Just Some Info on WW, Air and Water Dropped

[RedRiver]

Cast a bunch of .45 230gr RN. Used 50/50 stick on/clip on wheel weights. Water dropped some, air cooled some and powder coated some. The following was after two weeks of sitting.


Water dropped were approx. 18 bhn

Air cooled were approx. 12 bhn

Water dropped/powder coated were 12 bhn.

Heating them up in the oven for powder coating really softened them up.


...and thank you all for the information on this board. Lots of good information. My favorite thing is everybody's real world experiences with casting and little tips they have learned.

[Bzcraig]

Did you water drop the pc'ed boolits or air cool?

[runfiverun]

it won't matter.
you don't cook them long enough for water dropping to matter.
so they will go back to the air cooled alloys BHN either way.

[Bzcraig]

it won't matter.
you don't cook them long enough for water dropping to matter.
so they will go back to the air cooled alloys BHN either way.

So if I were to set the oven for 450 when pc'ing, and if I remember correctly, leave them in there for an hour then water drop, what would be your guess as to BHN?

[runfiverun]

well you'd burn the powder coating all to hell.
and at 450-f you could slump the boolits into a blob.
but with a low-no tin alloy and 450-f for an hour into ice water you would be near 30 bhn with a lower [2% ish] SB content after about a month of letting them settle.

[Bzcraig]

well you'd burn the powder coating all to hell.
and at 450-f you could slump the boolits into a blob.
but with a low-no tin alloy and 450-f for an hour into ice water you would be near 30 bhn with a lower [2% ish] SB content after about a month of letting them settle.

Well I suppose I need to reread the info on heat treating cause my memory ain't working.

[Recluse]

Well I suppose I need to reread the info on heat treating cause my memory ain't working.

I coat the bullets (Hi-Tek) with three light coatings, baking each one on at 400F. I give the last bake twenty minutes and then immediately dump them straight into a bucket of water.

This seems to give me that mid-range 14 to 16 BHN that I prefer with the coated projectiles.

:coffee:

[Nick Quick]

I keep experimenting with powder coating. One time I deliberately let the bullets in the oven for over 1 hour. The powder coat was burned bad. The bullets were looking like I dug them up from the ground after 30 years. The appearance was like rusty bullets.

[runfiverun]

I was just discussing this with Rick and Glen Fryxell about 3 weeks ago.
I was fairly certain that a shorter cook time would affect at least a portion of the boolit.
Glen said in no way would that happen.
you have to heat the boolit all the way through for the matrix shift of the antimony to take place.
the higher the heat and the quicker the cool the harder the bhn would be.
and you can get some very low Sb alloys to a high BHN through this method you can get even higher by removing them from the water and placing them in the freezer.
but there is a practical upper limit of about 34 or so.

[Yodogsandman]

I have found that by heat soaking boolits in my convection toaster oven for an hour at 450*F, then recalibrating the oven to 400*F and then powder coat by the ESPC method, I can get heat treated boolits. When the boolits are taken from the oven and coated, they are at 450*F. The powder melts on the surface immediately and care has to be taken from spraying them unevenly. Then they are placed back in the oven for the 10 minute cure time with the oven set at 400*F. Then removed from the oven and quickly quenched in ice water. Sorry, I have not checked the BHN but, it's certainly much harder. They don't burn or decompose and pass the smash test this way. If I don't size those boolits within a day, it takes some real effort (and lube) to size them. YMMV

[swheeler]

it won't matter.
you don't cook them long enough for water dropping to matter.
so they will go back to the air cooled alloys BHN either way.

YMMV
cast sept 4-16 50pb-50 COWW, 452-228 1R
air cooled 1-day 8.2
water dropped 1 day 8.2
pcoated 400 deg 13 min-8.2
pcoated reheated 400 deg 13 min and h2o dropped-8.2

sept 7-16 72 hours after
ac still 8.2
pc 8.2
water dropped pcoated 12.5 bhn

oct 9-16 one month
ac 8.2
h2o dropped 17.9
h2o dropped pcoated-17.9

11-11-16 2 months
ac-8.2
h20 dropped-17.9
h20 dropped pcoated-17.9bhn

I cast 311-467 and 452-228 from same pot of alloy same day for testing. Final bhn for both bullets are same but age up time is different, the 311-467 tested 10.4 at 72 hours, pc and water dropped they reached 17.9 bhn after one month.

After a decade of OHT rifle bullets with a one hour soak 5-10 deg below slump and immediate quench I was convinced 13 minutes at such a low temp would do nothing, boy was I wrong! Sometimes you just got to take the time to try it for yourself, glad I did.

[swheeler]

I am testing with Lee tester and a small flat filed onto the side of the bullet

[Bzcraig]

Thanks for all the info gentlemen