Lee .36 cast bullet.

[mec]

They are nominally 130 grain but cast from pure lead, actual weight was 125. The have a rebated heal and resemble some of the early colt steel or brass mold cavities- and not others. AT 20 grains of goex they became hard to seat and extreme velocity spreads became larger. Swiss FFFg from the same measure setting actually weighed 22 grains and they could not be fully seated. Pyrodex P from the 20 grain measure recorded 897 but with a 97 ft/sec spread.

These bullets were less accurate than the 100 grain ones cast from a Dixie scissors mold, and a lot less accurate than ball or the buffalo bullet that are out of production but still advertized in places.

The .44 lee bullets might group about like the 36s. Can't be sure from these 50-foot groups.

 

[swathdiver]

You'd be well pleased with the Kaido .36s, they shoot as tight as round ball in our Remington Belt Revolver.

 

[StrawHat]

LEe also produced a mold to cast those bullets (36 and 44) with hollow points. I used them for a year or so and went back to RB.

 

[mec]

The only reason I shoot bullets (instead of ball) at all is that they were a substitute-standard when the revolvers were in general use. This is probably not a very good reason so, I don't shoot them very often.
Approximating original performance is fairly elusive though somewhat worthwhile as a mild obsession. The Lee and the dixie scissors mold bullets resemble one or another of the cavities seen in original molds- which show some variety. * Loads that have been published as pertaining to cartridges and original loads represented as coming from colt show a variety of bullet weights extending to as much as 150 grains in .36. The powder charges recommended are sometimes suspect as some of them. seem overly large for the chamber capacity. When Elmer Keith mentioned bullets vs ball he seems to have been talking about the common variety available from the molds that came with the pistols. He said that round balls delivered much more effective impact but the bullets penetrated deeper and were preferred for head-shooting wild cows

* I have an original brass colt patent mold for 31 that throws a 77-78 grain bullet. I also have some bullets cast for me from an original mold with sprue cutter that weigh 72 grains. Both weights show up in various original documentation. The bullets look about the same but the consistency of bullet weight does not seem to have been stressed.