Hi, new caster

[trucker76]

I've been lurking for a while reading and learning, watching vids. I read the ingot to target book, excellent info there. I'm at a point where I can buy 2,000 cast boolits online or get some equipment to cast my own. I'm starting on a budget and ordered a lee pro4 20lb furnace, 2 lee molds for my .45 and .38, and some alox. I went scavenging today and got 140 lbs of wheelweights (sorted). The garages and tire places were all hit by other scavengers but it seems no one thought of, or knew about, the truck garages in the area. I also checked scrapyards and can get pure scrap lead there for $.70/lb. I think this would be too soft and need hardened a bit. I know where there's hundreds of pounds of linotype I could probably buy some cheap and use it to harden the pure lead.

Now I just need to do my local shopping for accessories like gloves, candles for fluxing, ladles and spoons, pots for smelting, camp stove or other burner, etc... I got thousands of empty brass I have been scrounging and no bullets to put in them.

[Cherokee]

Welcome to the forum - and to the fun of casting your own slugs. Get the linotype, you will want it down the line to alloy with pure lead. For fluxing, try sawdust, candles don't do that well. Getting the lead seems the hardest part now days so you are ahead of the game. Don't forget the hot plate for pre-heating the molds. The rest of the stuff is easy. Come back with any questions.

[trucker76]

Welcome to the forum - and to the fun of casting your own slugs. Get the linotype, you will want it down the line to alloy with pure lead. For fluxing, try sawdust, candles don't do that well. Getting the lead seems the hardest part now days so you are ahead of the game. Don't forget the hot plate for pre-heating the molds. The rest of the stuff is easy. Come back with any questions.

Hmm, I thought the sawdust was for removing the impurities and the wax was for getting the alloy metals (tin/antimony) to mix back into the lead. I think I read somewhere that you can remove your alloy metals that way if you don't use a flux or wax. One problem with information overload, I can't remember where I learned certain pieces of information.

[Scharfschuetze]

That info about sawdust and fluxing is in the eruditely written "From Ignot to Target."

It is well worth reading for any caster and particularly for a new caster. You can download a PDF of it here:

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?110212-From-Ingot-to-Target-A-Cast-Bullet-Guide-for-Handgunners

Oh, and welcome to the forum Trucker!

[trucker76]

I am actually rereading that right now looking for that info.

[GunFun]

Welcome.

I really like the advice from this guy too: https://www.youtube.com/user/FortuneCookie45LC

His videos will answer most of the questions you probably don't know to ask yet. Sometimes show and tell makes the reading here make more sense.

[trucker76]

Heh, yep I have watched fortune cookies vids. I spent a few months on the road in my truck reading and watching vids about casting. I'm home now getting a local job which gives me the time to actually do it.

[runfiverun]

for the 45 and the 38 that soft lead ca be used to extend the use of your ww's.
many use a mix of 3-1 or even 1-1 in those softer shooting calibers, it's all about what's available to you.
if you can get 100 pounds of lino and 300 pounds of soft that's a lot of clip on ww equivalent alloy.

[GunFun]

Make your wheel weights go far. Make ingots of them and your "pure" lead. Use equal numbers of both pure and WW lead for a 50/50 alloy. Water drop from the mold. Heat them on the rim of your pot as you cast and add one of each any time your pot gets about an inch down. This will keep you going fast. Your alloy will be about 16.4 BHN if you water drop or better yet, oven temper.

[trucker76]

Make your wheel weights go far. Make ingots of them and your "pure" lead. Use equal numbers of both pure and WW lead for a 50/50 alloy. Water drop from the mold. Heat them on the rim of your pot as you cast and add one of each any time your pot gets about an inch down. This will keep you going fast. Your alloy will be about 16.4 BHN if you water drop or better yet, oven temper.

ok so if my math is correct...a 1:1 lead and ww would give an approximate 97% lead 1.5% antimony .15% tin mix which gives an estimated BHN of 8-10 before quenching. So if you have pure linotype which is 84% lead 12% antimony 4% tin you could do a 4:1 mix with pure lead and get about the same mix (96%lead 3% antimony 1% tin) as 1:1 lead/ww but a slightly higher BHN due to the higher antimony and tin content. Isn't math fun?