Can I use straight WW or do I need to make a "mix"

[mugsie]

I'll be casting for 44 mag, 45 lc and 357 mag. I'm really new to this having just melted my first ingots of pure WW's this weekend. Can I cast with straight WW or do I need to add some tin to the mix? I have bars of 100% tin but what would be the ratio I need to come close to Lyman #2? How do I go about calculating it all out?
Thanks....

[jgh4445]

I am about to start casting for the exact same calibers and have the exact same question. I also would like to know where one gets bars of tin. To be honest, the only "tin" I knew anything about, till I started in this casting business, could be found on the barn roof. I don't suppose that is what ya'll mean by "tin" huh? I too would like to end up with something closey resembling Lyman #2, but am absolutely clueless as to how to do it. I've only cast pure lead RB's for my Flinters. Alloys are brand new to me. I've done searches and see references to tin and antimony, but the assuption is that the reader knows what the writer is talking about and just what metals and such, and exactly how much, make up this additive.

[w30wcf]

mugsie,

The composition of what is referenced as Lyman #2 has varied over the years from tin/lead alloys to 90/5/5 (90% lead/5%tin/5%antimony) which I feel is the true Lyman #2 alloy.

For your intended use, though, I would suggest the addition of 2% tin to your w.w. I have been using that combination for the past 30+ years in similar applications with very good results. The addition of the tin is by weight so, for example, for 5# w.w. [80 oz. (16 oz.'s per lb x 5 lbs.)] add 2% which = 1.6 oz.'s of tin.

Have fun.
w30wcf

[mugsie]

W30WCF - thanks for the info. Does this equate to a particular harness level or am I making it all too complicated? Would 2% tin be sufficient for the calibers I'm casting for? Thanks again folks....

[JSnover]

There's a lot of places to find tin and ather additives for casting. Buffalo Arms, McMaster-Carr and the Antimony Man are three. All are on the web. I don't think the caliber will determine which alloy to use, that's more specific to the rifle/load/intended use. Lyman #48 is one place to start if you'd like to know the composition and approximate hardness of each.

[KYCaster]

Mugsie, The 2% Sn that w30wcf recommends has very little effect on the hardness of the alloy. The purpose of extra Sn is to help the mold fill out better. You may find that you're able to get good boolits with straight WW alloy, but since you have the Sn available, add 2.5 oz. to 10 lb. of WW. If you're not pleased with the results, add another oz. and try that, if you're still not happy then adding more Sn probably will not help much.

You can't get Lyman #2 alloy with just WW and Sn, you'll also need to add Antimony (Sb), not as easy as adding Sn, but not impossible.

For virtually all handgun applications you can start with three basic alloy sources...pure lead (BHN 5)...WW (BHN 12)...linotype (BHN 20). Straight WW will take care of most of your handgun needs and simple mixes of the other alloys will easily handle the rest. I'd save the Sn to add to your softer alloys to help with fill out.

Try the WW first and if you don't like the results come back and ask more questions, somebody here will be able to help.

Good luck.

Jerry

[black44hawk]

First, you can obtain tin as well as a tin / antimony alloy from soldering wire. Most of that stuff contains tin and lead, but you can get the "lead free" that has 95%tin and 5% antimony. Try to avoid buying anything that advertises an "acid core". That stuff makes some pretty noxious fumes when you melt it and a strange black goo atop the lead melt. Next, about the addition of tin: I have found that on molds that don't require sharp fill in you can get away with no addition of tin. However, the addition of tin does improve fillout of the mold.

[mugsie]

Thanks guys - as soon as the molds get here I'll try casting just WW's this weekend. I can't wait.:-D I'm sure I'll have lots of questions once I begin.
You don't think a WW only boolet is too soft for a handgun? Especially a 44 mag? Granted, velocities will only be 800 or so feet per sec so I should be OK yes?

[jgh4445]

Mugsie, I'm so glad you started this thread! Great answers. Even I could understand all that is being said. All this time I was under the impression that to increase the hardness you had to add tin. So...if I truly understand correctly, you can cast using only WW and then if you really need to increase the hardness, it's possible to water drop or heat treat as opposed to adding just tin. Then, you can tweak the alloy by adding tin and antimony to get a better fill. Correct?

