Boolits shiney but light

[DavZee]

Had a casting session the other day and it was great. It was really hitting on all cylinders. I had the pot temp at 625 controled by my PID and my Lee 6 cavity 200 gr. .45 acp swc mold was just right. I was making some perfectly filled out boolits. And they are shiny. I mean chrome like shiny. I was using muffins given to me from someone who has passed. Even the muffins were kinda shiny. Real silvery anyway.
But tonight I got to weighting some of them and they are all in the 170 gr. area. I thought that seemed kinda light from a 200 gr. mold. I don't know enough to figure out why so light. Any ideas on why?
Wow, they sure do look good though! I got about 1000 of them!

[fryboy]

both tin and antimony are lighter than lead per same volume , tin and lead usually are the shinier of the various things we use in alloys , pure lead will throw the heaviest casting with various alloys casting less

[SWANEEDB]

If you have not lubed them yet I would melt them down, you have way too much good stuff there too throw down range, if all your muffins look the same you better get some w/w or straight lead, a quick way that I would do it is weigh them out, get a lb of lead and make a comparison.

[bangerjim]

Sounds like you have a good source of tin there! Way too high to shoot/waste.

If you have no idea what was given to you, you are pretty much "shooting(casting) in the dark". Those shiny muffins raise a really BIG question right there. They could be lino but you would not have the weight problem. You may have pure tin muffins!!!!!!!!!!

You can cast a 1# ingot in a Lyman or Lee standard mold and weigh it. It should pretty close to 16 oz if you have a standard lead alloy. If tin, it will be MUCH MUCH lighter. You WILL notice the difference! Also pure tin has a much "warmer mellow" (sort of a yellowish tint) glow to it's look than lino or lead.

Shiny boolits are not a requirement at all. And I think your soup was possibly too cool. 625 is pretty cool for casting. That is why I think you have waaaaaay too much tin in there. Or maybe PURE tin! You normally do not get good fillout at that low temp.....at least I do not. Pure tin WiLL!

1% tin is more than enough. I actually prefer frosty (hot) boolits. The PC sticks even better. If you want shiny boolits, polish them with some metal polish after you load them!!!!!!! Shiny does not shoot better.

What is the Bhn of the things? That tells a bunch right there. A hardness tester is worth it's weight in gold in situations like you have. Check out the CabineTree tester. The best out there in my and many other's book.

High tin levels will lead to lighter slugs, a problem you have......sounds like. I would take some of the feedstock you used to cast those and add some pure Pb to it to see how those cast. But without an Xray gun analysis, you will never know how much tin you have.

Good luck. Let us know what you find out!!!!!!!!!!!!!

banger

[RickinTN]

My math tells me you have an alloy of approximately 60% lead/40% tin based on the specific gravity of lead and tin. If there is something in the alloy other than tin and lead all bets are off. You probably have some solder which was melted into ingots. Good stuff! I agree it's too valuable to send down range as is. Keep the bullets as alloy sweetener. It's pretty easy to add in small amounts of 170 grains at a time to sweeten other alloys.
Rick

[DavZee]

I do have a CabinTree tester. I tested some of the muffins and they seem to come out as 9 Bhn. The muffins are kinda hard to get to sit flat and the pointer just gets the edge. I tested each one in three spots. The cast boolits test at about 14 Bhn. The melt had a goldish sheen on top. As I mentioned I was at 625 F and I rolled the mold on a wet sponge after every cast to cool it or they would frost and the bases would not be as nicely filled out.

[lwknight]

Yup, its 40/60 solder.

[bangerjim]

You have yourself a nice stash of solder there! Keep and use to alloy as mentioned above!!!!!

Do NOT shoot them as-is!

Now just go out there and get 'ya some pure lead!


Have fun!!!!!!

bangerjim

[DavZee]

Thank you all for telling me what I've got. Now I'll have to get some pure lead somewhere.
I guess the up side is that I've got probably a few hundred pounds of these solder muffins.
About what ratio would be good for Bhn for pistol? About how much lead to how much solder muffin?

[RickinTN]

Two of those 170 grain bullets to a pound of clip-on wheel weights will give you pretty close to WW + 2% tin. I know, it doesn't take much. Either air cooled or water dropped depending on the application this should make a pretty good alloy.
Good luck,
Rick