Swaging start ups

WannabeWoodsman

Private
Minuteman
Jan 24, 2022
37
10
35
United States, Iowa
Does anyone make their own bullets with swaging? I realy want to get into it but the only website I can find is Corbin's and their website is really confusing. From what I could understand I'm looking at about $1000-$1500 to start from there?

I know some can be made using a reloading press instead of a swaging press.

How did you get started? Where do I start because I really want to do this?
 
Talk with the guys on accurate shooter dot com and Benchrest central.

Al Nyhus and Jackie Schmidt have made their own.
Some guy by the name of Randy Robinette
makes bullets too. 😉

Corbin isn't the only die maker out there.
George Ulrich is another source.

Lots of used bullet making setups are available.
 
I swaged pure lead bullets with a Corbin press. It was purchased in the early 1990s. I use it for paper-jacketed bullets for a Sharps Rifle and a Whitworth muzzleloader.

I've also used it for swaging Minie balls for the CW muskets and a Sharps bullet for the .54 caliber Sharps paper-cartridge rifle.

Not knowing what your goals with swaging your own bullets it's a little difficult to answer your questions. However, if you give Corbin a call, they are really great at answering your questions. Their products are top grade and you won't regret it.

What caliber are you wanting to swage bullets for?
 
I swaged pure lead bullets with a Corbin press. It was purchased in the early 1990s. I use it for paper-jacketed bullets for a Sharps Rifle and a Whitworth muzzleloader.

I've also used it for swaging Minie balls for the CW muskets and a Sharps bullet for the .54 caliber Sharps paper-cartridge rifle.

Not knowing what your goals with swaging your own bullets it's a little difficult to answer your questions. However, if you give Corbin a call, they are really great at answering your questions. Their products are top grade and you won't regret it.

What caliber are you wanting to swage bullets for?
Below 50 caliber. Mostly pistol caliber and small caliber rifle. 9mm, 45 ACP, 300 AAC, and of course .223/5.56. looking at getting a straight walled cartridge rifle so .450 BM or .350 legend as well.
 
Below 50 caliber. Mostly pistol caliber and small caliber rifle. 9mm, 45 ACP, 300 AAC, and of course .223/5.56. looking at getting a straight walled cartridge rifle so .450 BM or .350 legend as well.

Unless you are going for something unique and like experimenting, IMHO, you would be better off buying the bullets off the shelf. It can be a little labor intensive.

The .450 BM and .350 Legend could be worthy of experimentation as they are basically short range rounds. For hunting purposes it might pay to swage if you can increase the lethality of the round, given the velocity limitations.
 
  • Like
Reactions: WannabeWoodsman
Unless you are going for something unique and like experimenting, IMHO, you would be better off buying the bullets off the shelf. It can be a little labor intensive.

The .450 BM and .350 Legend could be worthy of experimentation as they are basically short range rounds. For hunting purposes it might pay to swage if you can increase the lethality of the round, given the velocity limitations.
I understand what you're saying but seeing what happened during pandemic buying has got me considering other means of obtaining ammunition. I'd rather make sure I've got the means to not only reload but make bullets. Could even be a source of income
 
I understand what you're saying but seeing what happened during pandemic buying has got me considering other means of obtaining ammunition. I'd rather make sure I've got the means to not only reload but make bullets. Could even be a source of income

Correct. That's why I got into swaging. I couldn't get the factory ammo in the flavor I wanted for the .45-70 and I certainly wasn't going to buy bullets for my muzzle-loading rifles.

Swaging the bullets was so superior to casting.

I passed on some small pistol primers in Cabelas the other day because they were close to 9 cents a piece. Add that to the cost of a jacketed bullet, powder and my time and it was better to buy the factory rounds in the .357 magnum I was looking for.

