Curio of bullet base protection with paper patch

RBHarter

West Central AR
I've had fair to good results in several rifles using conventional methods of fit , size , wrap , paper , powder selections etc . No I don't have the "paper jacket" and it's probably covered there . I've fed a gas matic , slide , bolt , lever , Trapdoor , and revolver with patched ammo and fairly readily matched whatever else I had shot including a particular rifle that shot " you might hit a gallon antifreeze jug broad side " at 50 yd down to 3×5 at 100 .

I've considered after seeing many photos of paper patched bullets with powder peening and creases pressure formed into the bases using an appropriate sized "over powder" card from perhaps a soda/beer box or note book cover type matierial to protect the base from the case contents . The card would be rolled inside of the patch , I've had my best results dry wrapped with green bar or a close cousin to it , and folded as to leave a open gap or just touch . I don't know if that is blowing up like an HB skirt or mashing flat said I really haven't had an opportunity to recover bullets and those that I have were too damaged to make head or tails of but no evidence powder peening . So it's possible that my thinking is just over thinking a nonproblem that either doesn't exist or has such a tiny impact on outcome that at my shooting level and desired needs it'll never be seen .

So should I pursue it with several card types ?
Are the cards likely to upset the flight after exit like a lost check ?
Should I start , if I pursue this with 45 , 30 , 26-28 or go on down to 222 ? I know where to find the greatest aggravation .
 

fiver

Well-Known Member
IME cards work okay in straight walled cases,,,, okay.
if you wanna fight with something and really explore this go with one of your 7mms.
that card testing was the worst beat down of an experiment in lost accuracy and wasted time I have ever conducted.
 

RBHarter

West Central AR
So it's a case of logic and reason prevail except where they don't .

Ok back to the boards .......I do have a 264 WM to toy with and a 260-120 to try . For some rediculous reason that skinny barrel FN 98 just shoots everything , except on demand with witnesses of course . If it's futility I'm after that should do the trick .
 

fiver

Well-Known Member
yeah that should do it.

I'd look hard at a buffer and a filler or at minimum seating long and using a filler under the base protector.
 

Ian

Notorious member
The only PP load I had that benefited from the addition of a card wad was in .45 Colt, in an H&R single shot using the Lee 457-340RF sized to .448" and wrapped in drawing paper. The patch was installed wet and folded over the base to just touch ends and the wrapped bullet placed on its base to dry. 50-yard groups of ten went from 3" to a little under an inch and a half just by adding a single card stamped from a Dr. Pepper 12-pack carton. The load in both cases was a compressed dose of Reloder 7.

Most all my other smokeless powder paper patching involved "two wraps and a twist", clipping the tail, and compressing the dried knot of paper into a thick wad of its own kind. Also, almost with out exception, I built up my loads around a powder that was two full steps too slow for the cartridge and bullet weight and would fill the case at a safe starting load. Then I would begin substituting buffer for powder and watch for pressure, report, recoil impulse, and of course groups until buffer was around the body/shoulder juncture or until I hit a sweet spot or saw danger signs. This method enabled me to easily obtain full velocity capability of the cartridge (including .270 Winchester) with accuracy rivaling the best copper jacketed groups from the several rifles I worked with.

If you want to experiment with base wads to see if it is going to help, develop a full-density load and add a gas check turned around backwards under the bullet. If that helps, you solved the problem. If it doesn't, start looking somewhere else.

The only other things I can add about HV small/medium bore PP is always use a wet, shrink-to-fit patch and always lightly lubricate the dried jacket with something, anything. Chapstick, bullet lube thinned with Vaseline, JPW, bearing grease, liquid Alox/beeswax, it doesn't matter but smear just a little film of it on the surface with your fingers.
 
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CZ93X62

Official forum enigma
"What Ian wrote" sums up my experiences with PP bullets, though I have never explored paper or copper bases. My experiences are not vast--just 30-06 and 9.3 x 62 have been successful to date. Leverguns in 30/30 WCF and 45/70 were unmitigated disasters, owing (I believe) to the abrupt rifling leade angles present in those rifles. If my heart was set on using PP bullets in a levergun--and it ISN'T--I would have the leade angle tapered down some and let the jacket's edge gently kiss the leade. I haven't tried such stuntwork, because the aforementioned leverguns do pretty decent work with unpapered castings of proper sizing. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. The 30-06s and 9.3 x 62 do good work with unpapered castings also. In short, it is hard for me justify the outlay of time and effort to develop PP bullets. This goes double for me, now that Barnes bullets are coin of the realm for hunting usage in the PRC.
 

