PDA

View Full Version : Aging boolits-why???



taco650
05-12-2015, 08:50 PM
The title says it all. I'm no chemist so I don't know what lead does when it cools but I read here about many of the long time casters letting their cast products sit for a week or so before sizing and lubing. Why wait and if you should, how long?

BenW
05-12-2015, 08:57 PM
Boolit hardness will change over time. Lead/Antimony alloys will harden and grow over time. Letting the boolits stabilize in diameter and hardness will yield more consistent results. Even after water dropping and heat treating, the hardness will change some.

JSnover
05-12-2015, 08:58 PM
That all depends on the alloy how it was cooled (air cooled or water quenched). Aging will allow precipitation hardening, for one thing. If you shoot pure lead or lead/tin, it may not be an issue. It gets more interesting when you add antimony or arsenic.

taco650
05-12-2015, 10:35 PM
I water drop all mine regardless of the alloy blend. All of my boolets are either range scrap, COWW's or SOWW's or a combo of COWW & range scrap. A lot of my range scrap comes from j-words so it's softer than COWW. I do add a little plumbers solder.

BenW
05-13-2015, 07:01 AM
For pistol, you generally don't need to water drop. Adding extra tin will increase the amount of time before the extra hardness from water dropping kicks in. With a high enough tin percentage, they won't harden at all from water dropping and will soften over time (years/decades).

taco650
05-13-2015, 08:04 AM
Boolit hardness will change over time. Lead/Antimony alloys will harden and grow over time. Letting the boolits stabilize in diameter and hardness will yield more consistent results. Even after water dropping and heat treating, the hardness will change some.

So boolit diameter changes as it ages? Does it grow or shrink?

44man
05-13-2015, 08:42 AM
They grow and it depends on the boolit diameter for how much. Small ones grow less while my .476" boolits will gain .002". The Metal Man says size very soon, as soon as 1/2 hour after casting so further sizing after hardening does not soften the surface.
I have not found any problems with waiting since I hardly size any boolit and never past rifling depth. I don't think it hurts to size .001" in any case.
One problem that crops up if you load before letting get hard is you can size a still soft boolit when seating. So if you want to shoot hard, let them harden. Same if you need case tension.
No affect at all on pure or a tin lead mix.
Tin alone hardly changes hardness but will make casting easier and still can toughen a boolit.

cs86
05-13-2015, 09:48 AM
So boolit diameter changes as it ages? Does it grow or shrink?

I think it depends. Do you research because I'm not sure about this... If I remember reading correct I think higher tin alloy can tend to shrink over time and higher antimony grows. I can't remember if that was right but I was reading it on an article that was showing a heat treating process and that they didn't want lots of tin in their mix because of the size fluctuation when aging.

BenW
05-13-2015, 07:45 PM
They tend to grow. Not by much, but if your boolit is already on the large side of what will chamber, and you wait a couple months, it may be too large.

-Ben

Yodogsandman
05-13-2015, 08:02 PM
My "rule of thumb" has been to wait for air cooled boolits to age harden for 3 weeks (21 days) and 5 days for oven heat treated and quenched ones before shooting. By that time most hardening has occurred and they've stabilized for the most part. The consistency difference after that will be very slight and not noticeable.

I like to size prior to HT'ing without gas checks or lube whenever the sizing difference is greater than .001". I broke my table once trying to size HT'd boolits 4 days later with a pipe for leverage to push them through.

GoodOlBoy
05-14-2015, 05:36 AM
soapafication.... when ya cold process make soap ya gotta let it set in good airflow for a few weeks for the process to finish.... oh wait... lead? no no idea why you would wanna age lead...

GoodOlBoy

catskinner
05-14-2015, 06:20 AM
If they don't sizzle going thru the lube-sizer they are aged long enough.

44man
05-14-2015, 09:52 AM
I like to size prior to HT'ing without gas checks or lube whenever the sizing difference is greater than .001". I broke my table once trying to size HT'd boolits 4 days later with a pipe for leverage to push them through.
Why do you need to size that much? Handle weight of my press handle will take most boolits through a Lee die. You must have greatly oversize boolits.

MKastning
05-14-2015, 02:02 PM
If they don't sizzle going thru the lube-sizer they are aged long enough.

Exactly what a friend of mine told me a few years ago when I asked. :) Word for word, and I think it makes me laugh every time I think of it. Generally as I am sizing bullets cast an hour earlier the night before a military rifle match!

taco650
05-14-2015, 04:01 PM
Thanks for the replies. I would like my Lee 309-180R to grow a little so they get squeezed down more when I run them through my .310 sizing die. The last batch I cast will sit for at least a week because my work schedule & family commitments.

Yodogsandman
05-14-2015, 05:17 PM
I like to size prior to HT'ing without gas checks or lube whenever the sizing difference is greater than .001". I broke my table once trying to size HT'd boolits 4 days later with a pipe for leverage to push them through.
Why do you need to size that much? Handle weight of my press handle will take most boolits through a Lee die. You must have greatly oversize boolits.

Those boolits were .006" oversized from powder coating them hot right from the heat treating oven and then quenched after curing.

Geezer in NH
05-19-2015, 04:02 PM
My "rule of thumb" has been to wait for air cooled boolits to age harden for 3 weeks (21 days) and 5 days for oven heat treated and quenched ones before shooting. By that time most hardening has occurred and they've stabilized for the most part. The consistency difference after that will be very slight and not noticeable.

I like to size prior to HT'ing without gas checks or lube whenever the sizing difference is greater than .001". I broke my table once trying to size HT'd boolits 4 days later with a pipe for leverage to push them through.

I cast all winter Nov-March.(what else to do? ice fish? not into drinking) No problem sizing or leading from April on shooting them. :kidding: Rabbit hunting use to count but hate the cold now.