• The AGN App is ready! Search "Airgun Nation" in your App store. To compliment this new tech we've assigned the "Threads" Feed & "Dark" Mode. To revert back click HERE.

Best big bore slug lube for hunting

@Llama I’ll pass on advice I was given. Powder coat.


@RM.510bigbore and @karl_h have given me some good advice here. There are a few threads around the forums where the advantages of doing so are discussed. Maybe not quite the answer you were looking for but it’s a start.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RM.510bigbore
For hunting, everything I have read or watched from the Airgun hunting experts all agree on using pure lead bullets for maximum expansion at Airgun hunting velocities. Any type of hard coating will change the Brinell scale hardness of a bullet and its rate of expansion. At 2000fps any coated or plated bullet will tend to expand at 950fps, maybe not so much. Just food for thought but I think people tend to overthink things and worry too much. A lot can be said for keeping things simply. Some people put a light spray of Ballistol or a similar non petroleum product on a cloth and roll their pellets or slugs in it for a very light coating of oil. Have fun.

This is a .25 JSB MKll pellet that expanded to .451 after being fired into a tube filled with plastic shopping bags with an Eagle Claw carbine.

1710850211646.jpeg


1710850320645.jpeg
 
Last edited:
Two .510 slugs recovered from game at modest ranges...Can you tell which one is a.hollow point? One slug is a solid with powder coating..Really at 1000 fps and under their big ridiculous slow bounce around and do whatever they want. Powder coating had no.effect on expansion... The purple slug is a solid and powder coated baked in oven..Both slugs 800fps...

17108621342607408669675087724863.jpg


17108621908485889910071427276748.jpg
 
Before hunting I simply roll them in a tin with pure silicone oil on the foam pad and load up the magazines, just as I do when shooting from the bench. If the oil does dry in the magazine while hunting, so be it. I have not found any difference in accuracy during the day. When done the magazine is unloaded and the pellets or slugs get replaced at the next shooting session with newly wetted projectile's.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RM.510bigbore
@Llama I think powder coating is an option worth exploring. I don’t have comparative experience. When my barrels are leaded to the point where accuracy is affected I clean them. But I’m not shooting my .45. I like my .357s. They don’t lead up too quickly. I don’t lube my projectiles, but a member sent me some powder coated slugs.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RM.510bigbore
NSA airgun amo uses slick 50 to lube there slugs..If your barrel is good many different lubes will work. Even waxing your bore is a option. Something I recently learned on the forums. So maybe clean and wax your bore .use your favorite lube.. More lubrication and a smooth non leaded bore may reduce your velocity in a big bore a little bit.. I lost 60 fps from my old rough leaded up bore,to a hand lapped.bore with powder coating slugs and lubricant. Ill take consistently over 60 fps...
 
  • Like
Reactions: Airgun-hobbyist