To Moly or not To Moly?

[gypsea]

What are the pros and cons of moly coated bullets fired through my stainless NM M1A barrel? This Black Hills match stuff seems to work great since I am not reloading, yet.

[Big Dog]

You'll get differing opinions, but I personally like Moly. I have a .22 Hornet rifle I use moly-coated ammo in, and it is superbly accurate! The groups are far tighter for me, than if I use uncoated bullets. :right:

But, I haven't used moly on a .308 yet.

[Otter]

I use Black Hills Moly coated in my 7.62x51mm Savage model 10FP-LE2. It seems to be easy to clean, 168 gr match hollow point. Good stuff.

"Life is too important to be taken seriously."

[7mmag6]

lots of controversy on this. Many folks say it improves accuracy while there are many who say no, I know that moly bullets usually exit the barrel about 25 fps lower than regular bullets, a friend of mine proved that on his chronometer. One thing batted around is the wear may be quite a bit less with moly due to the reduced friction. some folks say that combining water and moly residue in the barrel will make a steel barrel rust like the dickens, so cleaning asap is reccomended. I have noticed no improvement on my nm m1a, but it could be operator error. For me its not worth the extra money.

[dave375hh]

Gypsea,
The downside of moly is that it's hygroscopic ie; moly will attract moisture from the air and rust can result. The simple fix to the problem is just oil the barrel before storage. All my varmint guns use moly bullets and i've had no rust at all. My reasons for using moly were to be able to shoot more rounds before cleaning due to a loss of accuracy, and possible longer barrel life. As an example the 22-250 had to be cleaned after every 20-25 rnds before moly. After the moly I can now shoot 80-90 rnds before the accuracy falls off. The jury is still out on barrel life as only time will tell, but I got what I wanted in regards to cleaning interval. I saw no change in accuracy and the velocity was only slightly changed, not enough to make me feel a need to increase my loads.

Many people(who never used moly) will tell you that moly is hard to remove from the barrel, but it's not with the newer cleaning products on the market now. The problem is, moly is supposed to coat the barrel that's how it works! An even build up is what makes it work best. If you remove it every time you have to start over every time you shoot the rifle and that can take 15-20 rnds to re-plate the barrel with moly. I believe the wax leads to chunky build-up and I don't wax mine, I've never had an uneven or clumpy build-up that I've heard others complain of.

Cleaning is much easier and quicker also. Like 5-6 min per barrel, Two patches of 50/50 Kroil/Shooters choise, 6-10 passes with a brush. clean patches 3-4, 6-7 passes with J-B on a patch wrapped around an undersized brush, one tight patch with laquer thinner, one patch with Cleansoil, Done.

Moly does just what I wanted it to do, It works for me.

[gypsea]

Originally Posted by Big Dog

You'll get differing opinions, but I personally like Moly. I have a .22 Hornet rifle I use moly-coated ammo in, and it is superbly accurate! The groups are far tighter for me, than if I use uncoated bullets. :right:

But, I haven't used moly on a .308 yet.

Thanks for the input...gypsea

[gypsea]

Thanks for the input...gypsea