ITX lead free round balls

[Billnpatti]

Hmmmmm :hmm: I wonder if the condors taste just like chicken?

 

[matt denison]

Not replying to anyone in particular, picked Elzonie 'cause his comments are neutral on the subject.

I just ordered an ingot of "lead free bullet alloy" which is 93% bismuth, 7% tin. I plan to cast up some common size rouond balls and shoot them out of my trade gun side by side with lead as a test. I'm trying to be open minded about the result, not predicting anything either good or bad. The stuff is quite expensive considering it is expendable. But so is a $25 dinner or drinks at the bar. A round of golf costs more than a pound of alloy so what the heck. The point is if a fellow has a $1,000.00 + gun and can't use it to hunt then all is lost to him and his favorite gun. I want to find an alternative to lead that will take game humanely and is reasonably affordable and not too exotic for the average Joe who just wants to shoot a deer or hogs in CA.

 

[teakmtn]

Thanks Matt,
I look forward to hearing your results. Also, could you please inform as to your methods to casting the bismuth/tin balls and what difference there might be vs casting lead balls.
Thanks, Doug T.

 

[ApprenticeBuilder]

Yes, thanks Matt,

as was stated it would be nice for the particulars as it is a cinch that the value of this testing is obvious, there is no question as to the legality of the materials being used.

Expense would be less of an issue if they share a common trajectory, this would allow practice with lead and hunting with the alloy.

:hatsoff:

 

[matt denison]

"Expense would be less of an issue if they share a common trajectory, this would allow practice with lead and hunting with the alloy."

'zactly. Also things like velocity (the old Chrono needs batteries..) and penetration.

 

[ApprenticeBuilder]

Seems that the numbers are close enough that the velocity, energy, trajectory numbers should be all but interchangeable.

Pure lead is 11.3

Bismuth is 9.79

Very few shooters are using a pure source of lead.

I am most interested in your results.

 

[nhmoose]

Why would an animal eat any metal ball? Lead, brass, or other?

Animals, and raptors in particular, eat spent projectiles in the gut piles of dressed game, or crippled animals that have been shot.

I don't gut shoot the animals I hunt, I am 62 and have never lost a mammal I have shot. There are many like me this idea that the birds are endangered from lead from lost game of hunters is a pure bullSh*** idea no wonder it happened in CA

 

[nhmoose]

Lets use that energy to fight spread of these ridiculous lead bullet bans, that WILL pop up in other places around the country.

In AZ I had a trophy tag for deer in a remote area by the north rim of the grand canyon. They are trying to save the Condors that been eating carcasses with lead bullets. I received from Game and Fish a certificate for two boxes of non-toxic ammo. I didnt use em cause I used my .50 (which they didn't say I couldn't). Not sure if its now the LAW about non lead ammo but soon if not already (unless the condors go away somehow).

Hopefully the electric wind generators will KILL condors as good as they do eagles. That will make all the greenies go Uhhhhhhh!

 

[Billnpatti]

I'm not so sure that what they claim about raptors getting lead balls from gut piles is all pure :bull: . I am pretty sure that not everyone has a ball that penetrates all the way through their animal. Even where the shot is to the "boiler room", the ball can still end up in the gut pile when the heart, lungs, etc are removed and dropped into the gut pile, I save the heart, liver, etc. but not all do. I also can't say how many gut piles are found in an area where the vultures and other carrion eaters are found and of those piles what percentage have the ball in them. I'd say the probability of finding a lead ball in any given gut pile is pretty darned slim. The main problem is that we are talking about California, an area populated largely, but not exclusively, by twinkle toed and starry eyed beings, not an area populated by rational human beings. And therein lies the real problem. Or so I believe. But, that's just me.

 

[azmntman]

"They" claim its as small as slivers of lead?? Wonder if an autopsy on a condor has ever REALLY proven its lead poising and not feather gathering etc that did em in?

 

[Billnpatti]

Their minds are made up, don't confuse them with the facts. :haha:

 

[THBailey]

The real power behind shoving this down the California hunting communities throat had little to do with saving condors and everything to do with: 1)taking the next step towards the total ban of sport hunting and 2)discouraging ownership and use of firearms in general. As mentioned by others above, the condor is a handy poster boy.

Having said this, the wildlife folks do a necropsy on the dead condors they find and the lead levels are found to be quite high. They make the leap of faith this was caused by the hunters bullet. Maybe it was. Hope it's not, if the condor lead drops off after the ban goes in it will provide more scientific fodder for the lead ban coming your way in the future.

The people making up these rules generally have a pretty thin understanding of variations in terminal ballistics between different classes of firearms. The lead round ball, or lead conical for that matter, and the 500gr lead slug coming out of my 50-70 rolling block, all traveling at relatively low velocity, will really never blow up on hitting an animal. After the animal is hit somewhere there is a single blob of lead that often has passed through.

On the other hand, a .30 cal 145 gr hunting bullet travelling at 3000+ fps does fragment, especially if it finds bone. Understand also the rifle deer season in California starts in august in the west half of the state. Typically 80 degrees or better during the day. Especially if you're a couple miles from your truck, and certainly when backpack hunting in the wilderness area, the deer are dressed and skinned where they are dropped. Bloodshot meat around the wound channel is cut out and discarded as part of the process. Sometimes the deer is boned out and the skeleton is left behind. Tough to say no fragmented lead is left behind in the process.

I did write the Governor and the involved assembly members asking the lead ban not be passed, but if so exempt the muzzle loading and black powder cartridge weapons. Others did also. Obviously the effort fell on deaf ears.

 

[nhmoose]

Funny how a human can swallow lead ball and it just passes through like everything else and has no effect

Eat something like lead paint, lead oxide from your hands or the old lead deposits from car exhausts and there will be an effect

 

[azmntman]

NOBODY eats em without lube! The lube stops them from being digested so they are safe. :blah:

 

[THBailey]

Funny how a human can swallow lead ball and it just passes through like everything else and has no effect

Eat something like lead paint, lead oxide from your hands or the old lead deposits from car exhausts and there will be an effect

Certainly true enough, but the human (or any mammal for that matter) does not have a gizzard that grinds what they eat. Unfortunately the birds do. The extensive studies done on lead poisoning in waterfowl pretty well confirmed a bird swallowing lead is not a good thing for the bird.

 

[Treestalker]

I must advise Chief Moonthunder not to smoke the peacepipe too close to those Texas brush goats! :shocked2: It just might land him on the other side of the Raypublica! :haha: Instant Cabrito? :stir: Nah, Texas brush goats are as tough as a plate full of woodpecker necks, :haha: Tree.

 

[Wes/Tex]

Texas/Spanish along the Border language lesson:
"Como Estas, Frijole Cabrito?"; "How you bean, kid?" :wink: :rotf:

 

[Treestalker]

!Que laaaaaaastima! :shake: (that is a good play on words though, I admit :haha:.) Tree.