water drop

[NSP64]

Cast up some .429 boolits last night out of w/w with a touch of tin added, and dropped some of them into ice water to see if the hardness would be better. air cooled came in at 11 bhn on my LEE tester and the water quelched was a 22bhn!!! now heres the question? if I size them will they lose the hardness on the driving bands?

[armoredman]

I gotta get a bucket, and try that.

[shooter93]

Lube them in a 430 die...nothing will happen....size them in a 429 die and the effect will be so minimal as not to notice. Smaller dies will have more of an effect but again....it would take a lot of sizing to make a significant difference.

[454PB]

If you want to size them much, do it immediately after casting. At that point, they haven't hardened yet, and sizing won't affect the hardening process.

[Driller640]

I water drop my ww and they drop at .433 eh. I then size them to .427 for my 44-40 and they remain HARD. So go ahead and size away, you can't soften then up by sizing eh. God bless

[Char-Gar]

It doesn't really matter whether those 22 Bhn bullets lose hardness or not. They are starting out way harder than any real world need known to mankind.

[trickyasafox]

I water drop all my boolits, just cause its easier and i haven't had a need not to yet.

I use a folgers plastic coffee can with ice and water and a t-shirt on top. very easy and less splash as i can put it up higher and it's easier to handle because it doesn't weigh as much.

a big casting day for me though is 500-600 boolits though, so you volume guys might not be able to get away with this.

[armoredman]

So you just tap the boolits out over a water/ice filled coffee can? No need for anything soft at the bottom? Sounds easy enough - I have an empty can, water and an ice maker, (required in AZ), so I can try this sometime soon.

[Ricochet]

If you're concerned about keeping the hardness very uniform from bullet to bullet, after you get done sizing them, stick them back in a pan, put them in an oven at 475°F or so (for wheelweight or softer alloys, linotype melts at this temp) and leave them for an hour after the oven reaches the preheat temp. Then dump them quickly in cold water. Lube them without further sizing and you're ready to go. Takes up to 2 weeks or so for full hardness to be reached, but the bullets in the batch will all harden together.

They may be very hard to size without some lubrication; soapy water or plain straight liquid soap like Murphy's Oil Soap is a lubricant that works and can be rinsed off easily prior to heating in the oven.

[trickyasafox]

just make sure you put a shirt over the top of the container with a slit in it to contain the splash so you don't get a drop of water on the inside of the mold cavities.

[Ricochet]

Unnecessary. If you have your mould well warmed up, no drop of water will survive till you put lead in the cavities again.

[trickyasafox]

wow! i didn't know that :) thanks ricochet. it didn't take long to set up the shirt, but it did prevent me from seeing how many i produced and that got annoying.

sorry for the misinformation

[NSP64]

I gotta get a bucket, and try that.

I go to the store and get a 1gal pail of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, eat ice cream then use pail for casting projects:mrgreen:
It has a nice big opening and pretty good depth.

[NSP64]

just make sure you put a shirt over the top of the container with a slit in it to contain the splash so you don't get a drop of water on the inside of the mold cavities.
I like the idea of a T-shirt over the pail, but I think I will try it with no slit. That way the shirt can be submerged and then pulled out when full of cooled boolits. That water was pretty cold the other night:drinks:

[Misfire99]

I go to the store and get a 1gal pail of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, eat ice cream then use pail for casting projects:mrgreen:
It has a nice big opening and pretty good depth.
Oh I'm up for this. Gee honey I need this ice cream for making bullets.

[madcaster]

If you happen to eat the ice cream box "al la Cheesepaper" wrapper,you can use a 5 gallon bucket,filled about 2/3rds full of water,with a water soaked car washing sponge and then place a few packing peanuts in there to finish covering the surface of the water,this both protects the bullets and prevents splashing of the water's surface.
Don't blame me for this advice,all these FINE fellas here on the board told me all this,and it sure has been helpful!

[Sundogg1911]

Sizing will work soften your boolits. I try to keep sizing to a minimum. I never water quench or heat treat because i'll cast large batches and by the time i've finished using them up (for the most part) they've gone back to their un-heat treat or water dropped hardness. either is fine if you use them up, but if they set for a long time. (I have some boolits that I cast almost a decade ago) you should just use a harder alloy. (more Lino or monotype) I shoot tons of .40 S&W and .45 ACP but all off my oddball stuff sets on the shelf for a good long time.