By my calculations I think I would spend and extra 25 cents per round if I reloaded my .357 brass. For 1,000 rounds that would be $250. I don't cast handgun bullets anymore as the bullet casters in my area do a better job than me. So not counting the casting or swaging I think that I probably spend an average of 7 minutes per round to reload.

That comes to about 117 hours for 1000 rounds. I use a single stage press to reload the .357. For .45 ACP and 9mm I use a progressive press.

Anyway. that $250 savings for 117 hours is about $2.14 per hour for about 8-9 rounds produced per hour.

Now someone might ask why I take so much time to make so few rounds per hour. I do a lot of case preparation, cleaning and polishing the brass. I don't count the time that the tumbler is polishing the brass.

Your mileage may vary but I would encourage swaging for anyone willing to put the time into it ONLY If you shoot muzzle-loaders or obsolete cartridges or willing to experiment.

If there is readily available ammo take some time to calculate the cost/benefit equation to produce the ammunition that you are looking for to see if it's worth it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: WannabeWoodsman
I understand what you're saying but seeing what happened during pandemic buying has got me considering other means of obtaining ammunition. I'd rather make sure I've got the means to not only reload but make bullets. Could even be a source of income
I dabbled in it to give me something to do while I was working on other things to keep my hands busy. Corbin makes spectacular things as I understand it but costs quite a bit. I'm not sure if Blackmon is still out there but have seen his and they were dynamite for varmint shooting and they pretty much explode on impact. Your velocity somewhat limited but they handle 2800fps without coming apart until they hit fairly well. For mine, I went with a standard 7/8-14 dies version from a guy out of Oregon who is labeled ElysiumField. I started with his 22LR ironing die (the cheaper of the two ;) ) which worked well so took a chance on his bullet swage setup. Again, as has been pointed out by others, it's not the ideal route. It's arguably more trouble than it's worth even.

I know the 22LR approach has been used for 224/243 jackets but have wondered if they would be effective for very light 6.5mm rounds with an additional expand or two after the 243. Varmint bullets out of the Grendel would be low enough velocity to keep the jacket from spinning apart (I would think but could definitely be wrong here) and might be a good option for my older's rifle and coyotes. I've tried PC lead and have yet to find one that truly likes the Grendel (B-A). Since the die I have above doesn't shed excess (like the corbin) and WYSIWYG, I wonder if I could PC the blank to control some of the shrapnel while eliminating lead exposure. I'm sure it will thin but it wouldn't really need much. /groan
 
Ps, If you do go that route I've heard good things about Lee's "sizer" used as a 22LR casing iron but have never seen or tried it in use. I've heard they're only about $30-35 though. The first swaged bullet I'd ever seen was 25cal jacket swaged around a slightly sized down 243 casting. It was pretty accurate out to at least 300y and had ran full velocity out of a 243 so I don't see why not.
 
Does anyone make their own bullets with swaging? I realy want to get into it but the only website I can find is Corbin's and their website is really confusing. From what I could understand I'm looking at about $1000-$1500 to start from there?

I know some can be made using a reloading press instead of a swaging press.

How did you get started? Where do I start because I really want to do this?
About 20 years ago, I made 6mm benchrest bullets for a while - 68 grain, .2435, flat base, I seem to recall 7 ogive.

