Today is a good day.

[Josh45]

Hello everyone, I thought about getting into casting sometime ago but never did jump on the band wagon. That has changed as I have about 50-70 lbs of lead avilable to me and a 230 Gr TL-RN for my .45 ACP and got a hold of a single cavity mold dropping a 125-128 Gr LRN for my GP-100.

My TL-Mold came in 2 days ago but could produce nothing as I was using a hot plate and the lee ladle. It doesn't work when you try to do it this way. Need to much lead to get it done. How ever, The single cavity worked pretty darn well! So I kept doing so and produced my self some LRN boolits! I was excited. S

Sure they came out wrinkled even tho I was pre heating the mold but not dipping them into the lead while hot. They wrinkled up but I figured for plinking, It isn't a big deal.
I water quenched them. I hope that was a good idea. As for lube, I only lubed up one with some beeswax. Did it by hand. I have no idea how others really lube up there boolits in batches other than the cake cutting method.

Any tips there would be greatly appreciated. I fluxed using some parrafin wax. Talk about smoke! But fluxed lead is better, Right? So I then decided to load one round up in .38 Special.

I grabbed a W-W case, A CCI 500 Primer, Some Universal powder with a charge of 4.4 Gr and sat my LRN boolit to the cannelure and gave it a slight/modest crimp. I checked the OAL and got 1.560? Is that normal?

I already got a order in for a Lee Production Pot IV and should be in 2-4 days from now ( I hope ) Thanks for having this site and I hope I can learn a lot. :bigsmyl2:

[MtGun44]

Water quenching is totally unnecessary for 99% of pistol ammo, and harmful to
some - too hard can cause problems. Beeswax by itself is a poor lube, needs the
Alox to make it work well.

Cast faster if you have wrinkles - to get the mold up to temp.

Bill

[Josh45]

I have the Lee Alox available. I will mix some of it together. I was only doing a couple of test rounds. They are hard but add a bit of strength and I can leave a slight nail mark in the boolit.
And I will stop the water quenching. I will just use a slight damp rag I guess?

And thank you for responding.

[runfiverun]

it takes a week or so for the cast boolits to reach thier final hardness.
read around in the various forums here things will become much clearer.

[Josh45]

A week or so? Well, Reading would have helped. Guess I was to excited. I thought I could cast and lube and shoot them!

[edler7]

A week or so? Well, Reading would have helped. Guess I was to excited. I thought I could cast and lube and shoot them!


Or throw them in that new Pro 4 when it comes. You should scrounge/find/buy a single burner hot plate to warm your mold...no wrinkles.

Do a search for the Recluse 45/45/10 lube if you have alox. Good stuff.

[hanover67]

Josh:
I recently started casting also, .38, .44, .32-20. I had obtained a Lee bottom-pour furnace and an RCBS Lubrisizer before starting. The first bullets I cast were wrinkled, but as the mold (Lyman steel mold) heated up bullets came out fine - no wrinkles and sharp, clean bases. As someone on this website said, "The more you do it the better you get."

Keep casting, and just as important, keep reading posts on Cast Boolits. Ask questions and you'll find a wealth of information will come back to you from the other members. I can't tell you how much i've learned in the few months I've been casting. Its like a Masters Degree...

[Josh45]

Thanks for the response guys. As for the hot plate thing, I have one that is a double burner. Let the mold heat up on one side and the lead on the other. It wasn't as hot as the one with the lead melting so maybe that was the problem?

Also, Are you guys serious about the one week thing? Or you just yanking my chain? lol

[waksupi]

Seriously!

[Bullet Caster]

You don't have to wait a week before reloading and shooting. Many don't. That week is just the time it takes for your boolits to become the hardest. I think it's called age hardening.

I always try to plan ahead and have a bunch of boolits already made before I reload 'em. But it is not necessary. I've got some boolits that I cast last fall and haven't reloaded 'em yet 'cause I ain't got no more brass. Guess I'm gonna have to go to the range soon so I'll have some brass to reload. Lol. BC

[MtGun44]

Why a damp rag? I just drop mine onto a dry folded towel. No need to cool them
quickly or make them harder than air cooled wheel wts.

Please try to get past this "harder is better" baloney. You can lube and shoot them
the same day you make them. If you water drop, they will harden over a week or
so. If you air cool, they may harden slightly with time, pretty much
negligable IME.

50-50 beeswax and alox is the classic NRA formula, a very good lube.

Bill

[waksupi]

I must disagree with that, Bill. Even air hardened, they will increase in hardness for around three weeks. Water quenched, they will achieve finished hardness in a few days, and be close enough after 24 hours.

[mdi]

For a new caster, just concentrate on temperatures. Find out, by practice, how hot your mold needs to be to produce good boolits. Find out how hot to have your lead to keep your mold hot at your casting tempo. Buy a lube from White Lable Lubes or T/L with alox, less to think about until you start getting good boolits.http://www.lsstuff.com/lube/ Just drop the boolits from the mold onto a folded towel and don't be concerned with boolit hardness, that will come later. Unless your alloy is pure lead don't fret BHN stuff.

