New to cb

[Mag357]

Hello all I'm new on this site herd all about this from YouTube like fc45 LOB ex ex,
A little about me i all ways love the out doors and I guess that's why I'm a wild land fire fighter now and love to shoot I have been reloading since I was 14 I'll be 35 In about two months now, and last Christmas my parents got me a Laymen big Dipper.
Have been collecting WW and now when and or if it does warm up will be making ingots for boolets for a 357 revolver & rifle will be the first two and this I will have lots of questions but for now I will just have to say hello and thank you for letting me join you guys.

[country gent]

Welcome to the site. early spring late fall is the time to do your smelting to make ingots Its hot work and cooler temps make it more comfortable LOL. A cast iron pot or steel pot over a burner or wood fire to smelt works good and keeps the crud out of your casting pot.

[Bzcraig]

Welcome aboard and hang out, it's a great place to learn.

[nvbirdman]

If you tell us where you are, you might find a mentor close to you.

[Bazoo]

Howdy from Kentucky.

[carbine86]

Welcome! Get ready for the addiction of casting to take over you. This is by far the best forum on the net so don't be afraid to ask ANY questions even if you might think they are dumb.

[swamp]

If you tell us where you are, you might find a mentor close to you.

+1 If the weather holds I will be casting tomorrow. You are welcome to join me.
swamp

[tinhorn97062]

+1 If the weather holds I will be casting tomorrow. You are welcome to join me.
swamp

+2. I’m in SoCal (Riverside County)

[RogerDat]

Welcome to the site. early spring late fall is the time to do your smelting to make ingots Its hot work and cooler temps make it more comfortable LOL. A cast iron pot or steel pot over a burner or wood fire to smelt works good and keeps the crud out of your casting pot. Plus 1 on this. Making ingots you don't want all that crud to end up in your bullet casting pot. You will be skimming the crud out and fluxing with wax and wood chips or clean sawdust. You do not want the glue filled or treated lumber stuff you can get free at a big box home improvement store. Cedar or pine chip rodent bedding from pet department or pet store is a good cheap source of clean wood chips. Planers are a really good size chip also. Some use sawdust from a chain saw. Bag of rodent bedding will last a long long time.

Point is you do not want all that crud in the pot you will be using to make your bullets in. Most electric hot plates are not hot enough for "smelting" lead into ingots. Propane fish or turkey fryers are a common choice. Pitch any aluminum pot, when hot enough to melt lead aluminum softens then fails under the weight of molten lead, bottoms will give way and lead goes everywhere. There are helpful posts on reinforcing a Coleman stove to handle more weight and some use those to make ingots. Harbor Freight has a cast iron Dutch oven that is good at around $25 with the 20% off coupon. Salvation Army store for a good sized stainless steel or cast iron pot for melting ingots is another good source. Solid handle is important, most are not designed to take the weight of pot of lead and won't. Trust the handle NOT. While you are at it those regular soup ladles used can have the handle bent 90* and used for ingot making. Cheap and readily available.

You will need some ingot molds. Don't waste your money on the Lee or RCBS molds. Muffin tins make good molds, creating 12 or 6 "puck" ingots per filling. Just one warning on muffin tins. Try one cavity first. Some tins will bond to the molten lead and you will not be able to dump out the ingots, you have to beat the muffin tin to scrap to get the lead puck out, finding out with the tin filled with 12 ingots is really annoying. Don't ask how I know. Rusty is fine, actually better than new. Non-stick will work but there will be off gassing bubbles on the outside of the ingots until the non-stick surface gets burned dry. Aluminum can be a bit hit or miss. The sort of porous tin plated ones are what got me, and an aluminum one. But at $1 apiece from thrift store I can afford to test a couple with one or two muffins and toss the ones that don't work after beating the one or two stuck ingots out the tins are trash anyway.

There are vendors I think in the Swapping and Selling forum that make angle iron ingot molds that are good. Or if you have access to weld your own those can be an ideal choice. https://www.google.com/search?q=angle+iron+ingot+mold&tbm=isch&source=univ&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiX_Lft293gAhWQxIMKHU5VAHIQsAR6BAgEEAE&biw=1680&bih=994 Plenty of examples on Google Images.

To skim the steel clips and gross crud from your pot of wheel weights you will probably want a course mesh deep fryer ladle like this one. https://www.homedepot.com/p/RiverGrille-Chrome-Plated-Steel-Skimmer-BA2014005-RG/206441936

Also a slotted serving spoon and/or a serving spoon with holes in it. Another good thrift store or garage sale item, but not expensive new. Wood or metal handle better than plastic, again don't ask how I found that out. Plastic does melt, who knew? I have both, slotted and holes. One has the tip ground straight across to make it flat and so it has sharp corners on end. I use it to scrape the bottom of the casting pot and along edge where bottom meets the side in my Dutch oven. You will also use these to skim the surface of the molten lead and scoop the ash and crud out, while the lead flows back out through the holes/slots in the spoon the because you pre-heated spoon by setting in the molten lead for a bit to get hot.

