Cheyenne,
The idea of a bullet resting against a primer bothered me at one time, too, which is why I did some checking on it. In the smaller calibers, the bullet has to rest on a primer in a straight tube mag. Any ogive at all makes a .25 bullet nose smaller than a large rifle primer. The meplat has to be larger than a quarter inch to bridge the primer pocket. Yet, .25-35s are and always have been loaded with RN bullets.
As long as the bullet does not dent the primer, the primer will not go off. With an exposed lead surface that is fairly blunt, the lead will flatten long before it will dent the primer. The major factories have depended on this for over 100 years and they continue to load RN bullets in cartridges for rifles with tube magazine. If it's safe enough for them, it's safe enough for me.
The only magazine explosions I have heard of with RN bullets involved FMJs. Those were handloaders putting 265 FMJs in .44 mag and shooting them in the little Ruger semi-auto carbine. I suppose one could also run into trouble using a very pointed RN cast from straight lino or water quenched wheelweights. That might make them hard enough to dent a primer.
Just out of curiousity, I took some very pointed bullets cast of air cooled WW and put flats on the point. I was set up to size using a Lee push through, put a bullet on the pedestal and a flat piece of steel across the die. Moderate force gave me nice uniform flats ahout the size of a small primer and did not seem to deform the body of the bullet at all. They went through the sizer with the normal amount of effort.