"The only way to learn to cast bullets, is to cast bullets". I read that in Joe Brennan's book "Cast Bullets for Beginner and Expert". Worked for me.

If you don't have one get a copy of Lyman's Cast Bullet Handbook 3rd Edition (If you can't find a 3rd Edition a 4th Edition will do fine). Lots of info on making your own cast lead boolits...

BTW; Casting and shooting your own bullets is prolly the single most satisfying aspect of roll yer own ammo.

[Wolfer]

I didnt have any luck mixing beeswax and lee liquid alox. Soon as it cooled it became hard as a rock. Wax from a toilet bowl ring is a good softener for beeswax or parrifin. It's also a good flux. It's also cheap!

I haven't had good luck with pan lubeing. Don't have a suitable pan or a level place in my house.

I built a set of tongs out of banding that I can grip the nose of the boolit with and dip them into my melted lube then set them on a piece of glass. Most of the bases will come clean because the lube sticks to the glass.
I then run them thru a lee push thru die or cut the lube off with an oversize cartridge case.

IMO if your boolit fits your gun your bhn can be pretty soft and any soft gooey lube will work great for this low velocity stuff.

[Josh45]

Well, I finally got the pot in and read up a bit more and asked a few questions and took advice from everyone I could ask. I dropped 260 45 ACP 230 Gr LRN TL bullets that are good to shoot. Very few came out wrinkled and some out of round. They went back into the pot.

This is what the 45 ACP looks like after I finished up with them. Loaded one up just to see what my OAL was and it came out to 1.260. The weight of the boolits are coming out at 235-236 Gr. There coming out at .452-.453.

http://i656.photobucket.com/albums/uu285/Dork1989/DSC02951.jpg

This all 260 rounds, Like I said some came out wrinkled but they were fine round wise.
http://i656.photobucket.com/albums/uu285/Dork1989/DSC02953.jpg

Then I casted some more 38 Spcl boolits. Getting them at 125-127 Gr. Using the single cavity getting them rounded out at .358-.359. Had my pot set at 7-8 most of the time and my mold was lubed and aligned. Made sure of it and got it to temp. Threw the rejects and ended up with these.

http://i656.photobucket.com/albums/uu285/Dork1989/DSC02952.jpg

I started at about 10:30 this morning and did not stop till about 20 min ago. Being 3:10 or somewhere in that area. Took me so long to do using a single cavity and a double cavity but Im fine with that! Im not worried about hardness but I did find out how to make my boolits come out right! Get some lubed and get some shot thru the 1911 and the Mil Pro PT145!

Thanks for the info and let me know what you guys think. Im looking for lube recipes now as I have beeswax, Alox, Mineral Spirits, Parrafin, Vaseline, and some 2 cycle oil.

[largom]

I must disagree with that, Bill. Even air hardened, they will increase in hardness for around three weeks. Water quenched, they will achieve finished hardness in a few days, and be close enough after 24 hours.


Agree 100% with waksupi. I conducted tests where I hardness tested air cooled boolits every week until the hardness stabilized. It took 4 weeks.

Larry

[ubetcha]

Running your Lee pot at #7-#8 should get the lead quite hot.You should be getting frosted bullets.Some of your bullets still look wrinkled.Just wondering if you did a good job of cleaning you mold of oil and grease.Also some of the bands do not have sharp clean edges.An indicaton of not enough heat or not a clean mold..Give your molds a good scrubbing in hot soapy water and a nylon brush like an old tooth brush or a AR/M16 cleaning brush found in many catalogs.An investment in a lead thermomitoris a good idea.You will be able to find the right temp your mold like to be at to produce good casts.My molds lke to be run at between 700 and 800 degrees.Once the right temp is found ,find a good pace to cast at.keep the mold and lead at the right spot. 45/45/10 Recluse lube

[Josh45]

Ubetcha, Thanks for the insight.
I will try cleaning them again. This time I will use some mineral spirits I got to make the Recluse lube. I would make some of it but the problem is I cannot find the JPW anywhere around me. I do not have a Lowes/Home Depot by me. Just some small hardware stores. I have to get in contact with them about it.

For now, Im gonna try the straight Alox with them and see how it works out for me. Some of the boolits did get frosted but very lightly and some on one side only. These were all casted in between that area of 7-8. Also, The wrinkled boolits were not my casting. Those were my fathers and brothers. They were trying to do it about 2 days ago.

I had got the mold to a high enough temp to keep it going good enough.
I will keep trying but so far, I think my experience is climbing steadily in this.

[ubetcha]

I would think that if you had an Ace or Tru value nearby,they should be able to help with the JPW.One thing to sure and follow if you are making 45/45/10 is NO OPEN FLAME when reducing the JPW.Quite flammable

[Josh45]

So I read about the quite flammable part here by another member here.
Got a hotplate still and can do the double boiler method to try that out.
Thanks again.