Cast bullets key holing in 9mm?

by Slow Hand , Indiana, Thursday, September 19, 2013, 07:33 (4088 days ago)

I went out shooting last sunday. After shooting some drills with a few different guns, I looked at the target and notice I had some oblong holes and even a few that looked like the bullets were hitting completely sideways! I was shooting at about ten yards. The load was a Lee 125 truncated cone tumble lube cast of air cooled wheel weights over 4.0 gr of Promo. I shot them through a Glock 19, a S&W SD-9, and a 10" barreled semi auto Uzi SBR. It happened 5-10% of the time and it occurred with all three guns. None of the barrels showed excessive leading. Accuracy was pretty bad for all rounds, not just the key holing ones. I have only shot a few of these bullets and they were in a .38 special. They shot fine in those revolvers. Instead of trying a few since this is a new handload, I loaded up all 400 I cast a couple weeks ago! So, I can't measure them unless I pull a bullet, but since they shot well in a .38, I'm sure thy aren't undersized. The tumble libed bullets are usually a hair oversized with their micro grooves.

Any ideas? I hate to dump the remaining loaded rounds, pulling them with my inertial puller would take a long time and there's so little powder to recover, it's hardly worth it! The scary thing is, I shot the first of these through my Uzi with the can attached! I'm glad they stayed straight enough to not cause a baffle strike!