Gas Checks:

I picked-up a wee baggie of .32" GAS CHECKS from a dealers stall at last years Christchurch MAMS Show .. I gave the guy $5 when he asked how much were they worth to me!

- I didn't have any particular application in mind - but thought that they "might come in handy".

These things are designed to be crimped in place to the base of projectiles to protect from the gas-cutting action of the high pressure burning powder on cast lead pills when driven hard:

I'd be guessing a bit if I said that most handgun loads below say 1,000 feet per second wouldn't need to be gas-checked .. unless you're trying to shoot swagged soft lead 9mm pills from a Glock .. those hexagonal grooved bores definitely don't like lead bullets and will "lead-up" real quick - 'Glocksters' stick to jacketed or plated pills I'd say.

Certainly riflemen playing with cast bullets might make better progress towards a low cost but useful home load if they selected a casting mold that throws bullets ready for a gas check. like those 'thirty calibers' above.

- Although bear in mind that the latest anti-gun study is that lead bullet fragments & residue in the meat of hunted animals will cause lead poisoning .. particularly in young people.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5161761/

Guys with brains should be focusing on making better ammunition WITHOUT LEAD .. What's wrong with solid copper? - then we could boast that our bullets are both 'lead free' and anti-bacterial. 😊.

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Hornady seem to be the main source for gas-checks - but you might be able to find a die set kit to stamp-out your own gas checks from sheet aluminum beer or soda cans (or aluminium as we poms were taught at school).

I keep looking at that wee baggie and scheming for duplex / triplex or 'buck'n'ball' loads for my 327 Fed. Magnum with the gas-check used between the powder and balls or shot.

I'll do it 😄

Marty K.