T thought this was supposed to be a fun hobby, casting your own bullets

[Buckshot Bowman]

I just spent my Saturday melting down 300 pounds of big chunks of lead from a sail boat keel into pure lead ingots. The stuff was dirty as hell, but thankfully no sign of zinc. My 64 year old back is screaming, my knees hurt, I am bone tired and I have blisters on my blisters.

and I still have to alloy these ingots into shootable metal.

Fun? Bah, Bah, I say, as this is actual work. On the other hand I do have a giant pile of pure lead ingots at under 40 cents a pound.

Keep shooting!

Buckshot Bowman
"He has killed more men than the small pox"

[MtGun44]

Free shooting isn't really free, but it is easier to get than ammo
from the gun store.

Bill

[1bluehorse]

Well, see, you missed the "fine print" in the "we're having fun now" catalog......casting bullets IS fun, as is shooting your own creation (bullets not kids) smelting on the other hand, is a hot, nasty, back-breaking (as you now know) endevour....:lol: where-a-bouts you at in Eastern Washington....we're probably almost neighbors....

[mdi]

Well, ya don't hafta melt a half ton at a time! You know, there's only one way to eat an elephant, that's one bite at a time...

[Hickok]

Those ingots are like pure silver! :bigsmyl2:

[Vinne]

I have lots of yard to store chunks. I'll take that pain any day of the week...well maybe every other week!!

[Buckshot Bowman]

Bill,
I live in Ellensburg, and do most of my shooting up in the hills outside of town. I need to do an overnighter to Spokane, as they have a 500 and 1000 yard gong range over there, which is what I need for my Sharps and Rolling Block rifles. I shoot really big bullets pushed along by black powder. and my goal before my 64 year old eyes give out completely, is to shoot and hit with some degree of accuracy a 1000 yard target with my Sharps 45-110 with a Sharps vernier tang sight. Nothing like black powder cartridges and iron sights to separate shooters from riflemen.

I had to start casting my own bullets, because if you want to shoot these big guns, buying a couple of hundred 535 grain cast bullets from the dealers is fiscal folly after awhile.

It's nice for the new guy to get noticed by the group. Thanks

Buckshot Bowman

[MtGun44]

Well, there is your problem right there! Wasting WAY too much lead on each shot! :kidding:

Sounds like a laudable goal. I wish I had a range that I could shoot at 1000 yds.

Bill

[Buckshot Bowman]

Bill,
I know it's a waste of good lead to shoot these big rifles, but it is the only way I have to fulfill my desire to be punched very hard in the shoulder over and over until I can no longer move my arm.
I know, it's a kind of masochistic thing, but it's my thing.

Buckshot Bowman

[Teddy (punchie)]

Enjoy, Did I say injoy or indur . Any way just have fun, life is what you make of it.

[smokeywolf]

B Bowman,

Welcome to the madness. A very worthwhile goal indeed. One of these days I may graduate to one of the finer flingers of large lead. For now, the closest I can come to a long distance gong clanger is a '73 Trapdoor rifle.

smokeywolf

[leftiye]

I load my 10 lb ladle from a bottom pout smelter. The ladle is suspended on a chain to save my back while making 1 lb. ingots. It's still a killer.

[Hickok]

Buckshot I know what you say about using up lead. I shoot a 1859 Sharps Berdan which uses up 475 gr of lead per shot and a couple .577 Enfield rifle muskets that use up 565 gr of lead per trigger pull. A pound of lead doesn't go very far when casting boolits!:holysheep

[6bg6ga]

You have just begun to have fun. Now you get to make equipment changes. Generally one starts with a single stage press and then graduates to a LNL, Dillon, or Lee progressive. You start with a sizer lubricator like the 4500 which is cost effective and move up to a Ballisti-cast or Star/Magma. Bullet molds...hand held single or dual bullet then you move to a larger cavity mold assembly or to a bullet caster like the Magma or Ballisti-cast.

Yup its a fun hobby that never ends and always finds more ways to INVEST your money and time.

[Land Owner]

Here's a revealing little cost perspective. We all conclude that reloading "saves" money, because we shoot more for less than the other guys who are shooting retail Factory ammunition. And in that, I agree, but only after the Break Even point.

To be an honest comparison, we have to divide ALL of our caliber-specific purchases plus a prorated potion of the non-caliber specific purchases by the cost of factory ammunition.

Add up ALL of the specific parts and pieces (equipment) that were purchased to reload a specific caliber, including consumables, add to that a portion of the non-caliber specific equipment, then divide that total cost by the cost of a single Factory round! The answer is the minimum number of reloaded rounds one must make and shoot to EQUAL the cost of shooting that same number of Factory rounds.

After the Break Even point, shooting reloads, particularly cast boolit reloads, is all about "saving" by shooting more. Inherently included is perfecting this hobby and achieving greater accuracy.

In time, casting and reloading is cost effective. But the reloader must shoot to make it so. Nothing inherently "wrong" in that. Practice makes perfect.