[GrizzLeeBear]

Like the others said, the tin is really only added to help mold fillout. Anything over 2% doesn't do any good. If you are still having trouble with fillout, turn the heat up. Aluminum molds like a little more heat than steel ones in my experience.
I have gotten good accuracy with WW gas checked 30 and 35 cal. boolits up around 2000+ fps with no leading (use a good lube, though). WW will work just fine for anything you want to do in 44, 45 & 357.

[robertbank]

Try making Felix Lube. Recipe is a sticky. The lube works great in all my pistol and rifles I load for and I have experienced no leading. All I use is WW alloy. I water drop all my bullets right from the mold but it really isn't necessary for pistol.

Take Care

Bob

[Woodwrkr]

ITo be honest, the only "tin" I knew anything about, till I started in this casting business, could be found on the barn roof. I don't suppose that is what ya'll mean by "tin" huh?

That stuff on the roof of the barn has a coating of zinc on it. Stay away from it when you're casting!

[Pavomesa]

Mugsie, YES you can use just straight wheel weights. I've case and shot 1,000s of them. They are a little soft but suprisingly never gave me any leading problem except at the very highest velocity...which I seldom shoot anyway. And I know many other fellows who have had the same experience.

Personally I like a bullet a little soft, so long as it doesn't lead. Contrary to current wisdom, there is nothing sacred about hard cast bullets. You can actually get some mushroom with a softer bullet.

But don't take my word..........try it.

[Blackhawk Convertable]

Almost everything I cast is for Cowboy Action Shooting. So, I just cast straight WW's and am happy. That said, what is it you want the cast bullet to do for you? If just a mild to mid range plinker bullet, WW's are just fine. If you want to push it a bit or if hunting is your thing, then a blend is in order.

It all depends on your use.

[waksupi]

Since I've pushed WW boolits to over 2700 fps, I imagine they may work in your .44. Good luck!

[mroliver77]

Alot depends on what type of lead supply you have. If you have all WW then cast with straight WW. If you find lots of lead pipe, lead roof flashing or shower pans(sheet lead) or soft range scrap and not much WW I would blend the soft with the WW and drop hot boolits in a bucket of cold water. These should be hard enough for most anything you will do with a pistol. WW are becomming an endangered species.
J

[HeavyMetal]

mugsie:
As you've no doubt learned by know tin is not a metal "hardner" But it does allow the bullet to form nice crisp lines and edges which is a must for consistant weight in your casting.

I have for years used plain WW for 44 and 375 mag semi wadcutters, however I "quench cast"! This involves dropping the hot bullet from the mold into a 5 gallon bucket of cold water.

This is faster than trying to heat treat cast bullets and makes them just as hard. The down side of "quenching" is you run the risk of getting water in your lead pot and that will make your day pretty exciting!!

I am always careful how I set up my pot so I must make a 1/4 turn to be over my bucket of water. I also put some clean rags on the bottom of the bucket as a cuhsion.

This works very well and I suggest you give it a try.

Now if you decide you do need a harder alloy you can buy some linotype or if you get lucky foundry type. Both these alloys have a very high antimony content and will certainly be able to harden up any reasonable alloy.

I'll suggest you get a copy of Handloaders Bullet Making Annual! The second addition has an article showing alloy compositions, Foundry type is: 15% Tin 23% antimony and 62% lead .

By doing some clever blending with this kind of type metal you can get bullets that can hit 30 on the Rc scale.

BY the way Handloader was selling the collection of four annuals on dvd thats the way to keep the info if they are still selling it!

[carpetman]

Read Lyman---You start out with unknown(wheelweights)add exact this and that and have an exact. I never bought this. I use straight ww's and was told repeatedly---probably more than Waksupi has been told about blindness and playing with himself, that I needed tin to help fill out on .22 cals. Bought some tin and can tell no difference(Havent noticed Waksupi wearing glasses in any of his pics---dont know about that part).

[jleneave]

I use straight ww's and was told repeatedly---probably more than Waksupi has been told about blindness and playing with himself, that I needed tin to help fill out on .22 cals. Bought some tin and can tell no difference(Havent noticed Waksupi wearing glasses in any of his pics---dont know about that part).

That is hilarious!! Now I know why I am blind in one eye and can't see out of the other!!!

