Pretty Boolits??

[Lizard333]

I have been casting now for only about a month now but I have found that my boolits are not that pretty.. I know this sounds stupid but I do not have the shinny purty boolits that alot of you post here. Don't get me wrong, they all shoot just fine and don't give me any leading in my guns but they are not shinny. I am using WW's with 2% tin added or jsut lain WW's and they just don't come out looking shinny. Am I doing something wrong?? Or do you guys just take the best looking boolits you got and shine them up for the camera??8-)

[RobS]

You are more than likely not doing anything wrong. The higher antimony content in WW alloy in particular straight WW without tin makes for more surface tension of the alloy so more heat is required to have adequate mold fill out resulting in the frosting. More tin in the alloy does lessen surface tension which helps with mold fill out and can also result in utilizing a cooler alloy temperature. Addition of tin and a cooler pot will keep the mold cooler resulting in the possibility of less frosting or none at all. Reducing the antimony content also makes it easier to cast those "shinny babies" such as 50/50 WW to lead with a dash of tin.

I though don't fret about the frosting and very seldom use tin as to the expense. If they shoot accurately and are working for your intended application then looks are trivial.

[462]

If there isn't any leading and accuracy is at an acceptable level, a shiney or frosty appearance is a non-issue.

[marshall623]

My boolits don't really shine but I think they are still purty. But they look even better when they smack a big bore ram at 200 M and watch it fall.

[Bullshop]

Pretty is as pretty does.

[fredj338]

Pretty/shiney bullets are usually a product of higher tin content & lower casting temps. Lino makes beautiful bullets @ 650deg, little to no frosting.

[Lizard333]

Good to know. Thanks for the info.

[L1A1Rocker]

Very informative thread. Thanks.

[blaser.306]

Pretty boolits , are well behaved boolits when they make it to the target board !

[Cadillo]

You've got enough tin to make a shiny bullet. Work on keeping your mould temperature down once it is up to the point it casts unwrinkled bullets with complete fill out. It took me a while to figure this out. Keep your melt temp below 700 F and then focus on your mould temp, and you will be there.

I use a small fan or a folded wet towel to keep mould temp down when I am casting in a hurry, but the moulds I use the towel on are iron. I don't think I would try that with aluminum or brass, because I just don't know whether it might cause warpage. No such problem though, with my iron moulds.

[cheese1566]

Why is it mine drop nice and shiny from my Lee molds, but then frost when cooled?

I usually do about 725 degrees, but cast fast and the sprues cut easily..

[noylj]

Don't you know the secret? Hand polish before photo shoot.
I have never had any problems with frosty bullets or dull bullets.

[Marine Sgt 2111]

I use a 92-2-6 mix and if I stay around 640 to 670 degrees...I get shiney boolits. If I go above 720 degrees I get frosting. It also depends on the boolits I'm casting. A two cavity .45 cal 400gr mold (irom) gets hot and stays hot a lot longer than a two cavity 200gr .30 cal or even a six cavity .30 cal 190gr aluminum mold. I used to cast WW alloy all the time frosted...but have noticed that with the 92-2-6 alloy that if you have one area that is frosted and not the entire boolit it forms a dip in the side of the boolit.

[geargnasher]

Photoshop :smile:

Gear

[Bret4207]

If it really bothers you then just take some 4/0 steel wool and swipe the loaded round. The boolit will be a lot shinier. Myself, I'm not much on surface appearances, not in boolits, cars or clothing. It's whats inside that counts.

Yers Trooly, Bret M, President and Chief Morale Officer, Curmudgeon and Not So Handsome Guys Society of America.

[cheese1566]

Yep, I oogle when I get the occassional shiny bullet that stays that way.

But I do notice a consistency of my frosty batches on how they run through my Star when sizing. I'll take that feel over shiny bullets any day!

[ColColt]

Mother's Mag works wonders as well.

[Ugluk]

A quick wipe with a rag makes mine shiny. Looks don't matter.

