Couple questions on bullet weld

[Orange Dust]

Bullet weld can actually occur due to drying lubricants. I've never seen it cause a catastrophic failure but it would certainly cause some inconsistent velocity issues.

Most manuals tell us not to lubricate bullets or necks at all. If you're going to I would definitely make sure I was using some sort of dry lubricant like HBN, graphite, or a lubricating wax that is non drying.

Years ago a lot of the bullets we bought had some sort of very fine lubricant on them. You couldn't see it but you could feel it handling them. I have no clue what it was.

I think the lube you are talking about was lanolin. Always a fan, I can testify that ammo loaded with HBN coated bullets will have no issues with start pressure changing or being inconsistent. Stuff is a pain though, esp with hollow points.

 

[shootski]

I would fire the lot of you!
Pretty sorry "welders" if your cartridges come apart that easy.
smh!

 

[MagnumManiac]

I have had this happen without any corrosion present.
Brass and copper based building metal are in fact different enough to cause electrolysis due to the zinc content of brass.
When brass is annealed, the gases between the grain crystals escape, this is most likely where the zinc is formed on the surface.
While annealing, that orange hue in the flame just as the correct temp is reached are the gases coming from the brass.
I annealed metals as a job, each different metal has a particular coloured hue when annealing. A gas spectrometer also does a similar thing, it shows up on a graph with different colours for each element found.
Anyway, whether it's caused by powder residue, electrolysis or something else, graphite powder brushed on the insides of necks works to stop it.

Cheers.

 

[1mechanic]

I was thinking this too but was wondering how the zinc would be isolated enough from the brass.

 

[WildRose]

I think the lube you are talking about was lanolin. Always a fan, I can testify that ammo loaded with HBN coated bullets will have no issues with start pressure changing or being inconsistent. Stuff is a pain though, esp with hollow points.

The two I'm most familiar with are bee's wax and carnuba oil.

You can even put a little carnauba wax in with tumbling media to both give it an incredible smooth finish but also keeps the dust down.

The guy who first mentored me when I started reloading kept a block of bee's wax on the bench and would just lightly stick the rim of the neck into the block and rotate a half turn. We were shooting flat based bullets at that time which can be a bit of a booger getting started.

Some bullets come with a proprietary dry wax coating of some sort on them and I suspect it's one of the other or a combination of both.

I also knew a guy who used paraffin the same way on his necks but over time paraffin can shrink so I was hesitant to ever try it.

 

[WildRose]

Brass and copper are similar metals there will have to be a medium of sorts like moisture and salt from finger tips slightly covering the bottom of the bullet in loading. Like WildRose has said if it's clean and dry when loading you should not have a problem.

That's my experience as well. I know for a fact though that petroleum lubricants really exacerbate and accelerate the problem.

Reloading brass has such a low zinc content I've never seen electrolysis being a problem.

 

[Teri Anne]

You are completely wrong.
It is called "Cold Weld" for a reason.
It is the electrolysis forming a residue that locks the two metals together.
As a normal round fires, the neck, being thinner, expands first. Even .00001" of expansion is enough to release the "grip" on the bullet.
However, in this instance, the grip on the bullet is a heck of a lot harder to break and can and does cause pressure to spike if it is already at or near max.
Many instances of this phenomenon have a corrosion inside the case. Many bullets pulled in this condition also have corrosion around the base of the bullet and on the insides of the brass. Look up electrolysis regarding lead and aluminium and tell me that this is not similar.

Cheers.

Lead and Aluminum??? Last I heard cartridges are made from brass and copper. Where does lead and aluminum enter into the equation? I am an licensed Airframe and Powerplant aircraft mechanic and well versed in corrosion problems. In some 52 years reloading I have never had to deal with this issue. Seems to me that whomever is doing the loading is doing something weird. I have shot commercially loaded and military ammo older than I am without corrosion issues. Gentlemen it this is an issue with your loads check your reloading process and techniques. You are doing something to cause this issue especially if it's ammo that is only a few months or years old.

 

[milboltnut]

Lead and Aluminum??? Last I heard cartridges are made from brass and copper. Where does lead and aluminum enter into the equation? I am an licensed Airframe and Powerplant aircraft mechanic and well versed in corrosion problems. In some 52 years reloading I have never had to deal with this issue. Seems to me that whomever is doing the loading is doing something weird. I have shot commercially loaded and military ammo older than I am without corrosion issues. Gentlemen it this is an issue with your loads check your reloading process and techniques. You are doing something to cause this issue especially if it's ammo that is only a few months or years old.

I had LC milsurp 06 ammo that the bullet was sealed with a black sealant to keep out the weather (I knew a guy who shot ammo that was from a flooded basement ? and they all went bang! Some went click bank, but they went off ! ) But maybe to prevent this bullet weld, I doubt it, it was used to fast, so I guess it would be the first. As I said before I had very few problems with what's titled here "bullet weld". It is weird, for sure, because it only was an issue to me a few times in a bunch of ammo I pulled, like 4 or 5 rounds out of many. MM may be onto something, brass and copper.

Many instances of this phenomenon have a corrosion inside the case. Many bullets pulled in this condition also have corrosion around the base of the bullet and on the insides of the brass.

Bullet weld is real because it is a chemical reaction between two differing metals. IDK

Saying that... Looks like he solved his problem, and probably solved others too. However.

Many instances of this phenomenon have a corrosion inside the case. Many bullets pulled in this condition also have corrosion around the base of the bullet and on the insides of the brass.

I never seen any corrosion on the bullet or inside my cases, so it's a mystery to me.

 

[Hugnot]

I am looking into cleaning up the insides of necks with stainless brushes spinning in my cordless vs. nylon that don't seem to cut thru the black inner neck coatings.

