Oregon Trail - Laser Cast Bullets

[Wedge]

I had a pretty rough day at work so ended up taking a half day and playing some hooky. I ended up going out with my uncle for some target shooting, rabbit hunting, hiking and maybe even an adult beverage at the end of the day. The weather was beautiful and the events certainly helped me relax from a pretty stressful day at work.

I was shooting some laser-cast 255 gr. LSWC .452" diameter bullets over 8.0gr and 9.0gr Unique in my Ruger Blackhawk. Obviously two different lots of ammo. I wanted to see which was shot better. I would have to say that it was a wash accuracy and recoil wise...the 9.0gr Unique load was a little heavier and a little louder but was not unpleasant at all. Both loads were very accurate at 15 yards (about as far as I felt like walking to change a target today). Holes in the paper were nice and sharp.

The best part were the bullets. They didn't lead up my barrel and they weren't too smoky. The Unique (new cleaner) was also pretty clean. The gun smells like it was shot, but wasn't a mess at all. I am very happy with the laser-cast bullet performace and plan to do some major loading on Sunday.

We only saw one rabbit but we did see about 7 turkey...too bad the turkey were out of season and the rabbit was gone before we even had a chance. At least the shooting was good, the day was nice and the company was great.

 

[P95Carry]

Great hooky!!! Glad you had some fun.

I can speak similarly for LaserCast bullets - at least the ones I use for my 45-70 loads thru BFR. These are driven pretty hot ... and cause me absolutely minimal prob's with fouling. They are the 405 grain offerings ... and they are propelled by 41.5 grains reloader 7. Forget exact chrono figures right now but I know I get approx 1550 ft lbs energy!

 

[Dave R]

I use Laser-Cast bullets and Unique for my pet 9mm load, too. Its the most accurate load I've found.

 

[cuate]

laser cast bullets

You folks convinced me, going to order a thousand. Been shooting hard lead cast with gas check in my 03 and Krag. No leading problem but I would like to push them a little faster but not quite as fast as factory ammo

 

[warddc]

If you like the lasercast bullets with unique, you'll like em even better with universal clays. Universal is just like unique only clean burning, meters well.

dave.

 

[happy old sailor]

Lasercast is all the lead bullets i shoot any more. some of them are shoved pretty hard with little to no leading. i plumb got too lazy to cast my own anymore.

 

[Wedge]

warddc, I have been happy with Unique so far but I may have to give Clays a 'shot'. I need to find a local distributor for the laser-cast bullets, the shipping is just crazy...why can't lead be lighter

Marathon loading session today...loaded up 150 rounds in under 3 hours Single stage is fun right? I went with the 9.0gr load since I liked it just a tiny bit better than the 8.0gr load.

 

[Black Snowman]

Sounds like a good load. For good metering, clean burning, and low flash I also like Universal. Tite-Group is another good powder with pretty much all the same properties but cheaper and requiring lighter charges.

My local source for Laser-Cast is Cabela's. No shipping for me but they cost more than the Berry's plated bullets they also carry. I imagine the Laser Cast would be more accurate than the Berry's but I usually shoot handguns indoors so preffer the lack of smoke and low lead of the plated bullets. As an added bonus I don't get much lead on my hands while loading or handling ammo.

 

[SASS#23149]

just proves the addage about a bad day shooting beats a good day at work.
and a good day shooting is better than ANYTHING!!
I have always liked Lc bullets,have shot thousands of 'em.

re: shipping,the rates are geometric...2k bullets is just a bit more than 1k,or it was a while back anyway.
I find that Unique shoots better in my 45colt cases than Clays,and it fills the case better.'dirty' is just a fact of life with gunpowder,and I don't fine Unique all that dirty anyway.
I"m gonna load up some 9 grain/255 lead for the weekend for the carbine and whack some steel plates,HARD.

 

[Quinbus]

Fired my first round of LaserCast 200 SWC .452 over 4.9 gr of HP38, and fired only that one round. Light particles of what i can only assume to be the bullet fell around me, some drifted onto my face. I check the 20 or rounds I had prepared, an noticed a bulge in a few of the cartridges.

Anyone else have this problem? Bullets out of spec? I don't think its my reloading process, since my plated FPs from rainier have been problem free thus far.

Suggestions?

 

[scrat]

mic out the bullets sounds like you may have had some a tad bigger than .452 the bulge depends on how big i never really had a problem with them but it depends a lot of factors involved.

 

[straight-shooter]

I had 1,000 Laser Cast .452 swc bullets that only mic'd out at .450.5
This is the same diameter of my 45 barrels. I melted all of them down and recast them to the proper .452 and they shot fine with no leading.

 

[qajaq59]

I like them in my 30-30 for targets, but since they don't expand, I don't use them to hunt.

 

[moosehunt]

One thing to keep in mind with LaserCast bullets is that because of their hardness, they often don't work well on reduced loads (my experience is in .45LC and .44 Mag) because they won't obturate. But, keep enough horses behind them and they are great.

 

[Envisaged]

Love the 180gr .357 bullets for the leveraction. Great price - no leading.

 

[CU74]

My "introduction" to LaserCast bullets was at Cabella's. Since Cabella's is a 75-mile round trip for me, and I have to pay state tax on purchases, I looked up the Oregon Trail website to compare total cost - I now order on-line. They frequently have Specials - such as free shipping with X thousand rounds. The current special is 1,000 "free" bullets with a 5,000 bullet order.

 

[MCMXI]

One thing to keep in mind with LaserCast bullets is that because of their hardness, they often don't work well on reduced loads (my experience is in .45LC and .44 Mag) because they won't obturate. But, keep enough horses behind them and they are great.

+1 on this. I bought 2000 LRNFP 200 grain bullets from Oregon Trail to shoot with Trail Boss powder at 750 fps but after contacting OT and being told that their Laser Cast bullets have a BHN of 24 I decided to save them for my Marlin 1894 and Ruger Redhawk and shoot them at 1200 to 1400 fps where their hardness will be useful. I plan on ordering much softer (BHN = 12) bullets for the CAS type loads.

Oregon Trail Laser Cast bullets are excellent though. The quality is superb and I'm definitely going to be ordering more (heavier) bullets from them in the future.

 

[Mal H]

Quinbus - the load of HP-38 you used is in the low to moderate range for a 200 gr lead bullet. I'd bet the stuff you saw and felt was unburned powder and not pieces of the bullet. It's not uncommon for powder to burn incompletely under lower than average pressures. Up the load several tenths of a grain, and the problem might disappear. (The Laser-Cast Reloading Manual gives a min/max of 4.5 to 5.6 for HP-38. Min/max for W231 is even higher at 4.8 to 5.8. HP-38 and W231 are the same powder.)

As for the bulges, I think it just might be your reloading technique causing them. Bulges generally occur when you seat and crimp at the same time. You might try seating the bullets to the proper depth and then add a slight taper crimp in a separate operation.

BTW, the above is assuming you're talking about .45 ACP, you didn't say.

I have to add that I haven't found a Laser-Cast bullet I didn't like. Their quality is superior. I would loved to have seen an example of straight-shooter's undersized bullets.

 

[Quinbus]

Thanks mal, I'll try 5.3 of HP38 on my next go for 45 acp. As for the bulge, yes I seat and crimp separately. I thought it might have something to do with lasercasts being .452 (as opposed to Rainiers 451). I measured a sample and found several to be greater than .452, from 453-454...