[leftiye]

Size 'em and then heat treat them.

[Bret4207]

I'm in the water drop crowd. I hardly have time to cast, much less screw around with ovens. If I want a harder boolit I water drop and alter the loading to fit what I need. I might also add some magnum shot to the pot to up the antimony/arsenic a bit too. My lino supply is very small and saved for really special occasions.

FWIW- If I can manage it I shoot as cast diameter with Lee's Mule Snot or use a die that barely touches the boolit and seats the GC in the lubrisizer.

[Newtire]

So you just tap the boolits out over a water/ice filled coffee can? No need for anything soft at the bottom? Sounds easy enough - I have an empty can, water and an ice maker, (required in AZ), so I can try this sometime soon.

Have been doing this since I read about it on castboolits! They indeed are much harder.

[armoredman]

Neat! I am back to work, (today is Monday, :( dagnabbit.), but next weekend, I will scare up a 1 pound coffee can and some ice water, and give this a shot. Thanks, guys!

[cast-n-blast]

For larger boolits, try floating a sponge on top of water and dropping them on it. The sponge will flip over, and sofly drop the boolits to the bottom.

[454PB]

I've never used ice water, at the rate I cast it wouldn't stay ice for over a few minutes. I've never noticed any difference in hardness from using water that might get up to 100 degrees. Use a larger volume of water to reduce it's temperature increase.

I don't fish the boolits out, I dump the water off. I then dump the boolits on a towel for a few minutes, then begin sizing (if needed). If they either don't need sizing or are to be sized in a slightly larger than as-cast diameter die, I do them at any latter date.

Yes, I've done the testing to prove to me that sizing resoftens the boolits if it is done after the hardening process is complete.

[shotstring]

Richochet, if you are planning on heat treating your bullets in a convection oven for increased consistency and then dropping them in ice water, would it be preferable to drop bullets in water from the mold or let them air cool? Does it even matter?

[Bret4207]

I don't think a 1lb coffee can is deep enough. IME using a 5 gallon sheet rock bucket I find a few boolits with dents. A smaller can will have more issues with this. The bigger/heavier the design the more the likelyhood you will get dents. Mind you I fill the bucket about 2/3 full and still get dents in the 35/250 Bator occasionally.

[Ricochet]

Shotstring, for hardening purposes it wouldn't matter, but I do most all of my casting with water dropping because it's so much easier to do it that way than to drop bullets on a towel without getting them dinged up against each other. If I want soft bullets I go back, heat them in the oven and let them air cool. If you're getting past a couple of dozen bullets at a time on a towel you've got a mess. Five or six hundred in a bucket of water's a good start.

[Adam10mm]

I dropped some 10mm-175-TC into water. Just used a 5gal bucket with a big towel on the bottom with the edges folded outward of the bucket. When I was done I picked the corners of the towel and lifted up my boolits. Then dumped them out on a dry towel to dry.

Haven't gotten to lube them yet as my order from Lar's isn't here yet.

[Single Shot]

I use a six gallon bucket filled with tap water to within 2 inches of the top. Splash is not a problem.

Bucket is on a short stool and the lead pot is on a 35 inch tall bench.

If any droplet of water hits the mold cavity, just hold the mold open a second and it will sizzle off.

I have cast up to 344grain bullets this way with no problem.

No towel in the bucket. Bullets don't dent with that much water.

I have a plastic valve on the bottom edge of the bucket to drain it when water reaches the top because of two inches of boolits.

I just drain the water into a separate bucket then dump the boolits onto beach towels used just for casting.

All that water and bullets is two much weight to lift and carry to the garage sink to drain it.

[JMax]

I cast mine so they are frosty and have a cardboard V that I tap the bullets into and let them roll into a 5 gallon bucket of water eliminating the splash problem. When I get my steel molds up to temperature I can keep 4 4 cavity H&G molds very busy and cast a large pile of hardened bullets. My Star lube sizer deforms the driving bands very little and have excellent results.

[fourarmed]

If your concern is with surface hardness of the bullet, then sizing might be a problem. If you want bullet strength to prevent slumping under acceleration, then I doubt that sizing will affect that.