ballistol or some such to tumble lube round balls. If so has there been any modicum of success?
 
Joe I have never tried lubing round balls at all. But I have only been shooting black powder replicas since 1967.

Give Midway another try on that mould. Yesterday I received a Lee 9mm mould from them that had been on back order. I also got the G, H & I dies from them.

Also try Graf's, I think they have stuff in stock.
 
Tumble lubing roundballs for a revolver will be an exercise in non accomplishment.
All the lube would be scraped off the bearing surface of the ball when it's rammed into the cylinder.
 
Unfortunately no joy on either. I'm surprised that Midway is even still in business, it seems about all they have left is pictures of what they would like to sell.
 
Don McDowell said:
All the lube would be scraped off the bearing surface of the ball when it's rammed into the cylinder.
Click to expand...

True, but over ball lube such as Crisco or what ever you choose to use is also not on the bearing surface and works very well. That is as long as you live somewhere that doesn't turn Crisco or Bore Butter into a liquid due to the outside air temp.

I quite using lubed wads years ago simply because I didn't like buying them. I'd make my own but I've got enough projects to deal with and really don't want to go into that particular manufacturing process. Also, leaving a pistol loaded with a lube wad is a good way to get practice pulling balls. If I leave a pistol loaded I never use any type of lube.
 
I don't use any lube (typically) with RB's from my pistol. I do have wads lubed with Gatofeo's lube, but using T7 I don't get much fouling, and I typically shoot about 7-10 cylinders at the range.

But, like you, if I leave mine loaded for a while, which usually has a lighter load of 25-30 grns I use a dry wad as I don't trust a lubed wad on my powder for long. I mostly use the wads as filler on light loads.

Maybe a lube cookie would work for your range shooting. Long time storage may either need an additional barrier or just kept dry.
 
Wouldn't it be easier to have a towel or rag that is saturated with lube to coat the balls?
 
Personally, I think that wheel weights are a might hard for any muzzle loading work and I prefer to cast all of my black powder bullets both balls and conicals from pure lead. I shoot round balls and Maxis both in my T.C. Hawkin and mostly balls in my .36 cal. Senaca. I prefer balls in my revolvers also. Fortunately, before I retired I was able to salvage a couple of lead "scale dampners" weighing 100lbs. each from my employer.
I save the "junk" lead thats around for casting fishing lures.
 
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Using wheel weights for casting round balls to be used with patches is fine but I agree with Zeke about not using that lead for c&b revolvers. Save it for casting bullets for your smokeless guns. Pure lead is the way to go for minies or c&b bullets.
 
Tape weights are different from clip on weights. The tape weights are pretty much pure lead. 45-70 Ranger gave me some RB's cast from clip on weights a couple of years ago and those things were not fun to push down into the chambers. The tape weights though are a lot softer. Since I don't have a mold yet I haven't actually tried 'em but one of these days I will.

When I get a bucket of wheel weights I always sort out the tape weights and smelt those down first so I don't have any contamination from the harder clip on weights.
 
In round ball shooting with a ML, the lube is usually applied to the patch rather than the ball. The patch is what #1 gives the ball the tight fit in the barrel, #2. contacts the lands and grooves and #3 provides the seal. Even if you lubed the ball, the patch would cover the ball and the lube on the ball wouldn't contact the lands and grooves. It would serve no purpose. A RB loaded and shot with no patch would yield poor velocity and accuracy in my opinion. The fouling would also be horrible. In C&B revolvers, a lubed wad provides lubing and seals off the powder, again, lubing the ball would not gain you anything. As others have said, pure lead is the way to go with RBs.
 
jgh4445 said:
In C&B revolvers, a lubed wad provides lubing and seals off the powder,
Click to expand...

At the risk of drifting my own post....

Nothing seals off the powder, i.e. prevents chainfire other than proper fitting caps and a proper sized round ball. If you're using lubed wads as chainfire insurance you might get a surprise one of these days.

Also....

Gary, the rag idea is plausible but probably more of a mess maker than Crisco I'm afraid. Currently I'm tumble lubing smokeless boolits in a Planters Peanut Jar (a large one). It takes all of about 30 seconds plus pulling the boolits out and standing 'em on wax paper to dry, it's pretty slick actually. And given that I'm inherently lazy my mind was just asking me if maybe there was something like this that I could do for round balls.
 
Foto, you are correct. Proper fitting caps and the correct size ball seal off the powder in a C&B revolver. I do believe a proper sized lubed wad will help seal off gasses and prevent blowby. I also think it aids in "scraping" the fouling out too. As you said, it is no substitute for a proper sized ball in preventing chain fires.
 
robhof

I got 50 lbs of the tape on wts from Ebay before the prices went crazy and have been casting balls for my pistols and yes they are very soft and as easy to load as pure lead. I'm still working through 50 lbs of lead sheeting and 30+ lbs of jacketed bullet cores that are also soft enough for b/p pistols.
 
Using something a bit better for the purpose than Crisco over the mouths of the loaded chambers does a lot more to prevent chain fires and help keep fouling to a manageable state.
 
jgh4445,

A few years ago I ran some chronograph tests attempting to prove/disprove the "gas check" theory of wads as well as corn meal filler. It just didn't pan out with either one although I did get a slight increase in accuracy with the filler moving the RB closer to the forcing cone. It all really boils down to "use what works for you and your particular gun" I think.

The myth of over ball lubrication as a seal and insurance against chainfire has been around for a long time. It really doesn't hurt anything and what folks use is entirely up to them. The Crisco works well for me but I don't have to worry about hot weather in Wyoming too much. It's cheap but it can be messy.
 
I put about 50rb in a sandwich baggie add tablespoon of Bore Butter seal it up & mix ...loaded straight on cyl. level full of 777 in my ROA...keeps everything nice & lubed with easy clean up ...run 100 loads then clean in hot soapy water ...will shoot 6 shot 1.5" to 2" gps. all day long...have left it loaded 6wks. at a time with no problems ...BTW; I can get very good .457 rbs from Rush Creek Roundball...about $100 a 1000 to my door... it ain't worth the trouble or time to cast my own... take care
 
Last edited:
looked up the invoice on the RB that I shoot & use in my ROA ...stonewallcreekoutfitters.com ...nice folks
 
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