[geargnasher]

If it really bothers you then just take some 4/0 steel wool and swipe the loaded round. The boolit will be a lot shinier. Myself, I'm not much on surface appearances, not in boolits, cars or clothing. It's whats inside that counts.

Yers Trooly, Bret M, President and Chief Morale Officer, Curmudgeon and Not So Handsome Guys Society of America.

:mrgreen: A fresh, shiny coat of paint or bright lipstick has been the ruination of many a good man!

Gear

[songdog53]

Remember if they shoot on target and gun eats them good then no problem for thay are on one way trip and not a long time getting there so doubt whatever your shooting will ever notice lack of shine.

[gon2shoot]

I just shoot em, not dance with em. Dont worry about what they look like if if the results suit you.

[swheeler]

If it really bothers you then just take some 4/0 steel wool and swipe the loaded round. The boolit will be a lot shinier. Myself, I'm not much on surface appearances, not in boolits, cars or clothing. It's whats inside that counts.

Yers Trooly, Bret M, President and Chief Morale Officer, Curmudgeon and Not So Handsome Guys Society of America.

Pretty bullets are like pretty women, doesn't mean much! Beauty is only skin deep.

[Tom R]

Pretty bullets are like pretty women, doesn't mean much! Beauty is only skin deep.

I like them all pretty.

[caillouetr9981]

I have been casting now for only about a month now but I have found that my boolits are not that pretty.. I know this sounds stupid but I do not have the shinny purty boolits that alot of you post here. Don't get me wrong, they all shoot just fine and don't give me any leading in my guns but they are not shinny. I am using WW's with 2% tin added or jsut lain WW's and they just don't come out looking shinny. Am I doing something wrong?? Or do you guys just take the best looking boolits you got and shine them up for the camera??8-)
Try a mix of 9-parts WW and 1-part 50/50 Plumbers Lead (also know as Plumbers Solder).

If you can't find the Plumbers Lead at hardware stores, try Lowe's.

This mix does mold "purty" bullets, doesn't seem to give any leading problems (when used at reasonable velocities) and perform very well when they hit something.

Good Luck...

Reggie

[Doble Troble]

Run 'em hot and let 'em frost! Fill-out trumps shine. Casting lots of bullets fast trumps everything except shooting them.

[snuffy]

Ya mean like these?

http://photos.imageevent.com/jptowns/bullets/websize/IMG_0299.JPG

http://photos.imageevent.com/jptowns/cannont2ifolder/websize/IMG_0290.JPG

http://photos.imageevent.com/jptowns/cannont2ifolder/websize/IMG_0291.JPG

No, they're not all shined up, just as they dropped from the mold(s).

I was experimenting with Gears cool lead, hot mold technique. It works. If I let the molds get too hot, I got frosted boolits. In fact I had to set the molds on a wet sponge to keep them cool enough, even casting with 2 molds This was a relatively hard alloy, 15 lino-5 pure lead.

Yes, if the 500 440 lee started to get too hot, it would frost just a spot in the middle of the boolit, next to the inside of the mold. That thin area between the 2 cavities. It would be smaller in that area. The other is a 310 44 lee. The Miha grand canyon 500-700 was a dream to cast with. But it too would get too hot if not cooled or slowed the pace.

[GL49]

Snuffy,
Even on my best days, mine NEVER have looked that good!

[geargnasher]

Snuffy, the 9% antimony and 3% tin in your alloy melts at a pretty low temp, and fills out really well in a fairly cool mould. It's possible to do the same thing with wheel weight alloy, but much more difficult (for me, anyway). When using WW with a touch of tin added, I just set the pot about 100 degrees above the melt point and run the mould until I get complete fillout and a light, even frost, like these:

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=15701&d=1252306757

Gear

[a.squibload]

Snuffy, those are really nice.

Gear, yours look blurry???...:p
With my camera I partially push the trigger to make it focus,
then have to back away a little. Seems to work.

My latest boolits were nice & shiny... and full of wrinkles!:-(
Think my mold temp was too low.
I'll get better.

[weakhand luke]

OK, all well and good. But what is that frost on a hot molded boolit, and why can you just wipe it off?

