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Oklahoma Rebel
09-03-2016, 01:01 PM
I have a lee 311-100rn mold, and a noe 460-425rnfp mold, and realized the base of the 30cal fits perfectly in the nose of the 460-425 mold, so I am going to do an experiment. I am going to cast soft 30 cal boolits, maybe 10bhn, and set them base first in the bigger molds nose, then fill the big mold with some lymans #2 I made, so the 1st 1/4 of the boolit will be soft metal, so that expansion will be started, but controlled and limited. almost would be them same as if you filled a large hard cast HP's cavity with soft lead, then cross sectioned it, thats what it will look like. I think when I pour the #2 alloy in at high temp, it should bond without completely melting the smaller boolit. I will let you guys know in a few days how it turns out, until then does anyone have any input, thoughts, potential problems I might have?? let me know,Travis

OS OK
09-03-2016, 01:10 PM
This description makes me think 'cold joints' and serious wrinkle lines.
Preheat the lead inserts?

It's a good idea though, you have your brain engaged!

Tatume
09-03-2016, 01:13 PM
Okay Kidd, sounds like a nice experiment. I've done it before with other molds. Here's a test to perform after the bullets have cured. Hold them in your hand and try to snap the nose off with your thumb. If it pops off easily, you'll need to adjust your technique.

Oklahoma Rebel
09-03-2016, 01:55 PM
ok, I am aware that I might run into some problems.but with the base lead running around the sides of the smaller boolit and into its lube grooves, I hope it will have enough holding power, I will be doing this with the small boolits, and the mold preheated as well, maybe even plugging in the toaster ooven in the garage to hold the small boolits at,say, 400 degrees. that along with a hot mold, I would think, will slow the solidification of the harder alloy long enough to bond the two together. fingers crossed!

mdi
09-03-2016, 02:07 PM
Keep thinkin'! Advances don't come from listening to "naysayers", but from thinking and doing. While this type of "double poured" bullets have been made in the past, you may be successful...

Beagle333
09-03-2016, 02:15 PM
I too, think you'll have to get the boolits pretty hot, or you'll run into the same problems you'd have with a cold pin on a HP mold.... big air spaces and wrinkles. Good luck! I could see it being done, with lots of care. It ain't like you're gonna need hundreds of em. 8-)

Dusty Bannister
09-03-2016, 02:26 PM
A quick search comes up with this. The Lyman molds were once available, but discontinued long ago. There is a lot of reading that you can do, before you decide if you really want to follow that path.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/google.php?cx=partner-pub-6216953551359885%3A1942134700&cof=FORID%3A9&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=Casting+two+part+bullets&sa.x=13&sa.y=16&siteurl=castboolits.gunloads.com%2Fshowthread.php% 3F315105-soft-point-cast-boolit%26p%3D3765436%23post3765436&ref=castboolits.gunloads.com%2Fforum.php&ss=4410j1086480j25

RP
09-03-2016, 03:19 PM
Just a thought would the pure lead or soft lead weight being at the front cause the bullet to tumble ? More so if the smaller bullet falls to one side in the mold when your pouring the second alloy in. Depends on the size of the bullet your shooting I wonder how some round balls would work now that got me thinking lol. Very interesting keep use updated on the ups and downs.

Abenaki
09-03-2016, 04:10 PM
Try this

Get the mold hot.
Pour in some soft lead.
Knock of the spru.
Pour in some hard lead.

Take care
Abenaki

Tatume
09-03-2016, 04:20 PM
Get the mold hot.
Pour in some soft lead.
Knock of the spru.
Pour in some hard lead.

I think you mean:

Get the mold hot.
Use a little purpose-made dipper to pour in some soft lead.
Pour in some hard lead.
Knock off the sprue.

This method first came to my attention from Veral Smith of LBT Molds, but others may have published it before him. Certainly others have used the technique for many years.

