45 Acp question

[kweidner]

I really have gotten serious about casting lately. Reinvented my ACP load for 1911 I have moved to a load of 4.9 grains of bullseye running acww and felix lube. was ringing steel 8" plate nearly every shot at 100 yds yesterday. Question is this. I have a Ton "literally" of pure lead. Ex-ray tables and sticky weights. Would this be too soft for my ACP load? Need something to shoot it up anyway. I would like to keep my harder stuff around for my magnums. What say you to pure with said load? Anyone done this or is it too soft? Had so much fun yesterday and now that the season is over I will be shooting 1911 much more. i figure a ton should make 70000. better order a few more barrels if It works!

[Cherokee]

The pure lead is too soft, IMO, for the 45 ACP. You need to add some hardness. What other alloy do you have ?

[captaint]

I have been mixing WW's with soft lead at a ratio of 50/50 and had success with that. My loads are not quite as warm as yours though, in my 1911's. The soft lead may be lacking in the ability to hold on to that shallow rifling common in 1911 barrels. My experience only... enjoy Mike

[kweidner]

got plenty of ww just trying to ration it. You guys have helped make me a scrounger. Valued like gold in my house. I wonder what is the least i could mix with soft to get good boolits and use some soft up.

[runfiverun]

i'd bet 50-50 snd s titch of tin would be fine.
you can always waterdrop that alloy to get about 14 or so bhn.
i doubt 70,000 boolits will wear out a Bbl.

[Shiloh]

That works fine runfiverun.
50/50 range scrap and WW is plenty hard enough. I'm actually running a bit softer metal, but the load is 4.0 gr. of Bullseye. This is with a LEE TLSWC that drops at 208 gr. .

Same boolit with 5.0 gr of Unique.

Shiloh

[williamwaco]

I really like 50/50 WW/Lead. Makes top notch bullets. For any handgun.
A smidgin of tin will make them prettier but will not make them shoot any better.


.

[lead chucker]

If you don't mind buying some tin to conserve your WW 16-1 or 20-1 lead tin should work. I tried pure lead in my black hawk with 45 acp cylinder but it would lead.

[kweidner]

was thinking the same thing with tin. Might get some superhard to blend or go 50/50. I figured I was asking something someone had tried. right now bhn is a 9 with acww. IIRC bhn too is exponential so a 5 or 6 is some kind of soft. Just see this huge pile of soft lead and was trying to conserve the ever disappearing coww actually made from lead and not steel or zinc.:violin:

[leadman]

Superhard will make an alloy you can use. A little bit of tin if it doesn't want to fill out.
If you can get some lino to mix this works real well.

See the "Cast bullet notes from LASC" at the bottom of the page for mixing your alloy.

[saint_iverson]

Adding 50/50, or close to and maybe chilled... Has proven to boost BHN, also, size as close to your 45 bore as you can. Taking any remaining slop out of the bullet/bbl combo. Also note, that as you change alloy, your mold will drop to a different size and will affect accuracy.

[prs]

Your ton of lead plus 40 pounds of tin and 60 pounds of antimony, then you are all set. One of our sponsors has the aformentioned super hard product and also high tin alloy.

prs

[Wayne Smith]

I'm willing to bet your current ww's are cheaper than buying tin or superhard. 50/50 Pb/ww gives you about the equivalent hardness as 16/1 Pb/tin. It will be a tougher alloy but cheaper than buying tin. You pays your money and takes your choice.

[garym1a2]

I would try it and find out. With a good fit and the slow speed of your boolit you may get decent results.

I really have gotten serious about casting lately. Reinvented my ACP load for 1911 I have moved to a load of 4.9 grains of bullseye running acww and felix lube. was ringing steel 8" plate nearly every shot at 100 yds yesterday. Question is this. I have a Ton "literally" of pure lead. Ex-ray tables and sticky weights. Would this be too soft for my ACP load? Need something to shoot it up anyway. I would like to keep my harder stuff around for my magnums. What say you to pure with said load? Anyone done this or is it too soft? Had so much fun yesterday and now that the season is over I will be shooting 1911 much more. i figure a ton should make 70000. better order a few more barrels if It works!

[Echo]

You might try going on eBay and buying some monotype. I have bought it for about $2/lb delivered. I mix it 7/1 ww(or range scrap, or Pb)/mono, and add about 1% additional SN. Monotype is 9% Sn, 19% Sb, and works great as a hardening agent. 35 lbs Pb, 5 lbs mono, and 6 oz Sn works!

[geargnasher]

Personally, I'd be very cautious of buying type metals unless it was from a reputable seller here, many of the old type metals are very depleted and I have a perfect example in a bunch of monotype I traded for that's 7 bhn. Perfect little letter blocks, 7 bhn. Might as well be roofing lead.

What I would do is take advantage of being able to make a "known" alloy and buy some Superhard from Rotometals like Leadman mentioned, and get about ten pounds of tin also. Twenty pounds of Superhard and ten pounds of tin will make half a ton of 2% Sb/1%Sn alloy. That's 30,000 230-grain boolits for less than $200. You can use the same alloy in your rifles to VERY good effect, better even than ACWW in many instances, if you water-quench them properly, or oven heat-treat them. I prefer water-quenched 50/50 COWW/roof lead or 75/25 COWW/roof lead to ACWW most of the time, the heat-treated low-antimony alloy will take the same pressures and velocities as the higher antimony air-cooled stuff will, but the low-antimony stuff is tougher and more malleable when heat treated to the same BHN and just seems to shoot better.

Just my dos centavos, if you're short on funds try doing what Runfiverun suggested.

Gear

[Lizard333]

50/50 soft to WW. Water dropped you should be good. I've shot thousands of this combo through my 1911 with 5.0 gns of 231 in a 225 gn RN Lyman. One of most accurate loads.

[MT Gianni]

Sell 1/4 of your PB and buy Rotometals superhard. Blend as Gear suggested and you will be set for a long time.

[kweidner]

thanks guys. I will try a couple different things this weekend. I just loaded 300 more to get through till then. I shoot insane amounts of ammo for not doing competition anymore of any description. Just no local matches around here. My goal 6 years ago was to become a great shot with a handgun. Just average now but working hard towards that goal. Little rifle groups lost their charm for everyday shootin. still love it and do it on the weekends but there is certainly more challenge for me with a handgun. It is an everyday affair. Throw the boolit factor in and it becomes even more fun. Still got lots of learning to do.