Going thru my previous entries on the subject my thoughts are:

Nitrate/sulfate - potassium salts contained in powder residues are partially responsible for corrosion inside previously fired ammo. Info - https://winchesterpowder.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/winchester-smokeless-ball-powders_072811.pdf - product composition (3).

Electrolysis and corrosion might occur as bullets, almost all copper, are in contact with brass cases (30% zinc, 70% copper). An electrolyte of moisture & powder residue containing a nitrate-potassium salts (not the white stuff used on French fries) might be present. Smokeless powders contain a certain amount of moisture.

Stuck bullets don't happen with ammo having bullets loaded in clean new brass.

Coating the insides of necks with graphite is worthy because it would arrest corrosion and reduce friction occurring when necks are pulled over an expander ball. The additional force caused by friction might introduce neck run-out. The expander ball in Forster F/L dies is located high in the die, just below the neck portion, in an attempt to reduce neck run-out.

Finally, heatless "cold welding" in its true sense, is sort of esoteric in that the tiny little atoms of like metals sort of meld together creating a bond if no dissimilar atoms intervein like lubricants, air, nitrogen/oxygen/tobacco smoke. Apparently, this is problem in outer space with flying satellites in an airless (vacuum) environment. Conventional ammo might have a "cold weld" problem out there. Possibly the solution might be some kind of plasma weapon. Arnold Schwarzenegger, in a movie, attempted to deal on a plasma rifle in the 40-watt range in some pawn shop but Arnold settled on conventional weaponry having manufactured ammo and did not have any "cold weld" problems.

I once knew this guy who re-loaded aluminum case Blazer ammo - "something weird". He used a nail to punch a flash hole in the aluminum case to allow a boxer type primer to be used. An increased amount of electrolysis might occur if steel jacketed (26) bullets or lead (82) bullets were loaded in the aluminum (13) cases.

 

[milboltnut]

Hatchers Notebook and other references mention salt in primers not powder.

 

[WildRose]

Hatchers Notebook and other references mention salt in primers not powder.

There are I believe potassium salts in both.

 

[WildRose]

I am looking into cleaning up the insides of necks with stainless brushes spinning in my cordless vs. nylon that don't seem to cut thru the black inner neck coatings.

Going thru my previous entries on the subject my thoughts are:

Nitrate/sulfate - potassium salts contained in powder residues are partially responsible for corrosion inside previously fired ammo. Info - https://winchesterpowder.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/winchester-smokeless-ball-powders_072811.pdf - product composition (3).

Electrolysis and corrosion might occur as bullets, almost all copper, are in contact with brass cases (30% zinc, 70% copper). An electrolyte of moisture & powder residue containing a nitrate-potassium salts (not the white stuff used on French fries) might be present. Smokeless powders contain a certain amount of moisture.

Stuck bullets don't happen with ammo having bullets loaded in clean new brass.

Coating the insides of necks with graphite is worthy because it would arrest corrosion and reduce friction occurring when necks are pulled over an expander ball. The additional force caused by friction might introduce neck run-out. The expander ball in Forster F/L dies is located high in the die, just below the neck portion, in an attempt to reduce neck run-out.

Finally, heatless "cold welding" in its true sense, is sort of esoteric in that the tiny little atoms of like metals sort of meld together creating a bond if no dissimilar atoms intervein like lubricants, air, nitrogen/oxygen/tobacco smoke. Apparently, this is problem in outer space with flying satellites in an airless (vacuum) environment. Conventional ammo might have a "cold weld" problem out there. Possibly the solution might be some kind of plasma weapon. Arnold Schwarzenegger, in a movie, attempted to deal on a plasma rifle in the 40-watt range in some pawn shop but Arnold settled on conventional weaponry having manufactured ammo and did not have any "cold weld" problems.

I once knew this guy who re-loaded aluminum case Blazer ammo - "something weird". He used a nail to punch a flash hole in the aluminum case to allow a boxer type primer to be used. An increased amount of electrolysis might occur if steel jacketed (26) bullets or lead (82) bullets were loaded in the aluminum (13) cases.

New brass and bullets are treated with some sort of non petroleum coatings that help keep them looking shiny and new most of which I believe are different types of natural waxes and even perhaps lanolin.

That also provides a measure of lubrication our clean brass doesn't have until we start lubing up for working and seating. In my own experience dry lubes like Moly and Graphite while offering a level of lubricity also are themselves very fine abrasives and I steer away from them.

We might be able to eliminate these rare issues totally by adding a bit of ultra fine wax to our tumbling media for dry tumbling and as others suggested using something like lanolin as a neck lube.

The one concern I'd have with Lanolin is that over time it does dry out and might create at least minor issues with bonding the bullet to the case over time creating inconsistencies in pressure.

Brass and copper both oxydize when exposed to air which is why it gets dull over time after tumbling so I'm thinking more and more of buying some of the Carnauba Wax in the ultra fine flake form to add to dry tumbling media and see how much difference if any it makes.

One thing I know for certain is that if you want to accelerate corrosion of the bullets and brass, handle them with sweaty hands. I've even seen primers fouled and not ignite properly when handled with sweaty hands.

I know some rather obsessive loaders that will not handle any reloading materials without wearing surgical gloves and maybe they have the right idea.

 

[milboltnut]

There are I believe potassium salts in both.

I saw it... there is.

 

[Hugnot]

The olde style potassium chlorate primers had nasty corrosive effects, so the potassium chlorate component (strong oxidizer - good for matches) was replaced with barium nitrate. I heard a good olde bore cleaning method was to use hot soapy water. But that's all history now but acquiring primers is the current problem.

Lots of bad stuff encountered in loading ammo, mostly lead. Nitrile gloves provide a barrier between my inner workings and nasty residuals and my harmful residuals (sweat) and pristine components.