Take care, Tom

Oklahoma Rebel
09-03-2016, 05:35 PM
yes I was wondering how you were going to know how much of each you had poured, as far as stability, the pure lead is heavier then the lyman#2 alloy, so it would be nose heavy, and inherently stable. I also figured it would be prudent to drill 2 holes at 90 degree angles through the nose (which would be facing to the rear) of the small boolit, so when I pour the harder alloy, it would flow into the holes and help lock it in place. or a faster way, chuch the small boolit in the drill gently, and spin it while making a fairly good size groove to give the other alloy another place to flow around and grip onto. mind you this project has never been meant to make more than 5-6 at once, just to time consuming. but I have used less then that during a successful deer season, now for those that think this is a waste of time and all, I have no intention on using these on any animals, unless a long period of experiments eases my mind, it might not work at all, I have read about doing this kind of thing before and people have met with various degrees of failure/success. I say any good idea tried is a success regardless of the outcome "I found a thousand ways not to make a lightbulb"-Edison

Moonie
09-03-2016, 06:51 PM
Somewhere on here many years ago I read about a technique where you used a dipper to add enough lead to fill the nose of a mold with soft lead, then add a harder lead and dip the bottom of the mold into the melt until the spru became liquid again, then take it out and let it cool and solidify. This would create a boolit with a soft nose and hard shank without a seam or wrinkles. I have yet to try it but a number of people on here did and had good results. I thought it was a sticky somewhere.

I think this one was it:

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/archive/index.php/t-17546.html

gwpercle
09-03-2016, 06:59 PM
I read the Veral Smith article back then and made a little nose pour dipper for the soft point , had a bigger dipper for the harder base and had got two pots for each metal. If you were quick and everything was good and hot and you got the body poured quickly on top of the nose and kept everything level ( if the nose base was not level when the body was poured the boolit was off kilter)
it can be done, but the rate of production was low and rejects were high. They were just tedious to make.
But maybe you can refine the method, possibly with two bottom pour pots with the first delivering a measured amount on the nose pour and the second pot fill out the body ? Back in the day we just had open top pots and ladles to work with..
Go for it !
Gary

OnHoPr
09-03-2016, 07:20 PM
Hey, sounds like an idea. A few thoughts, if the Marlin 45-70 Guide gun is used or possibly with micro groove barrels where the hard lead seems to help with accuracy thats great. This is probably helping to get a bit more velocity as well. I can see where you might want to enhance the tunnel wound even with the big metplat for different velocities and still have deep driving instead of the flattened out like a pancake and maybe a little less penetration on certain shots. If the smaller boolit is centered and has grooves with a good poor then it should basically lock in good enough for animal tissue. A few comments were addressed about getting nose wrinkles, and if you kept them warm in a oven or hot plate you should figure out the system of getting a good boolit. Heck, its a 425 gr 45 cal, if its doing even 800 fps it is still going to penetrate. The style though might increase knock down shock at certain velocities. Are you thinking of WDing the boolit or just using the Lyman #2. At certain speeds the Lyman #2 may not allow the soft point to function anyways. I can see where there might be a ponderance of the allow of the base boolit. Instead of Lyman #2 maybe a little less Sb and a little more Sn in the mixture. This would soften, but not to much, and give less brittleness or breakoffs of the Lyman #2 if at the speeds where the boolit does mushroom and give more elasticity for the outside of the nose around the soft point. It may also widen the spectrum of velocities of which the boolit will mushroom. I think you just got creatively more technical in alloy make up, possibly, depending on your hunting style preferences.