What do you need:
  • three dies - squirt die to make cores of a uniform size and weight, core seater die to seat the cores in the jacket, and a point up die to form the pointy part of the bullet. My dies are carbide (at least the point up and core seater are carbide) and I think they were originally made by Simonson or Detsch. Speedy Gonzalez reburned my point-up to a new ogive. The dies are 7/8x14.
  • Punches for the squirt and core seater. I have core-seater punches that are in one tenth steps. My squirt punch and ejector have hemispherical faces - the thought was that they would seat better. I don't know if that works or not.
  • I have three presses, one for each die, each with ejector frames. They are repurposed RCBS - each ram was machined to fit its punch. I think one of them is an A2, the others are probably Rock Chuckers. They are plenty stout for this purpose - most forces are low.
  • You need lead wire for cores. I used to buy pre-cut chunks that were about 45 grains each and squirt them to the weight I wanted. If you want to do it yourself, you can buy a device that will cut lead wire.
  • You need high-quality jackets. I bought mine from J4. I think you can get J4 jackets from Lester Bruno or Berger. Other people also make jackets, I think I got some 30 cal jackets from one of the guys are Holland.
  • You need jacket lube. This is typically pretty special stuff. It needs to provide enough lube to eject the bullet from the point-up die while still being thin enough to not change the shape of the bullet. Mine is a combination of vaseline and anhydrous lanolin. There may have been some alcohol in there. If I got back into it, I would want to make new lube.
Assuming that you have the gear and you know what you want to make so you know core weight and you have jackets, the process: is:
  • Squirt cores. Set a chunk of wire on the punch and lower the handle to run it into the die. Excess lead squirts out the holes in the die. Raise the handle, the ejector frame pushes the sized core out of the die.
  • Lube the jackets. Too much lube is bad. Not enough is worse. Just right is VERY hard to determine.
  • Seat cores. Drop a core into a jacket. Flip it over and set it on the punch. Lower the handle to run it into the die. Raise the handle, the ejector frame pushes the seated core out of the die. When the punch is compressing the lead, you want it to stop about a zillionth of an inch from touching the jacket. Don't cut the jacket. If lead should flow around the punch, that may unbalance the bullet.
  • point up. Set the jacket/seated core on the punch, lower the handle to run it into the point up die. Raise the handle and the ejector pushes the bullet base first out of the die.
In my case, the point-up ejector is about 0.060 so the meplat is about that size - that's pretty big. Couple things to keep in mind
  • If you set the squirt die wrong, you get a core that is too light. Throw it away, no great loss.
  • If you set core seat die wrong, you cut a jacket. Throw it away, no great loss.
  • But don't get a bullet stuck in the point-up die! Since the die is lined with carbide and the bullet is small, you have to be VERY careful getting it out of there. That is the voice of experience. I had a friend EDM a hole in the base of the bullet, we tapped the hole, threaded a screw into the threaded hole, and pulled the bullet. I had to do that twice and it cost me a lot of beer.

When you have the gear set up right, you can make hundreds of bullets in a reasonable time. You do batches 1,000 cores then seat a thousand then point up a thousand. I still have a few hundred - maybe a thousand - from those days. In the mid-90s I was making bullets, shooting matches, doing okay but not great. My guns stopped shooting well. I thought it was my bullets - I was pretty new to it so that seemed reasonable. I swapped scopes between the guns (Leupold 36x targets scopes, state of the art at the time), neither gun would shoot. It had to be the bullets. I found myself in a political shit show at work so I put it all aside. A couple years later, thinking I would get back to to it, I had a 24x scope so I threw that onto one of the guns, took my crap to the range, made some ammo and shot a mid-2. CRAP! Bullets good but I had two bad scopes. Send both scopes to Leupold and they fixed them but the work situation got worse and I never went back to BR. Sold the rifles about a year ago - a light and heavy varmint, Stolle Pandas glued into McMillan stocks, Arnold Jewel triggers, Hart barrels with low round count, made by Dan Dowling. I hated to see them go. Dan makes really nice guns.

The bullet-making gear is just sitting there.

I also have some steel 30-cal dies. Made for and used by a famous shooter from before my time. At this point, they are curiosity. I don't have presses and they may be missing punches.
 
Does anyone make their own bullets with swaging? I realy want to get into it but the only website I can find is Corbin's and their website is really confusing. From what I could understand I'm looking at about $1000-$1500 to start from there?

I know some can be made using a reloading press instead of a swaging press.

How did you get started? Where do I start because I really want to do this?
Their old site was cumbersome and confusing. A new site has been created and is linked below. Just thought I'd add that to this old thread. https://www.corbins.com/