Bullet variation??

[Bub524]

I just bought one of those small electronic scales from Midway. Pretty nice and accurate.
However, when I started weighing bullets I realized it might have been a mistake. Ignorance is bliss. The weights are not as near to perfect as I thought they would be. What is the standard deviation between bullet weights that you guys look for? This is the first time I ever weighed bullets.

[Yancey von Yeast, 8073]

I did the exact same thing when I got a good scale a few years back. I'm sure others disagree but I think that at the ranges we shoot, it does not make that big of a difference....to a point. Large voids or variances of over say 6 grains may be a concern. I can't wait to hear what some of the others have to say.

[matt]

you can weigh and group them together by weight then shoot them and discover which weight shoots better and to what point of impact it all depends on how anal you are about it. any huge variation in weight would be indictitive of a void. you will have different weights also if you vary your casting technique and also how hot the metal is versus heat of the mold and whether you have virgin pure lead. i found that getting virgin pure lead made a big difference in not only my quality but also helped get my weights much more consistant. im down to a + or - 2 grains anything under that means there is a void and is rejected. i then group them by weight and try to shoot the same weight for a match.
matt
usmc 1988-1995
winslows battery 9775v

[Greg Ogdan, 11444]

Bub,
I too, weigh my minies. I have found that with good casting technique I can get a yeild of 95+% in a run of 300 to 400. I visually inspect and weigh 10 of my casting run, get the average, then figure what a half percent of that would be and arrive a plus/minus figure. For Rapine .575 trashcan, about 475 is average and I would accept anything between 472 and 478. If I do my part, which I usually don't, I can shoot with the best. Just my $.02. Now, let the trash talk begin!

[Gary Van Kauwenbergh, 101]

I weigh my bullets, but I can change, if I have to, I guess...

I sort my bullets into 1 grain increments (e.g. 500, 501, 502 thru 510). I keep the group of whatever I have the most of, plus one grain heavier and one grain lighter as "match grade" bullets. After that, I look and see how many are close enough to keep, and save them for practice and regional team competitions. When you have them all sorted in front of you, it's pretty easy to decide how many you want to recast, and the obvious rejects are apparent.

I think the heaviest ones are best because they have the least voids, but as a practical matter, I don't get enough of them to satisfy me.

[John Bly]

I shoot the Lyman 575213 and I weigh my bullets. I keep anything between 513 gr. and 518 gr. for team events. The lightweights get remelted and I keep the heavies up to 522 gr. until I have enough to shoot individuals at Natls with the heavies. I figure they are the best of the lot. My shooting does not prove anything though. Most of the lightweights are because the mold is not hot enough. Most of us start keeping bullets when they start looking good, but the mold keeps getting a little hotter as you keep casting and the bullets get a few grains heavier.

Make sure you let the scale warm up from 20 minutes to 1/2 hr before you weigh anything to let it stabilize. Weigh the bullets once and sort them. If you try to weigh any of them again, you'll get different numbers by a small amount and it will drive you nuts.

I also shoot long range BPCR Silhouette and the weight criteria gets a lot more critical when you want to shoot 500 meters. Then I sort to +/- 1 grain. Good casting technique is more critical on these bullets.
Keep shooting and good luck, John Bly

[Terry Davis 10639]

I would suggest you set up a Design of Experiments to see what effect it has.

As some have suggested, find your extreme light and heavy weight, and then group the bullets by weight, say every 2 grains. Then do out and shoot them and see what effect it has on your groups.

That will let you decide how much it is worth to sort them.

I don't weigh mine but one thing I do though is I check my minnies for voids. I use the 315 grn wad cutter and generally the void occurs at the tip of the core pin and is visible. I throw any with a bad void back in the pot. I would probably be more worried about it if I seriously shot individuals.
Before I figured out how to avoid the void, I did an experiment where I sorted void and no void bullets. The no void bullets grouped better but generally even the void bullets would have broken a pidgeon at 50 yards. Some were 3-4 inches out, but usually stayed in the 8 ring.

So for ME, I don't get too bound up about weight, but I do check for visual voids.

[J Weber 4114V]

What I found is by visual inspection and throwing out ones with ANY visual defects,then weighing you get very close to same weight.
So being lazy I just skip the weighting part :lol:
Being equipped with two old eyes and only one that works I got one of them lighted swing arm magnifying lens.If a minne looks prefect under that lens I shoot it.