Cleaning cast bullets

[04DarkShadowGT]

I bought some cast bullets from a guy in a huge lot of .38 special stuff last year. I was going through the cases of speer 148gr WC bullets. I have about 300 bullets that have some sort of sticky coating on them. It almost looks like cosmoline or something.

What would be a good way to clean them? I guess my concern is if I clean them up will it remove any lube that was on them and if so would that even matter?

New to the reloading stuff.

 

[XtremeVel]

My knowledge on cast bullets doesn't go much further than ordering from Dardas or Missouri... I do remember once when I was having leading issues, a friend gave me a bottle of Lee's liquid alox to coat them with. It did leave somewhat a sticky feeling, but did help eliminating leading. If by chance this is what you have, I wouldn't worry about cleaning it off. If I remember right, the alox had a reddish tint to it.

 

[red_zr24x4]

Sounds like lube to me. If its on the bullet after the round is loaded. I would wipe it off the exposed lead and the case with a rag. If its on the side of the bullet (projectile) it's lube where its suppost to be.

 

[kludge]

Probably lube-alox or some such tumble lube. No worries. Load. Shoot.

 

[Slapstick]

I found a box of the same bullets in a box I haven't open in years. They have a coating on them that's lube since they don't have a hard wax type lube in the lube channel.

 

[jsn_mooney]

It's a good thing it's there- as said before, it sounds like lube. When I'm loading cast bullets I keep a rag on the bench and wipe off the exposed lead before putting the loaded round in the box.

 

[shootinghoosier]

Sounds like lube to me too. However, I bought some cast bullets at the Indy 1500 last year and they were the worst batch of cast bullets I've ever seen...they were coated with chunks of lube. Since then, I've returned to buying only from Dardas. They are excellent cast bullets and one of the most affordable that I've found.

The Dardas family is heavily involved in competition shooting, so you can probably imagine that their product is top notch.

 

[04DarkShadowGT]

Thanks all, appreciate it. I actually bought a bunch of those Dardas bullets from McDonalds gun shop in Marion earlier this week when I was down that way. They were pretty good price, especially from a shop. 1000 .38 158gr was $60 a box.