[MT Gianni]

I find that my revolver cartridge loads shoot better air cooled than water dropped. This is whether they are shot out of a 20"bbl or a 5 1/2". Gianni

[Shuz]

In my experience, plain wheel weights work just fine, but I have noticed better fillout when I add a little tin. Therefore my choice is wheel weights plus 1% tin. Air cooled hardness is in the Bhn 9 to 11 area and heat treated they get to Bhn 22. Air cooled works great in revolvers and heat treated works great when velocities climb.--Shuz

[American]

.. Air cooled hardness is in the Bhn 9 to 11 area and heat treated they get to Bhn 22. ...

This thread is just full of great stuff a novice like myself needs to know.

Any idea of the hardness of WW boolits that are dropped into water from the mold?

[robertbank]

About the same as heat treating them. I do this for all my bullets only because I find it handy. Just make sure your bucket is set away from your melter or melting pot. Water and lead do not mix and things can get real exciting real fast when water meets molten lead. I fill my bucket about half full so there is no chance of water splashing any where near my casting pot.

Take Care

Bob

[mechdriver]

I followed someones advise of cutting a slit in an old towel and placing it over my quenching bucket. This stops most of the splash.

[Whip]

I use a cardboard box pushed in a little with a split in it, over my bucket. I tap my mold and the bullets pop out and roll into the crack and in to the bucket .

[Gohon]

Like the others said, the tin is really only added to help mold fillout. Anything over 2% doesn't do any good. .

I've heard and read this before and it is a little confusing. According to Lyman if you take 9 pounds of WW and add 1 pound of 50/50 solder you end up with 10 pounds of material that is equal to Lyman #2 at 14-15 BHN. Somebody has to be wrong but who?

[robertbank]

Tin does harden the alloy but not as much and only to a certain point then it does little to no good to add more. As others have posted adding tin does improve mold fill out.

Both camps are right.

Take Care

Bob

[Gohon]

But that's where the confusion comes in. According to my Lyman book #2 alloy has a BHN of 15 and straight WW has a BHN of 9. However by making the mix in my last post which results in a 92/4/4 mix, Lyman states you will end up with a #2 alloy mix, or at least very close to it. Thats an increase of 6 BHN which seems like a substantial increase to me. I'm thinking if I can end up with a #2 alloy at 15 BHN by just adding tin to WW then I have no need to ever water drop or heat treat bullets again.

[robertbank]

It isn't "necessary" some of us drop our water bullets out of habit, others to get harder bullets for a specific purpose. Not sure how the BHN values increase relative to each other but going from 9 to 15 is an increase in six. If I get to 29 by water dropping them I am increasing the BRN by 20....much wider spread.

I prefer to water quench my rifle bullets, and those destined for my .357 and 9MM. When I cast I am typically casting three molds at a time. Rather than air cool my .45acp bullets and water drop the others I just plunk them all in water. Doesn't seem to bother my .45acp results so I just keep doing what is comfortable. Works for me and the paper targets and cans I shoot at don't seem to care either.

Take Care

Bob

[Gohon]

I think I should have just left off that last line as it seemed to distract from my point. Which was, it is wrong to say that tin is really only added to help mold fill out. I think it would be correct in saying anything over 2% doesn't do any good as far as mold fill out goes . Unless Lyman is way off base, tin can and does play a significant roll in bullet hardness. Another example Lyman gives is pure lead has a BHN of 5 but when you add enough tin to change this to 10-1 (91% lead & 9% tin) then the BHN is increased to 11.5. Most likely I suspect the lack of using tin is the factor of cost and other means less costly are more desirable. But, to someone new to this like myself it is easy to be confused or misled when I/they see a statement that tin is only used for fill out and over 2% is wasting. Not trying to argue here but trying to to stay on the right track of a hobby I'm really starting to enjoy.

[robertbank]

No problem my friend. Aside from the fact our hobby will drive you crazy from time to time it really is quite enjoyable. WW alone are good enough for most applications I have found. Used to add solder but now don't bother. WW work just fine in every application I have tried to date. Try making your own lube using the Formula for Felix lube. Once you get past that step you will be hooked for life.

Take Care

Bob

[44 flattop]

Hello,
I have been casting for almost 40 years. If there is one mistake that most casters make (IMO), it is thinking you need a harder bullet to stop leading and improve accuracy. One lesson I learned from my father back in the late '60's was to 1/40 was fine for pistols, 1/16 was good for rifles. For my own part I've found that WW's +25% pure lead is great up to 2000fps.