[TXGunNut]

I had to start casting my own bullets, because if you want to shoot these big guns, buying a couple of hundred 535 grain cast bullets from the dealers is fiscal folly after awhile. -Buckshot Bowman

That's exactly what brought me to casting. I spent a couple hundred $ on mail-order boolits and none would work in my Sharps. I got disgusted and ordered a very comprehensive casting setup and my first boolits were better than I could buy.

[TXGunNut]

To be an honest comparison, we have to divide ALL of our caliber-specific purchases plus a prorated potion of the non-caliber specific purchases by the cost of factory ammunition. -Land Owner


You're making my head hurt! Just finished my last tax return for the year, lol.

[Land Owner]

You're making my head hurt! Just finished my last tax return for the year, lol.

Yes. I know. It is akin to Adjusted Gross Income, Consumer Price / Dow Jones Industrial Indexes, Monthly Labor figure from Washington, DC, et al.

Basically, the underlying questions is, how thin to slice the baloney?

The more we cast and shoot, the more economical our hobby seems, i.e one cast round compared to one factory round. Only when we account for equipment, shipping, HAZMAT fee(s), and consumables do we really find the Break Even point.

[bangerjim]

Bill,
I live in Ellensburg, and do most of my shooting up in the hills outside of town. I need to do an overnighter to Spokane, as they have a 500 and 1000 yard gong range over there, which is what I need for my Sharps and Rolling Block rifles. I shoot really big bullets pushed along by black powder. and my goal before my 64 year old eyes give out completely, is to shoot and hit with some degree of accuracy a 1000 yard target with my Sharps 45-110 with a Sharps vernier tang sight. Nothing like black powder cartridges and iron sights to separate shooters from riflemen.

I had to start casting my own bullets, because if you want to shoot these big guns, buying a couple of hundred 535 grain cast bullets from the dealers is fiscal folly after awhile.

It's nice for the new guy to get noticed by the group. Thanks

Buckshot Bowman

Make 'em 1/2 as big so the go 1/2 as far and use 1/2 as much lead!!!!! HA.....ha...................:veryconfu

I rarely melt more than 60-70# at a time, and do it until I get tired. I keep most of my stash in it's native format...hunks/chunks/bars/sheet/whatever....until I run out of ingots. Then I make more ingots for my casting pots. Lead is still lead (hillbilly gold!), no matter what form you store it in!!!!!


Welcome to the madness!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :drinks:


bangerjim :guntootsmiley:

[WILCO]

Free shooting isn't really free, but it is easier to get than ammo
from the gun store.

Bill

Well said Bill.
My friends that shoot FMJ still make fun of me for switching to lead projectiles.
I tell them when they get to their last one, that's it but for me, I can keep on making my own.

[jonas302]

but then you have to figure out the resale value and the cost saved in copper cleaner and barrel life then when your all done compare that end value of all your stuff to spending your time and money sitting a bar all day come out pretty good dont it(:

[captaint]

I started casting because I couldn't stomach paying for factory ammo. That hasn't changed, and I shoot ten times as much as I used to. Not to mention not worrying about ammo cost while shooting. I don't even think about it, because it's not enough to worry about. Up went the fun factor... Mike

[geargnasher]

I'm still waiting to save money.

Gear

[Mod42]

I've been loading for over 40 years..........saved so much money that I can now afford Ramen noodles every day......

[Beagle333]

If you cast with a Lee mold over a steel pot and load with a Lee whack-a-mole kit, you can save oodles! Once you start getting fancier than that... it's all downhill.
:holysheep

[Buckshot Bowman]

101599101600101601Lads,
Well, after finishing up the smelting of the 300 pounds of lead chunks, using a turkey fryer burner and a cast iron dutch oven. I fluxed numerous times with both paraffin and marvelflux
And stirring to pot constantly, and a next day check of the ingots on my cabine tree BHN tester tell me it averages an 8 for pure lead.
I was left with this mysterious chunk stuck to the sides and bottom of the pot after the last useable ladle was dipped and the pot cooled. see photo
Any ideas as to what this mystery metal is that was in the original lead?

I started out casting in a single Lyman mould so I could have cute little ingots, after waiting for the third batch to cool I switched to a muffin pan, as the little lyman would have taken three days to get this job done. not pictured is another 100 lyman ingots I had boxed up.

This now gives me a tad over 1000 pounds of pure lead ingots, I figure that it will take another 300 pounds of tin and antimony to make bullets.
That comes out to only 18,200 535 grain bullets, so... I think I need more lead if I am going to keep shooting for more than a couple of weeks.

Buckshot

[Pilgrim]

I'm not sure, but that **** looks like Marvelux flux residue to me. That's why I stopped using the stuff. I have a friend that swears by it, but I think he means he swears at it instead. He's just confused. Actually, dislike Marvelux is a gross understatement. I couldn't believe it the first time I used it, so figuring it had to be me, I bought another can of it. Nope...that stuff plain sucks IMO.