RBHarter

West Central AR
5er ,
? You worked with the "nert" filler ?
I recall something like a 308 with 35 gr of 4895 and 10 of 5010 or something like that . (Arbitrary powders for exaggeration not to be taken for ANY data) .
Maybe it was Ian ......
The 264 was soo easy . Start data for H1000 with W857 surplus and 1"@100 with vintage WW power points .
12 gr of Unique with the 260-120 fp NOE , 2 wraps of green bar , fold over to cover the base shoulder . I think I rolled them across the case lube an ironed the patch in a Buckshot .265 Lee style if I did it loaded at .265 . I held , with the +3"@100 2900 fps 140 WWPP zero with the old Weaver V9 duplex with the bottom step point at 12:00 on a 24" plate and had 3 consecutive hits @400 yd and called it a day . The hits were 6" below center so probably about a 34-38" hold over , not unhappy numbers for me and what I was doing . I think the H1000 would put me over 3600 with the 120 and would put me into probably a 500 yd coyote wrecker if I had that far to shoot and it will hold groups .
The 7×57 is probably a much better candidate or even the 7×6.8 Carcano .

The 7×6.8 I worked out down to full power 130s ......oops that bullet was 141 gr , the rifle is proofed now however . Actually this is probably the one I'll work as 4350 or W857 will be the 100% case fill .
 

fiver

Well-Known Member
there is several ways around the problem.
the too slow powders for case fill and let them provide you with a plug of powder to protect the bullet.
hard on the throat, and hard to account for the extra unburned weight which must be counted as projectile weight.

the slow powders and a filler like Grex [which was a Winchester product] or puff-lon, or BPI's original buffer.
these are true buffers.
I seem to remember people making their own 'grex' in a blender with graphite and cornmeal or the like.

a filler is something that occupies air space in the case but gets counted as powder and not projectile weight..
it's the traditional kapok, cat tail poof, or Dacron.

the other is a combination of the too slow powder and an ignition aid [booster powder] this lets you control things pretty well if your willing to keep moving forward with different ignition aids.
and if your willing to stop and start over again with a new combination until your happy.

straight smokeless paper patching relies more on careful measurement and loading techniques of the bullet itself more than on powder tricks.
the powder part is pretty straight forward, your just using starting data for jacketed bullets, or high end cast bullet data.
 

CZ93X62

Official forum enigma
Those 50 BMG and 20mm milsurp powders like WC-860 and WC-872 at $3/lb. prompted a whole lot of experimenting in the 1990s. Rick Tunell/"Buckshot" came up with the idea of a "full case of 860 in a 6.5 x 55 Swede gives 1896-level ballistics to a 120-140 grain bullet". OF COURSE, I had to test drive that idea--and did, 55.0 grains with Hornady 140 grain spitzers (#2630, IIRC). 2450 FPS from my Ruger 77 (22" barrel), and SUPERBLY accurate.

Not leaving well-enough alone, full case of 860 in 30-06 (60.0 grains) behind a 200 grain cast Lee spitzer gave 2050 FPS, impressive report, and decent accuracy. Love that BOOMIE report, and the recoil was healthy also. Boys turning money into noise, as Marie refers to it.
 

fiver

Well-Known Member
see some of the older 5010 & BMG-50 data in the 7 mauser, it was actually pretty efficient considering the 45-K ceiling that round has[d] on it.
best I could tell it was basically scoop the fire formed case full, level off the mouth and jiggle the case as you seated the bullet in baby steps.
you'd need 5-6 thou neck tension to keep the bullet in place once you got it there.
 

RBHarter

West Central AR
9.3 in my shooting with 30-30 and 45-70 there's no point to chasing that except maybe if I wanted a 460 type load in a Marlin .
 

RBHarter

West Central AR
My Dad did something similar with 25-06' back when it was brand new and 4831 when it was just 20 mm surplus .
 

CZ93X62

Official forum enigma
My 45/70 stuff that runs 400 grain GC flatnoses at 1700-1750 FPS is sufficiently entertaining for yours truly.

I did try a full case of WC-860 in 223 with 69 grain Sierra Matchkings. I had the deep sagacity to NOT try them in one of the gas guns first--and thankfully I only loaded 10 of them. In the bolter 223, they might have burned half of the powder charge. The first bullet did clear the barrel and hit the 50 yard target sideways.....and bounced onto the ground without punching through the cardboard backer. The bore had A LOT of "zombie" unburned kernels. One of those rounds was enough, I pulled bullets and recovered components. The unburned kernels poured out of the barrel onto the ground. Epic fail.