Has any one tried taking 5/16 copper tubing and making driving bands with them for the .30 cal molds? It would apear to me if one did, you could drive them as hard as jacked bullets with out leading. I wonder would you need to even lube, I am guessing not. I supose one would need to have the copper bands heated before placing in the mold so that the bullet would fill out right. Mabby the bands could be left floating on top of the lead if one was using a bottom pour pot and inserted in the mold with long neddle nose plyers. I ran across Lyman # 311291 h.p. and was thinking if one has to take the time to mess with the h.p. why not mabby some driving bands as well. I am still not shure why one would even wont a h.p. mold for a rifel, but it was a orphan I tried to explane to my wife and every orphan needs a good home. Would it help to anneal them first like I do my gass checks? Also what options would one have with outher calibers as tubbing comes in more than 3/16. Dose Canada's copper tubing come in metric sizing that might give a caster more options in caliber? If you have tried this, I would really like to no the results. Looking foward to Your imput!

Adoptive of Lyman orpran's: Leon

Yeah, somebody wrote up an article about this for the .375 H&H, I believe that the shooter may have been in England or Europe. Was in an old Handloader's Digest. As best I recall just cut strips of 3/8" tubing and put them in the mould before casting.

I've got an old Lyman reloading manual from the early fifties (don't recall what number it is), but towards the end of the book, it has other manufacturers products, and among them are some copper driving bands as you describe, that I believe were available from Frank Barnes, for just the purposes you are describing.

Another source of different diameter copper tubing you might explore is that which is used for the refrigeration industry, industrial application stuff, and it comes in some thinner-walled tubing in a variety of diameters.... might have to do some legwork and many phone calls, and another place to look is your local salvage/scrap yard where they buy scrap. Often they'll have a bin of nothing but copper tubing..... some real bargains to be had at times!

Just a couple of thoughts to throw into the ring.

God Bless,

I haven't seen metric sizes of copper tubing in Canada yet, but I haven't bought any for a year or two. Seriously doubt if any's around, but old Fred Barnes (Barnes Bullets) used to bolt a sizing die to his house and pull the tubing though with his car.

Bye
Jack

Hi guys,
I have done some work with this, drilled holes through gas checks for the appropriate calibers and inserted the checks in the molds driving band grooves. Didn't experience any real benefit, but I can't say I really put a lot of effort into the project. I can't take credit for the idea, I believe Ross Seyfried wrote an article on the subject several years back in G&A.
Regards,
Bryan

i've got two boxes of the old barnes driving bands. on the box it says "barnes driving bands for saeco h-b (henninger-barnes)high velocity cast lead alloy bullets, for use with saeco h-b .30 cal bullet moulds". i have used them in a hollow-point bullet mould i have (which i believe also takes a gas check). they look like a gas check with a large hole in the flat. PM me if you would like me to send you some to try/measure.

monty

The "holy" gas checks (wilks?) work. Do make the bullet a pain to cast, but so would copper driving bands.

Have also tried copper wire...just one "ring" of thick wire cut just right to meet end-to-end as it rests in a driving band or two or three coils of thin wire to fill a driving band. Did keep leading down at high velocity. The single ring worked beter, but aren't a lot of fun to cut to just the right length to butt up.

Capped at the rear with a normal gas check, and with a Wilks check cast into the bullet at the first driving band, the velocity can be very high with good accuracy in a smooth barrel. Doesn't seem to help rough barrel abrasion leading.

Are also a pain to cast. Better to pre-heat the copper band/holed gas check and insert it with tweezers (or a hemostat)...if the copper is signifcantly cooler than the lead, tends to poorly fill or fraction at the joint at impact.

i also experemented with using teflon tape on dry bullets before sizing. the results seemed to vary according to the unsized bullet/sizing die ID relationship. had good luck with a certain bullet, but did not continue my work in this. when this worked right i could approach max loads with very little leading. i'm sure this has been tried elsewhere, tho.

monty

Monty- Don't use teflon tape on bullets. I heard many years ago, that teflon tape can give off harmful fumes when burned. I'm not sure where I got this from, it could have been Ed Harris. ==Bob