This sounds like it could enhance the smaller cals like the .30 to .35 for instance. Though, not using a boolit prior to the final pour, but to HP in a certain fashion then filling the HP with a designed nose alloy. Something like the boolit working whether it needs to hit a 100 lb does ribs broadside at 250 yds with just a lung hit. Or, being able to penetrate deeply on a heavy deer on a raking shot at 50 yd. Basically similar performance to tapered jaxets.

odfairfaxsub
09-03-2016, 08:16 PM
Pour a boolit, drop it in water to quench it. Pull out of water, blow torch the nose but not the body. What you have is a inharently hard body and a untempered softer nose. Boom!!!

catskinner
09-03-2016, 09:24 PM
I doubt if a soft lead nose would unbalance the bullet. I have used two alloy bullets where I poured a measured amount of pure lead into the mold and then filled the rest of the cavity with harder lead. When shooting them on paper I never noticed any thing different from the same bullet cast of one alloy. A soft nose would probably shift the center of gravity but I don't think enough to make a difference. And I would definitely use a tweezer to handle the soft bullets when placing them in the mold. Let us know how it works. I am always interested in such things.

Elkins45
09-03-2016, 09:31 PM
How about a mold with a huge cupped HP pin, then pour the soft lead into the HP hole level with the nose?

Oklahoma Rebel
09-03-2016, 09:42 PM
no, I am going to slow cool them in sawdust, 15bhn( lyman) is hard enogh, and I would be afraid that the sudden temp change would separate/weaken the area where the metals meet, you guys have some good ideas, I didn't think of using a torch, maybe not for detempering, but to help" weld" the nose even further. elkins, I have filled the nose of leverevolution boolits with lead after taking the dumb plastic out, that was before I had the means to cast

OnHoPr
09-03-2016, 10:27 PM
How about a mold with a huge cupped HP pin, then pour the soft lead into the HP hole level with the nose?


Hey, I like that Elkins. Except for, put the HP pin in of your design. Then pour the front half of boolit with a tough elastic alloy with a bunch of Sn and a bit of Sb. Then pour the bottom portion of the boolits bearing surface and lube grooves with a harder tougher alloy, maybe even a little bit of copper in it. Then pour the nose full of whatever 1 to 10 or 20 Sn/Pb. So, you get the 30 to 35 cals doing over the 2200 fps level into the 24 - 2500 fps and the boolit should perform good on 80 lb to 250 lb critters from any angle and ranges a bit pass the 250 yd mark. A three alloy boolit. Obviously, tedius, but how many critters are you going to shoot in the season. It should work on the rib side of a small doe @ a couple hundred yards or a raking shot on the big boy at 30 yds in the brush with good penetration, but hopefully not a lot of extra curricular damage.

Oklahoma Rebel
09-04-2016, 02:16 PM
onhopr ,elkins, that would be so much easier than my 2 boolit idea! I don't have any hp'd molds yet, but when I do get one, I will try that for sure!

dh2
09-04-2016, 03:43 PM
trying to get a 45 cal bullet to expand better I will just cast soft and stick with this one
http://noebulletmolds.com/NV/product_info.php?cPath=42_139&products_id=906

Oklahoma Rebel
09-04-2016, 10:03 PM
but I don't have a hp mold, besides, its just an experiment, I can use half WW half pure, and get good expansion too, nothing wrong with trying an idea! :Fire:

hc18flyer
09-04-2016, 10:48 PM
I am going to use a .32 soft round ball, melt it by dipping the mold, then pour the mold with a harder alloy for my 358 win. Don't need to make many, a few to confirm accuracy, few to hunt with, have the noe 36-230 flat point mold. Hopefully I will get a chance to try it on a couple of whitetails in November? Flyer

Mk42gunner
09-04-2016, 11:10 PM
I think you will have problems with the softer nose section bonding with the rest of the boolit, maybe not though, you will never know until you try it. If you do have problems, here is a way to make soft nosed boolits that works: http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?11749-Casting-Softnose-Bullets-From-ANY-Conventional-Moulds

Good luck,

Robert

olafhardt
09-05-2016, 01:17 AM
Pure lead has a good bit higher melting point than lead alloys. This meàns with a two pot two dipper method you can pour boolits that perform kinda like Nosler Partitions, or so I have read.

