Cast My First Lead Boolits Today

[WarEagleEd]

I retrieved my dad's old casting stuff from my mom's house yesterday and was able to cast for the first time today. I had planned on casting 90 gr. 9mm for .380, but discovered that my dad's old (early '70s) Lyman 2-cavity mould handles would not work with the much newer Lyman mould that I have for the above caliber. Looked at the other moulds my dad had and decided to use his Hensley & Gibbs #34 (4-cavity 225 gr. RN for .45 ACP) and try out the used Lee 452-230-TC mould I got out of the DukeInFlorida Mystery Box over in the PIF section. I was using some ingots that my dad had smelted decades ago. All I ever heard him say he cast boolits out of was CWW, so I'm pretty that is what the ingots were. The furnace I was using was an old Lyman model 61, which I also think is from the early 1970's.

I had decent success out of the Lee mould rather quickly. I guess this was due to its smaller size and the aluminum heating up much quicker than the steel H&G mould. This mould did produce various amounts of flashing on some boolits. The reason being is that it did not consistently close with the same "tightness" each time, which is most likely due to the way I got the mould (grabbed out of a pass-around box) than any sort of manufacturing issue.

Below are some sample boolits. The band near the base of boolit #5 didn't seem to fill out that well, but the rest look ok. Anyone see anything particularly bad in the sample below?

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Also, I weighed and measured (across the upper band, taking 2 measurements roughly 90 degrees apart) 5 sample boolits (not the ones pictured above) and got the following results:

1) 226.7 gr. & .4523/.4539
2) 229.0 gr. & .4520/.4559
3) 229.6 gr. & .4563/.4546
4) 228.8 gr. & .4521/.4540
5) 229.2 gr. & .4533/.4556
Standard deviation = 2.2 grains

The Hensley & Gibbs mould was more difficult for me to work with, due in large part to my own inexperience. My first batch was full of wrinkled boolits and rounded bands. These all found their way back into the furnace. I figured the wrinkles were due to a cold mould, though I had it sitting on the rim of the pot to warm up before using it. I decided to turn up the furnace from 650 degrees (according to the control knob setting) to 750. This helped greatly in reducing wrinkles, but I began to get frosted boolits. I turned it down to the 700-725 range and subsequently reduced the frosting, got pretty nice bands and a little wrinkling here and there. I think the boolits are usable, as is, but this is my first time doing this so my opinion doesn't count for much.

Below is a picture of the H&G RN boolits. I think #1 has frosting on the boolits, though in the picture it looks dimpled. 3 and 5 definitely have some frosting, and maybe 7, though that may just be the camera flash reflection. 4 & 6 have obvious wrinkles. A lot of them had minor wrinkles even at the higher temp. What could be the cause? Is the mould still not hot enough? Perhaps bad pouring method (it's a bottom pour pot, but the handle required just enough force on opening that precluded consistent smooth operation). How do the bands looks? A definite line can be seen around the top band and the base of the nose/ogive

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Statistics from 5 sample bullets, not necessarily those in the picture above, are as follows:

1) 225.8 gr. & .4532/.4514
2) 226.2 gr. & .4526/.4530
3) 225.0 gr. & .4524/.4518
4) 224.7 gr. & .4540/.4509
5) 225.5 gr. & .4522/.4531
Standard deviation = 1.2 grains

According to the H&G website this mould drops bullets in the 225 grain range. The mould has .4515 stamped on it, also.

Once again, any comments in regards to usability of the boolits and the wrinkling in the boolits produced by the Hensley & Gibbs mould? Any other observations are also welcome.

Ed

[runfiverun]

they'll be fine size e'm and shoot e'm.
next go round a tick more heat in the mold will make some less shiny and better filled out boolits.
the ones in the second picture aren't frosted you got some inclusions [oxides] in the alloy and it manifest itself in the mold.
the steel mold will work just fine at 375-400-f
the aluminum molds generally like to be a little hotter.

what I do is find a rhythm like,, fill the mold and pull it out from under the pot, then use a 1-one thousand type 5-6 count, and break open the sprue with my gloved hand, return the sprue to the pot, and dump out the boolits.
I also like to make a fairly long run [3-400 boolits]
keeping the mold a consistent temp through casting cadence and watching the boolits for visual clues like frosting [white and rounded bands] or too shiny/wrinkled [too cold of a mold] and increasing or decreasing the casting speed to keep the boolits a galvanized grey color.

[sigep1764]

Keep doing it!!! All my molds are aluminum and they like to be hot. Those are all shootable in my book. Now, whatcha gonna loob them with and shoot them out of?

[WarEagleEd]

Lube is a good question. I bought some Lyman Orange Magic thinking it didn't need a heater. Turns out it does. I plan on using the stick I bought, but next time I will buy some Carnauba Red from White Label. However, my dad had some Javelina bullet lube he purchased back in the 1970's. I don't know if it is still usable. It has been stored in a storage room that, while not heated or cooled, was attached to the house and didn't see huge temperature extremes. I peeled back the paper from around one tube to check it out. It felt tacky and when I pressed firmly on it with my index finger it deformed a little.

Is this stuff usable?

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I plan on shooting them out of either a Star PD, Llama Max-I, or an old govt. surplus Colt 1911 that my dad bought through the mail sometime before 1968.

[runfiverun]

it's still useable.

carnuba red needs heat to flow too. [@100-f]

if you don't have the means to get a heater base for your sizer a lot of guy's will make a flat piece of aluminum to bolt the sizer down on and then put an iron on the plate.
or they'll use a light bulb like from a drop light and lean it against the sizer to heat it up.