Can you top this?

[Crash Corrigan]

Way back when I first started casting boolits I knew less than nothing. I first got a hold of Lymans casting manuel and read it cover to cover a couple of times and then went out and got a Lee 4-20 pot and a Lee 148 GR WC 6 Banger mold.

I had a 586 Smith and Taurus 85 to feed then. I set up the pot and after scrounging some wheel weights went to town. I got a small cast iron pot and put it on a coleman stove and smelted down the weights and fluxed with candle wax.

It was all going good until I started to mold boolits. I had a pair of leather gloves but that Lee 6 banger was really hot. I got another pair of bigger leather welding gloves and wore them. I now had two gloves on the left hand that held the mold and one glove on the right hand, safety glasses, boots etc. I was covered.

It was a nasty job making boolits but I kept it up. They turned out pretty good and I was a happy shooter and boolit caster. This went on for two years.

I guess I made about 6,000 .38 Wadcutter rounds during that time and one day a friend of mine invited me to go to a gun show at Cashman Field here in Vegas.

I was enjoying looking around and my buddy found my Lee mold with some others on a table. Only this one looked different than mine. It was the same mold but it had a pair of handles on it! :drinks: Wow! I never knew they came with handles. :mrgreen: All this time I was holding the mold in my left hand when I opened it to dump out the boolits and then I put it under the spout on a brick to hold it while I poured alloy into the empty mold and shook my left hand to cool off. :confused:

Needless to say I bought another Lee six banger with a pair of handles that day for $20 and used the handles from the new/used mold on my old mold. They fit just perfect. :-D

A little knowledge can be dangerous but that had to be the most stupid thing I did for two years was to mold boolits without using the handles that the silly mold was designed for because of lack of complete knowledge.

If that did not turn me away from this addiction then I guess I am hopeless?

[no_1]

Crash,

You are one TOUGH dude! Has the feeling come back in that hand yet?

Robert

[Cherokee]

Crash - Man I don't see how you did that even with two gloves on !! But I understand for sure. I had no instructor and had to learn on my own (way before this internet stuff) to cast. Same for shooting. It was 20 years of shooting Ruger's before I learned that the SAA & Ruger's should only be loaded with 5.

[TaylorTN]

THAT IS HARD-CORE!!!!

I got started because I wanted to pour up strap weights for my duck decoys. I bought a 405 RF for my 45/70 just to play with. I had so mych fun ladling those big slugs that I bought a 6 cav SWc mold for my 38s. Now I am up to 6 2 cav molds and 3 6-cav. I haven't even shot any of teh first 45/70s because I had a load of ammo loaded already but I am now hunting with my cast 30-30s this year.

GREAT STORY!!

[docone31]

You Da Man!!!
What is amazing, you did so many, so well.
I am impressed.
Handles do make a difference though.
Me? I would have quit after the first few like I did when I was casting cap and ball, balls, with a cold mold years ago.

[dromia]

So Crash, after giving both techniques a thorough test which would you reccommend?


Was there any difference in the quality of the boolits from each method?

[Buckshot]

..................Gee Crash, casting like that must have been about like driving a truck with a 318 Detroit Diesel. For it to work like it's supposed to you need to drive it completely pissed off. So if you see a truck driver slam his fingers in the cab door, then open it and get in screaming and yelling, you know he has a 318 under the hood :-)

..............Buckshot

[kir_kenix]

Man, not sure I could have made very many boolits like that! I'm very impressed. That is dedication right there!

[Tom W.]

Is there some blonde in your background?

[SCIBUL]

I didn't know that captain hoock learned you to cast boolits :mrgreen:
Very impressing [smilie=1:

[missionary5155]

This is BARE BONES CASTING ! Talk about Minimum Investment Casting ! This is the feller I want in a tank turret beside me !
On our M60A1 (ol" portable sewer) we had a pair of asbestos HIGH temp gloves the loader was suppossed to use to flip the hot casings out his hatch... Never used them because they would get dirty and the Bn Co wanted WHITE loader gloves in the rack ??? But I wonder how those would fare ?? Real Hazmat contaminated boolits !!!