Ballistics in Scotland
09-05-2016, 03:34 AM
Soft and hard alloys have a considerable difference in specific gravity, and I think if the former wasn't completely central, it could harm accuracy quite a bit. I don't believe you would get excessive flashing or ovality if you sandwiched a crosswise strand of the finest electrical copper wire in the mould when you are casting the light bullet. Then if you do the same when you are casting the larger bullet around it, it would hold it in place against the inrush of molten metal.

I doubt if the metals really need to be soldered together, but the shorter and more pointed the small one, the better. The fit of base in base is quite important, or I would suggest going to a smaller calibre. My cast .255 Jeffery bullet, almost identical to the jacketed one below, should work.

I don't know how likely bad filling around the smaller bullet is. Lead is a much worse conductor of heat than a steel hollow point pin or any mould block material, which should help. But the least possible interruption of flow is probably important.

I would be surprised if simply pouring in the soft lead doesn't occasionally produce a bad bullet, and you don't want to face the buck of a lifetime without knowing what is in there. If it isn't for the buck of a lifetime, what is wrong with a .460 flat nose as usually constituted? Even the kangaroo bullet idea needs a lot of testing before you rely on it.

Lloyd Smale
09-05-2016, 06:20 AM
for 44 and 45 soft nosed bullets I take a 38 spec or 32 mag case and make a dipper out of it. get your mold real hot and pour the soft lead in and count 3 to 5 seconds and then use the bottom pour to fill the bullet with the hard lead. I weed out any that don't look right. You can easily tell because the pure lead will be shinier and the hard lead dull.

Wayne Smith
09-05-2016, 08:04 AM
Just do a search for the BruceB softpoint method. It was worked out years ago. You need both of the alloys molten when they are poured together or you will get a solder joint and it is not terminally ballistically stable.. If both are molten they do not mix,the pure lead is heavier. You will barely be able to see where they join. This is stable and you have a softpoint boolit.

44man
09-05-2016, 08:52 AM
I have been pouring soft points for years and need them for some revolver calibers. I only need about half the ogive softer and my nose mix is 3# of pure/1# of WW and water dropped.
I have the LBT soft nose pot and it works better then a dipper. I drop the soft and set the mold on a level board, pour the hard quickly. It is almost as fast as casting a full hard.
You can see the line but they do not separate and they shoot as accurate as the others. They are devastating on deer. You will never recover one.
I tried the Bruceb method and it works but I do not like the time involved and my lead pot goes down fast so I have to keep it full and that means too much time for heat and the mold to cool. while ingots get to heat. I don't want to get involved in heating ingots.
Too much soft out front on deer can make you change your thinking. It is not pretty and I keep showing this picture.175886
This deer was moving so I pulled a lead to get her behind the shoulder but at hammer fall, she stopped. Before the boolit exit, I ruined the neck too. All the white is bone and the large bones were torn loose from muscle and shattered.
This boolit only has 1/8" of softer.
This is from my BFR .500 JRH, 440 gr at 1350 fps. I had sad results with full hard WFN but now deer just drop so fast I don't see it past recoil.
My other experience was not good either in my BFR 45-70 with hard so I used Babore's 420 gr HP cast of 50-50, oven hardened to 18 BHN. A quartering shot about removed the off shoulder and the deer was blood shot head to tail so be careful what you wish for. Like anything else there is a balance point.
A soft nose works but moderation might be called for, each caliber is different as is velocity. Work at this like you choose jacketed for each animal. The world of cast can do anything.
I look sideways at HP's. I love them to blow up water jugs.

Oklahoma Rebel
09-08-2016, 11:57 AM
yeah,.....I do llike to eat what kill, especially a nice young doe! HC18flyer's way of doing it sounds better honestly, but also would require tending to 2 lead pots and the different dippers, along with all the stuff we normally have to juggle, sound like it would be difficult for a clumsy feller like me.

44man
09-08-2016, 12:46 PM
Get a little 10# Lee pot for the soft and make a dipper. They really work and sometimes way too well.
I have not tried the torch method, seems kind of touchy. Should work though. My LBT soft nose pot is a Lee made for LBT. Just the drop for lead is different.