Why do you want ALOX in your Lube?

[Michael Petrov]

I use it because it works and has for some time now.

I've tried many of the commercial Alox base lubes and was not happy with them. In the late 1970's I bought a gallon of Alox 2138F and starting making my own. It's a good lube but has some limitations, it does not work well when the temp is over 75 (not very often here) and it must never be melted over a direct flame, always use a double boiler.

I have three lubes that I use and the Alox-Beeswax is the one that seems to work the best for what I do which is plain-base lead at one and two-hundred yards.

[Recluse]

The company that originally made ALOX 2138F stopped making it many years ago. Lubrizol claims to be making ALOX. LEE claims to have liquid ALOX. There is also ALOX 350 that has a lower melting point than ALOX 2138F. Is there a copyright on the word ALOX, if not anyone can mix some stuff together and call it ALOX.

Does ALOX still exist?

Why do so many reloaders insist they must have ALOX in their lube?

Everyone in my family has always driven a FORD so I drive a FORD too! I wouldn't get caught dead driving a CHEVY. Is that what we are dealing with here with ALOX? The Red Neck Attitude!

I read where people say they get gun barrel LEADING when they use JAKES lube or some other lube. Then another person claims JAKES lube works fine for them. Then another person says they get LEADING when shooting a 44 mag but NO LEADING when shooting a 38 special. Your compairing Apples to Oranges.

Barrel Leading is caused by a combination of things, the type of Lead you use, the velocity of your bullet and maybe the lube too. Barrel Leading is not just a LUBE problem.

A combination of soft lead and bullet velocity is the number one reason for barrel leading. A higher velocity bullet needs harder lead than a lower velocity bullet. Newton's laws of motion, a bullet at rest tends to stay at rest. You shoot a bullet down a gun barrel the rifling makes the bullet spin but if the lead is too soft the bullet does not spin it just rips the lead off the side of the bullet and fills the rifling with lead.

Well, damn.

I thought I had it down for the past thirty or so years, but thankfully YOU came along and in one post, explained everything that I and thousands of others here have been doing wrong.

Must be the redneck in me.

[cbrick]

A combination of soft lead and bullet velocity is the number one reason for barrel leading. .

Dang, silly me. And to think that all this time I was convinced the number one reason for barrel leading was POOR BULLET FIT.

Learn something new every day.

Welcome to Castboolits Rocket Man.

Rick

[timkelley]

I use ALOX because it works for me.

[runfiverun]

i seen the rocket man back in the day [serial at the theaters]
one of my favorites was 'radar men from the moon'
i think i even have it on video casette they shoulda just released some of those serials instead of making a new version

[Love Life]

The company that originally made ALOX 2138F stopped making it many years ago. Lubrizol claims to be making ALOX. LEE claims to have liquid ALOX. There is also ALOX 350 that has a lower melting point than ALOX 2138F. Is there a copyright on the word ALOX, if not anyone can mix some stuff together and call it ALOX.

Does ALOX still exist?

Why do so many reloaders insist they must have ALOX in their lube?

Everyone in my family has always driven a FORD so I drive a FORD too! I wouldn't get caught dead driving a CHEVY. Is that what we are dealing with here with ALOX? The Red Neck Attitude!

I read where people say they get gun barrel LEADING when they use JAKES lube or some other lube. Then another person claims JAKES lube works fine for them. Then another person says they get LEADING when shooting a 44 mag but NO LEADING when shooting a 38 special. Your compairing Apples to Oranges.

Barrel Leading is caused by a combination of things, the type of Lead you use, the velocity of your bullet and maybe the lube too. Barrel Leading is not just a LUBE problem.

A combination of soft lead and bullet velocity is the number one reason for barrel leading. A higher velocity bullet needs harder lead than a lower velocity bullet. Newton's laws of motion, a bullet at rest tends to stay at rest. You shoot a bullet down a gun barrel the rifling makes the bullet spin but if the lead is too soft the bullet does not spin it just rips the lead off the side of the bullet and fills the rifling with lead.

ALOX is made of sugar, spice, and everything nice. Actually I use Lee LLA because it just plain works. I am one of those you speak of who had problems with Jakes Purple Ceresin. Boolit size and alloy were not the issues. The lube was. Period and bar none. When I used the same size boolits, cast from the same alloy, in the same guns with only the lube being the difference it is kind of easy to figure out what the problem is. I get no leading with LLA, speed green, Lotak Hard, or Thompson Blue Angel. The only thing in your post that is correct is that boolit lube isn't the only factor in barrel leading.

[Char-Gar]

Alox came on the bullet lube scene 30 years or so ago, when the American Rifleman ran an article on a mixture of 50/50 alox and beeswax. It got good reviews but proved to be too much of a good thing in some applications. It became known as the NRA Formula and companies began to produce it for retail sale. Javelin still makes it and it is a good general purpose lube. with some limitations.

ONe limitation that comes to mind is with 38 Special wad cutter loads. If all of the lube grooves were filled, accuracy was not as good as just filling the bottom groove and leaving the others dry.

Folks seem to have gone to seed on alox. I don't use it and get great results without it. Lee popularized it along with it's other cheapo products. Some folks now assume that any lube without alox is no good.

I tried Lee Liquid Alox on a couple of occasion and the results were disappointing compared to the lube I had used for decades. I could see no reason to keep on playing with the goop trying to make it work. I know some folks have broken the code on it, but I never thought it worth the effort.

So, count me among the folks who are not enamored with alox.

[Michael Petrov]

I guess it all depends on what a person is trying to work towards. I think many different lubes work well> Each person has to find the one best suited for the bullet they are using.

I had a heck of nice group going this AM until a breeze showed up, even with my new wind flags it a least doubled in size .

[1hole]

Most handgun bullets were swaged or cast lead until the mid to late 60's when jackets slowly started taking over for higher velocities and to obtain better expansion from a hard jacket over a soft core.

The old guys were good and they experimented with hundreds of potential lubes mixed various ways. In the early to mid 60s some of the experts worked with the NRA to find the best performing bullet lube they could find. A 50:50 mix of Alox and beeswax turned out to do the job better than anything else but Alox wasn't commercially available in smaller quantites than 55 gal drums. Some NRA member took a chance, bought a drum of it along with an equal amount of beeswax. He melted it into half pint 'paint' cans and sold it cheap in Am. Rifleman adds. Having proved it would sell, he soon had several competitors, most of whom cast it into tubes for easy use in most lubrasizers. The rest is history.

For a long period the NRA stuff nearly wiped out the rest of the commercial lubes so they had to get on the bandwagon or lose out completely. But, some guys didn't like the smell (guess they wanted lilacs in their loading room?), some didn't like the tackness. Other lubes, especially the hard ones that need to be heated for use, came along but none of them work as well as the original for me. I can easily get 1,500 fps outta my .357/.44 mag stuff with it and only have light traces of leading - or none at all. I haven't even fooled with a different lube in the last 15 or so years and don't intend to do so.

My .243 'squirrel' load is a Lyman 85 gr, Loverin bullet lubed with Alox, it produces some 1,950 fps. It performs like a .22 WMRF with a flatter trajectory and much better penatration through leaves and twigs. I doubt I could get that speed with good accuracy using any other lube.

[nanuk]

I use ALOX because it works for me.

Hooct on fonex werkt fer mee