[Doby45]

The highlighted one is EXACTLY how I try to cast mine.

http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b327/Doby45/Capture-1.jpg

[nanuk]

just use the same alloy as Swede Nelson....

all his pictures show boolits that appear to be machined from cold rolled steel...

all shiney and such

[geargnasher]

Gear, yours look blurry???...:p
With my camera I partially push the trigger to make it focus,
then have to back away a little. Seems to work.

My latest boolits were nice & shiny... and full of wrinkles!:-(
Think my mold temp was too low.
I'll get better.

I just linked an existing a pic from my attachments, that one was focused on the mould blocks themselves with regard to making a HP pin to fit the very nice old Ideal Keith mould, it isn't a very good pic of the boolits.


OK, all well and good. But what is that frost on a hot molded boolit, and why can you just wipe it off?

I'm lead to believe that the light "frost" that you can just wipe off is antimony dentrites forming on the surface of the lead, and that they contribute to "antimony wash" in gunbarrels, often confused with very light leading.

Heavily frosted (and pitted, dull looking) boolits are from the same effect, just more pronounced. Here's a better pic, the ones on the left were from a mould too hot, middle is the way I like it, right is too cool. ALLOY TEMPS WERE THE SAME FOR ALL THREE, 650F for COWW + 1.5% tin with a full-liquidus point of 560F:

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=28007&d=1293562439


just use the same alloy as Swede Nelson....

all his pictures show boolits that appear to be machined from cold rolled steel...

all shiney and such

I don't know what Swede uses most of the time, but I know that he's posted more than a few pics of mirror-bright, perfectly filled-out boolits cast from straight wheel weights. I don't know how he does it, especially from his aluminum moulds.

Gear

[a.squibload]

The highlighted one is EXACTLY how I try to cast mine.



The highlighted one is how I would LIKE to cast mine!

[Lizard333]

MY GOD SNUFFY!! To think I was jealous of purty boolits before I saw yours!! I don't think I could even shoot those!! Those are far to purty to shoot. So let me get this straight, you cast with hot lead and a cool mold?? Care to be a little more detailed??

[SwedeNelson]

geargnasher

Its because of my aluminum moulds and what I have picked up from you.
Block temp, melt temp, get every thing right and its a ball.
Nice and shinny and full fill out, couldn't ask for anything better.

http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i80/swedenelson/311284214GrRF001.jpg

http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i80/swedenelson/316165GrRF002.jpg

http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i80/swedenelson/311165GRRFre-run001.jpg

http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i80/swedenelson/460500GrRF002.jpg

Swede Nelson

[white eagle]

blue light reflecting adds wonderfully

[stubshaft]

I just finished casting some of Ranch Dogs 225 boolits out of my new mould. I was using "hardball" alloy.

[MikeS]

just use the same alloy as Swede Nelson....

all his pictures show boolits that appear to be machined from cold rolled steel...

all shiney and such

Speaking of machined boolits, I just cast 100 of Lee's H&G #68 clone tonight, and they came out really nice. On closer inspection you can even see the tool marks from where the mould was cut! Half of the pot was my mix of stick on wheel weights & lino, the other 5 lbs were some clip on wheel weight ingots I bought today at a local gunshop.

With as much hassle as I've been having getting wheel weights on my own, I think I'm going to buy some more of his ingots, they're selling 1lb WW ingots for $1.00 each, and they're local, so there's no shipping involved!

[snuffy]

http://www.castboolits.gunloads.com/showpost.php?p=1151702&postcount=31

lizzard333 posted;

MY GOD SNUFFY!! To think I was jealous of purty boolits before I saw yours!! I don't think I could even shoot those!! Those are far to purty to shoot. So let me get this straight, you cast with hot lead and a cool mold?? Care to be a little more detailed??

Nope, you got it bass-acwards. Cool lead, hot mold. The link above is from this thread;

http://www.castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=106025

Gearnasher has changed the way I've been casting for the last 40 years. Look at his comments on that thread, you CAN make boolits that look like that, but the temp range of the mold is very narrow. Accurate read-out and control of the alloy is critical. The mold will tell you where it wants to be to produce shiny well-filled-out boolits.