Heat source, pot, strainer, spoons, ladle and molds. Yep that is about it except for....

Face shield or wide safety glasses. Because any moisture driven under the molten lead, even a little condensation causes a steam explosion. The visit from the tinsel fairy we all work to avoid. Dump nothing into a molten pot of lead, always set tools on top of lead for a brief pre-heat before immersing. Pre-heat molds over pot to insure they are dry before filling. Fireplace or welding gloves that cover wrists and have insulation. Natural fiber clothing, nylon or polyester or other man made fibers melted to skin is not good. Shoes or better boots and if shoes then cotton socks. Guess which way drips and spatters go? Yep down. The one saving grace is lead cools a great deal when a splatter travels through air so by the time it gets to your jeans, body or feet if a small splat it will have lost a lot of heat. Big splat like an "oops" with a ladle will not cool as much, Those long pants and foot coverings will make a world of difference. Visit from the tinsel fairy... well do some reading on that one, empty a pot explosively 6 foot or more in all directions and what you haven't protected will be burned. Me I use a face shield, I'm ugly enough as it is. I wear wide safety glasses when casting or larger reading glasses. Less chance of problems casting bullets (pre-warming ingots before adding to the casting pot to dry and avoid chilling melt) but I still want my eyes protected.

Some people cut the top off of a 20# propane tank to make a big heavy duty smelting pot. Works well for on a propane fryer or possibly on a wood fire. Big batches are easier with one of those. Dutch oven from Harbor Freight can do a bit over 100# at a time and is 6 Qt in size. Smaller pots from Salvation Army or thrift stores will do what they do. You can sort of figure from what the HF 6 Qt. Dutch will do. Match the pot to the heat source. Big burner bigger pot, smaller burner then smaller pot. Cast iron or steel only.

Read up on avoiding zinc wheel weights. Lots of approaches but the all boil down to either inspect them all to toss aside the non-lead WW's before smelting into ingots or melt them slow and keep the temp above lead melting temp and below zinc melting temp. The zinc will eventually float to the top of the molten lead where it can be skimmed off. I sort and inspect but some do the controlled melt. I assume they use a thermometer. Which is a generally useful but not required item. 200* to 1000* degree is what you need for lead casting. Amazon has those. It only takes a small amount of zinc to contaminate a batch of lead, the melt will get thick on top and mush covered like oatmeal. Of course not enough heat in a cold environment will sort of do the same but if everything is being done as "normal" which should work as normal and you find you have to keep skimming thick glop off the top you might have a zinc issue. Pictures and a post back here or the aforementioned mentor will help sort out what is going on.

Welcome! And happy casting. The precision hobby where anything that doesn't come out right just goes "back in the pot". Do overs rule.

[JBinMN]

Welcome to CB.GL Forum!
:)

There a bunch of Great folks here & tons of knowledge!
:)

[GhostHawk]

Good to see some younger people still get interested and join up here.

Great community and a wealth of info available. It does take some time to really dig in and understand some parts of it.

Welcome!

[Mag357]

Thanks for the welcome and grateful info and I live where the golden Sea meets the hills of black in South Dakota [smilie=l:

[lightman]

Welcome Aboard. Its a fun hobby and can be very addictive!

My hats off to you guys that fight fire, be it structure fires or forest fire. Takes a lot of courage and physical condition.

[gbrown]

Welcome to the forum, friend. Good place to hang out and learn some things. Lots of good information laying around. Look at the stickies at the beginning of the sub forums and read some of them. Some really good info stored there. Get a copy of Glenn Fryxell's article from Ingot to Bullets. Go down in the Casting and Reloading Forum and then in it, to the Cast Boolits. In the stickies of that section. Really good information.

[ShooterAZ]

Welcome to Cast Boolits. Feel free to ask your questions, we all love to help out new casters!

[Murphy]

Welcome Mag357. I have a 'slight' problem with .357's myself. And no, I don't want it fixed.

That being said, I've been a member since New Years Day 2006 on this board. I'd been reloading for over 20 years before I began casting. I only thought I knew about casting, until I signed up here. The knowledge and wisdom to be found here is bottomless. One simple thing to remember is don't be afraid to ask questions, even if you think or feel it may be a dumb one. There are none when it comes to casting.

Again, welcome!

Murphy

[Echo]

Welcome, MAG357, to the best dang forum on the web. And Welcome to the society that worships The Great God Galena, source of the supply for our endeavor!