Polymer and moly coated bullets are an attractive cheap alternative to the sky rocketing cost of jacketed bullets, while they do smoke alot less than lead or the lead bullet lubricants, they do have some major health drawbacks. The smoke from burning polymer's, moly. and homopolymers may be worse for you than even lead or older bullet lube's.
They don't shoot so well with very fast burning powders:
We use fast burning powders combined with heavy bullets in the pursuit of softer feeling loads, the faster we can go the softer. That's why 320, 310, Tightgroup and Clays are so popular. We have accepted some pure accuracy loss in the pursuit of the holy grail of soft shooting clean loads. The problem is fast burning powders generate more of a pressure spike and heat at the heal and on the bearing surfaces of the bullet. This is why the coated bullet manufacturers recommend slower powders like bullseye shooters would use.
In the guns I have tried them in they are actually more accurate than plated, although not near so as jacketed hollow points. They were horrible and messy in my open gun.
Is lead really the bad guy, not so sure? Checkout the MSDS sheets on those slick coatings.
While Teflon, Molybdenum, and Homopolymers are pretty much inert and safe when in there solid states, they become completely different beasts when heated or burned. The new MSDS sheets on Teflon and the various homopolymers read like a who's who of nasty inhalants when burned.
Teflon:
When temperatures exceed 750 degrees Fahrenheit Teflon will undergo thermal decomposition and will emit ACUTELY toxic vapors. These vapors include Hexafluoropropylene, Perfluoroisobutylene and Carbonyl Fluoride.
Aspiration of these wonderful gases may lead to pulmonary edema. Exposure to thermo-degradation products may cause influenza-like symptoms also known as "Polymer fume fever condition" such as chills, headache, mild respiratory discomfort, shaking of the limbs, and high fever. And after long term, cancer.
Homopolymers:
Homopolymers emit Formaldehyde gas when heated and or burned. Formaldehyde is another well known chronic inhalation carcinogen.
Do your own MSDS checks and decide for yourself. Now I know why I hate the smell of the coated bullets even worse than the lead shooters smoke plumes. The problem is its easy to test for lead buildup but not so for polymer or formaldehyde poisioning.
Its jacketed hollow points ,CMJ or plated for me. JM2C