For hunting heating treating bullets is not the best bet since the bullet becomes much more fragile. I like pure WW's +1% and 25% lead for best results.

Hey Glenn F, that 429640 that you converted to a PB and sold to me is working out fine! :drinks:

44

[KYCaster]

I've heard and read this before and it is a little confusing. According to Lyman if you take 9 pounds of WW and add 1 pound of 50/50 solder you end up with 10 pounds of material that is equal to Lyman #2 at 14-15 BHN. Somebody has to be wrong but who?


Gohon: Don't be too quick to accept everything you read as gospel. The Lyman book I have (don't know which edition, the cover's been gone forever) says #2 alloy is 90 parts lead, 5 parts Tin and 5 parts Antimony. They said then, "A mixture that compares favorably to Lyman #2 alloy may be concocted by melting down a few items which are readily available."....

5 1/2 lbs. WW, 1 lb. 50/50 bar solder and 3 1/2 lbs. lead. Do the math and that's 88.9% Pb, 6%Sb and 5% Sn.

That's somewhat different than what they're recommending now. 9 lb. WW and 1 lb. 50/50 gives you 87.5% Pb, 7.25% Sb and 5.25% Sn. That's not quite 90-5-5. And even further from the 90-4-4 that you quoted in another post.


You also said, "...tin can and does play a significant roll in bullet hardness. Another example Lyman gives is pure lead has a BHN of 5 but when you add enough tin to change this to 10-1 (91% lead & 9% tin) then the BHN is increased to 11.5." This is quite a bit different than my experience, it's generally accepted here(somebody is sure to correct me if I'm wrong) that ACWW has a BHN of ~12. I've found that Pb/Sn binary alloys won't get there without the addition of Antimony or Arsenic. The caveat here is that, most of the metals that we scrounge for our hobby do contain significant ammounts of Sb and As, so if your pure Pb comes from roof flashing, cable sheath, stick on WW, etc., then you're adding these hardening agents to your alloy.

My point to all this is...don't get too caught up in "absolutes". Seems to me, Lyman has finally found that the difference between 90-5-5 and 87.5-7.25-5.25 is insignificant. There are too many different opinions to call any one of them right.

Bottom line is....whatever works for you.

Jerry

[Gohon]

All right you guys................... you're gonna have me up half the night again researching before I can get some peaceful sleep. Here is where all this started rolling in my head. A few weeks ago I was casting some 30 caliber 170 gainers. With about every 5# of WW I was throwing in 2-3 ounces of 95/5 solder. Everything goes fine and I was happen with the results of my casting that night. Then I weighed some of the bullets and instead of 170 grains as called for my the mould, they were 160-161 grains. That was okay with me but I wondered why. So reading through the Lyman book I found what I posted in earlier threads, and also ran into a section that listed what approximate weight would be from moulds using different alloy mixtures. Low and behold the book showed a 170 grain mould would cast somewhere around 161 grains using #2 alloy. So what I was trying to decide was did I unwittingly make up a mixture of #2 allow using 3 ounces of 95/5 (tin/antimony) to 5# WW. If so then I would think I would be safe to assume the hardness was 14-15 BHN since I don't have a hardness tester. This would be perfectly satisfying for me for I don't need to go higher than that particular hardness. Just for the record these will be loaded in a 30-30 to about 1900-2000 fps.

[Dennis Eugene]

I followed someones advise of cutting a slit in an old towel and placing it over my quenching bucket. This stops most of the splash.try floating styrafoam peanuts on your water bucket to keep splashing down to zero when water quinching bullits. Dennis Eugene

[mroliver77]

WW have a lot less antimony in them than they used too. Keeping the tin cntent the same as the antimony makes for strong boolits as it helps "bind" the antimony. Heat treting does not make a boolit more fragile or brittle, it just makes it harder. Water will not explode if dropped on the surface of lead it will sizzle and evaporate.(I have done it to test) Steam explosions happen when water gets carried below the surface. I keep my quench bucket to the left of and a foot below my lead pot. Nothing covering it and a towel down in the water with a hole to slow boolits. Very little splash even with a 6 cavity .45 cal mold. You need to get boolits in the water very quickly when the mold opens.
J