By Jim
Cast bullets are a cheaper way of shooting. You get the satisfaction of controlling every aspect of making your own ammo. But casting your own lead projectiles can be pretty time consuming. You need special tooling to size and add lubricating grease to the grease grooves. This ensures that you don't smear your bore with soft lead and clog up the grooves of the rifling. But I have started using a different method lately. Powder coating.
I start off with a cheap container of the powder coat paint from Harbor Freight. About $7 is enough to coat a few thousand cast bullets.
After you cast your bullets and let them cool off, it doesn't require any special equipment.
I simply place the bullets in a plastic container with a lid and shake them around for a few minutes. The powder coat has a negative electrostatic charge which makes it stick to the surface of the bullets.
Baking the powder coated bullets for about 20 minutes at 400*F sets the paint. I usually place a sheet of parchment paper on a cheap cookie sheet to keep them from sticking to the pan.
I set the bullets to the side and allow them to cool. Most of the time I use the bullets right from the mold without sizing them. The coating adds only about 2 or 3 thousandths to the dimension of the cast bullets. But if you need them sized, you can do so in a push through sizing die.
The really nice thing about powder coated bullets is that in a black powder cartridge such as this .50-95 Winchester is that you don't have to worry about the lube melting and running down inside the case to contaminate the gunpowder charge. The powder coating is slicker than standard lead. This means higher velocities and lower pressure in the gun because of reduced friction. The best part of all, is that the powder coat paint is non toxic, so you don't need to worry about hunting with these bullets and contaminating the meat.
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