Those cast big, the .44's were .433, the 500's were .503. They sized well but took some work, the hard alloy and sizing to .431 and .501 was accomplished. I plan on putting some thermocouples in a few molds, then running them into a thermometer so I can keep track of temps, so I can duplicate the same set-up in the future. I also have to start writing stuff down, my main weakness is poor record keeping. Maybe now that I'm retired, I will have the time to do that.

[geargnasher]

That thread was a workout! I'm glad some good came out of it.

Lizzard, the short version that works 95% of the time is get a thermometer and find out at what temp your alloy is fully liquid, meaning the last speck of slush has disappeared, add 100 degrees F, and that's your pot temperature. Run it up to that point and make certain it stays there, frequent temp adjustments may be necessary. Preheat your mould by submerging a corner in the molten alloy until the lead won't stick anymore, or heat it on a hotplate until it will sizzle spit. Start casting boolits, as fast as you reasonably can, cut the sprue when still soft, about a half-second before it hazes over in the last solidus transition, until your boolits fill out like you like them. Keep casting until they start to frost, then slow down the pours-per-minute until the boolits are like you like them. Passing the "ideal" mould temperature zone both ways by varying the casting pace will show you how that particular alloy and that particular mould get along with each other, and don't forget to note current weather conditions in your casting area. For the other 5% of the time that the above doesn't work, turn the pot up or down 25 degrees (as dictated by the issue you're trying to solve). If that doesn't fix it, you have a problem unrelated to temperature.

Snuffy, I used to keep a casting log with detailed notes on my moulds, temps, casting pace (# of pours per minute) and alloys, but I found that the data changed with each casting session due to slight differences in alloy, the weather, state of mould break-in, etc., so there was no point. Easy enough to preheat, cast until the mould is too hot, then back down to "just right" (what ever that is in my mind at the time), and hold rock steady until it's time to add more to the pot and take a break. I have a touch of OCD, and keeping notes is kind of an obsession, but at a certain point it takes all the fun out of things, adding unecessary "noise" to the mental side of a casting session. I log my shooting sessions and have a log book for each gun, but casting and reloading logs are too much for this guy, I like to just glance at a fresh boolit and think "faster" or "just right", make sure the PID thermocouple reading is in range, and not think about it too much.

I'm not a fan of super-shiny boolits either, I prefer a light frost (the kind that wipes right off with half a twist in a rag), which is about 20-50 degrees above the shiny point, I find there is more forgiveness in the ideal temp window at that point than at the shiny point (where a mold temp dip of 5 degrees can suddenly round a base or band in one spot, or 10 degrees too hot and the sharp edges get "frostbite". To each their own, if they're good, consistent castings it doesn't matter except to the beholder, same reason they put eyes on fishing lures!

Gear

[nanuk]

.....it doesn't matter except to the beholder, same reason they put eyes on fishing lures!

Gear

so.... What are you saying? Seeing Hooks don't catch more fish?

Natives on the Left Coast painted Eyes on their bows so they could see the animals and help the arrows flight!

I simply REFUSE to believe that Hooks with Eyes Cannot see!

[Swindler1]

Pretty bullets are like pretty women, doesn't mean much! Beauty is only skin deep.

But ugly is clear to the bone. :p

[geargnasher]

Naw, man, they put eyes on fishing lures so as a marketing ploy to catch fishermen! (by their wallets, that is!)

Gear

[Cadillo]

Pretty bullets are like pretty women, doesn't mean much! Beauty is only skin deep.

I dunno. Looking at ugly women just never had any appeal for me, and pretty bullets are just 'Prettier"

[SwedeNelson]

I think shiny bullets are a byproduct of getting your temp right.
I a lot like gear like to run close to the frosty point, he goes over
and I like to stay under. I call it the transitional temp.
10F to 15F under and I get very consistent fill out and weight.
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showpost.php?p=1042688&postcount=85
Ultimately that is what I'm looking for.

Swede Nelson