Custom Designed .357cal Bullets in a Week

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Loren

Loren

Member
Jan 28, 2018
1,048
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Kansas, United States
I designed this new .357cal 94gr bullet for my Winchester model 70-35.





I sent the design to Tom at Accurate Molds and ordered a mold from him last Thursday. The mold arrived today and I made a sample casting run and sized samples to .359, .358, .357, .356, and .355 with past experience with the rifle telling me the .357 would most likely do the best. That held true in some shooting across the chronograph indoors at 15 yards.

After that testing I still had the lead pot hot and full of molten lead so I went to town casting my new custom bullets from design to shooting in a week!! 

Here is from casting this evening. 10.8 lbs of bullets==800+rounds





Hopefully I will get these sized and get some outdoor range time this weekend. :)

Here is the rifle.






 




This was 6 rounds and really some of my best. The squares are 1/2" I did back the hammer spring adjustment back out to the factory position and the rifle is shooting these at 790-800 fps at 180bar. I am really finding this rifle a tough one to shoot for accuracy. It seems to be super hold sensitive, almost like a magnum springer.

I have really had very little success with any cast bullets (6 different types including two BBT) The only thing I have feed it that it actually liked and made me feel like I could hit the side of a barn while standing inside with all the doors closed was a sample of cast .35cal pellets Rick from ebay sent along with the EPP/UG I ordered from him. They actually stacked...I was pleasantly shocked considering how everything I have shot was hopeful at best.

I'm ready to call unlce and buy some .35cal JSB's or put the rifle away until NOE comes out with a .35cal pellet mold.

I have cleaned the barrel, checked the crown for burrs, shot it without the shoud, with the shroud, with and without the LDC. None of it seems to make a difference. 
 
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Generally, boat tails do not work so well when they are not long enough. I have tried few boat tail designs in my airguns. at best i was able to do 2 inches at 20 yards on my Huben K1 .25cal. this is a choked barrel too. I don't know about your barrel. does it have a choke? the bullet driving bands needs to be sized to the groove also. As I did to my boat tail molds, i enlarged the driving bands to match my barrels groove. I did a little better. NOE will come out with a 35 pellet design soon I am sure. 
 
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I slugged the barrel and I sized the bullets to match the barrel grooves and have tested a range of sizes. I have some much longer boat tails and they are not doing well in the rifle either. It is a choked barrel on the rifle.

The only reason for it being a boat tail is to keep a less than perfect sprue cut edge from being directly in the airstream, and to not have it being the last edge touching the barrel crown. Just a little more forgiving than a plain base..IMHO

I am waiting for NOE to come out with their .35 cal pellet molds. Oh the wait!!!!
 
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Different rifle but also attempting to get a better .357 bullet.

Boat-tails and bevel bases can be inaccurate and plain base bullets are subject to being off square or having spru flaws but for some strange reason gas check bullets (without the check) in air rifles often do well. I also wanted a easier engraving / chambering slug that still centered and stabilized in the barrel and in flight so it is slightly bore riding (.351)

So since there was not a bullet in the weight range I wanted with the features I wanted I also had Accurate do one for me. http://www.accuratemolds.com/bullet_detail.php?bullet=36-168J-D.png

It is being sent to http://www.hollowpointmold.com/ to lighten it and change the center of gravity and aerodynamic balance to what I needed, which is in the 153 to 156 weight range. Note this bullet was designed to comply with the new 2018 Texas air rifle hunting regulations. The HP is .190 across and .300 deep so it is a massive HP that should expand well at air rifle velocities on hogs and deer (in rifles powerful enough to shoot this weight bullet to at least 800 FPS)

1540350463_2743773915bcfe1ffc15143.02268644_36-168J-D.png



 
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