By Jeff Brown.
I wrote back in 2017 (Feb) about a Lyman 280468 double cavity mould I bought and how sizing it down to .268-.269 makes for an awesome lighter weight bullet in my 6.5X52mm Carcano. The Loverin style bullet is, like all bullets of that design, a great little shooter however for field use on small games the likes of rabbits, hares and wallabies the round nose is of little use to me. For such applications a FN or HP is required in order to dump enough energy and create sufficient tissue damage for a clean kill. In the past I have had Erik at www.hollowpointmold.com convert a mold for me with tremendous success. Erik is just a hands down legend and I highly recommend his work however the Carcano is likely to only sling 50-100 bullets annually and to invest in the custom work just doesn't really make sense.
The solution I decided was to utilise my mini lathe to drill hollow points in my air cooled wheel weight (ACWW) bullets. The first attempt was to chuck up the as cast bullets held with just enough tension so as to not damage the driving bands of the bullet but sufficient to keep the projectile spinning on the drill. Hollow points drilled successfully the bullets were then put through the sizing process and test fired with reasonable results but not up to my expectations. I surmised that drilling sized bullets might produce less run out and a small collet would assist in holding the bullet in the chuck at the same time as protecting the driving bands from grip of the jaws. A donor piece of nylon was turned up to within a few thousands of an inch of the final bullet diameter and a relief slot cut in the collect to finish the job. The collet holds the lubed bullets perfectly and more importantly true and square to the drill bit.
I wrote back in 2017 (Feb) about a Lyman 280468 double cavity mould I bought and how sizing it down to .268-.269 makes for an awesome lighter weight bullet in my 6.5X52mm Carcano. The Loverin style bullet is, like all bullets of that design, a great little shooter however for field use on small games the likes of rabbits, hares and wallabies the round nose is of little use to me. For such applications a FN or HP is required in order to dump enough energy and create sufficient tissue damage for a clean kill. In the past I have had Erik at www.hollowpointmold.com convert a mold for me with tremendous success. Erik is just a hands down legend and I highly recommend his work however the Carcano is likely to only sling 50-100 bullets annually and to invest in the custom work just doesn't really make sense.
The solution I decided was to utilise my mini lathe to drill hollow points in my air cooled wheel weight (ACWW) bullets. The first attempt was to chuck up the as cast bullets held with just enough tension so as to not damage the driving bands of the bullet but sufficient to keep the projectile spinning on the drill. Hollow points drilled successfully the bullets were then put through the sizing process and test fired with reasonable results but not up to my expectations. I surmised that drilling sized bullets might produce less run out and a small collet would assist in holding the bullet in the chuck at the same time as protecting the driving bands from grip of the jaws. A donor piece of nylon was turned up to within a few thousands of an inch of the final bullet diameter and a relief slot cut in the collect to finish the job. The collet holds the lubed bullets perfectly and more importantly true and square to the drill bit.
The first process is to cut a flat nose section onto the nose of the bullet so the drill has a square section to start on. The bullets set in the collet consistently using the top lube groove as a reference. A parting tool adjusted to cut one tool width is run onto the bullet cutting a perfect flat then the drill run unto the bullet slowly to a set depth to produce the HP. The lathe I run at a slow speed and a good coating of oil is applied to the drill in order to prevent the lead strands adhering and binding up on the bullet. The entire process takes 20-30 seconds at most.
Range tested the bullet in its original profile (108gr) showed preference for 12gr of 2400 over a Remington 9 1/2 primer. The same load was put under the hollow pointed bullet now weighing 98gr with superb hunting accuracy.
Range tested the bullet in its original profile (108gr) showed preference for 12gr of 2400 over a Remington 9 1/2 primer. The same load was put under the hollow pointed bullet now weighing 98gr with superb hunting accuracy.
Loaded HP rounds in Carcano brass ready for the range. Load is PPU brass, ACWW alloy nose first sized to .268 inch over 12gr Alliant 2400 and a Rem 9 1/2 primer. Est velocity 1400fps.