[DLCTEX]

Missionary: that's why you were supposed to use two pair if gloves, one for display, one to actually use. It amazes me that we were able to cast lead soldiers when I was a Kid. I don't recall the lead having any tin, but maybe it did. I do remember warming the mold on the kitchen stove and pouring from the little one pound electric pot. DALE

[missionary5155]

Good morning Dale... We had a pair of GI Issue one each leather gloves we kept stuck up above the main gun on the recoil replenisher...

[2muchstuf]

Great story Crash . Thanks for sharing it with us. We've all blundered in some way or another.
Don't confuse unimfermed with stupid. If you're casting your own there's nothing stupid about it.
2

[725]

A true believer. Love the mission first outlook... I would suggest, however, to stay out of china shops.

[Bill*]

Yeah well,....... I got half a ton of 50/50 solder for free but had to throw it all away as I didn't know which percentage was tin and which was the lead:roll: [smilie=1: hehehe .....Bill

[crabo]

"It was all going good until I started to mold boolits. I had a pair of leather gloves but that Lee 6 banger was really hot. I got another pair of bigger leather welding gloves and wore them. I now had two gloves on the left hand that held the mold and one glove on the right hand, safety glasses, boots etc. I was covered."

Sounds like there was a little alcohol involved?

[jhrosier]

Laughing with you, Crash.
None of my misadventures have left a visible scar, yet, so I won't admit them in public.:D

Jack

[jnovotny]

WOW!!! I don't think I can top that but I once got a buch of WW from a local tire shop, and was smelting them down to ingots. I would grab a handful and slide them into the pot,and then there was a big BANG. Somehow a lone 30-06 round had ended up in the mix of WW. I have a few scars from the experiance but no worse for wear. I damn sure pay attention to what I put into my lead pot now!!!!

[Crash Corrigan]

:drinks:
Should I be flattered to have had so many replies to my thread? I think not...

Dromia---yes the early ones we molded with a lot of radiator shop droppings from the floor. My buddy used to have to pay someone to dispose of these toxic metals. When he learned that I was molding boolits he begged me to take some of his solder. I ended up with over 25 5 gallon buckets of this wonderful stuff. They molded great but when smacked against a steel target became instant dust.

You could say that I was one with the lead alloy after molding without handles for two years. I had very few rejections as I waited long enough for the lead to cool before attempting to dump the boolits. Something to do with pain and heat.

Tom W--- yes there was a Blonde involved. My wife she had a great rack and could write her name in the snow if you know what I mean.

Crabo---yes usually. I can recall one smelting session when it was kinda hot. I went through a lot of beer that day and when I woke up the next day I had a very large pile of metal clips and dross on the ground. But I also had over 250 ingots piled up haphazardly in the area. That was 13 years ago and I still have yet to use some of that lead.

JNOVOTNY---yes I can identify with that 30-06 story. Back in '57 I was only 14 and was put in charge of a fire in which we were burning some trash cleaned out of a an old barn. There was an old shooting jacket thrown into the fire which had belonged to my Grandpa "Uncle Joe". He had been a bootlegger and a bookmaker all his life and unbeknownst to any of us had usually carried a gun for self protection and such. He also had a habit of carrying extra rounds in various pockets in his outerware. Soon after the latest donation to the conflagration we were surprised from the sound of gunshots in the region of the fire.

I retreated to a safe distance and the noises continued for about a half hour. When all was said and done we found a pile of .22 and .38 casings buried almongst the ashes and burnt stuff.

No 1---remember that I am left handed. It kinda crimped my sex life for a time.

I guess that the lure of this addiction has to do with converting those ugly, greasy, dirty and unwanted wheel weights to shiny, new and custom sized boolits which we can shoot from our guns. The best part of it is that we think it is saving us money!

[runfiverun]

thought you read the book, it has pictures too.
wow.....

[rufracer]

I did that exact same thing except I only had one glove on, and it only took me about 200 boolits before I figured something was amiss.

[Southern Son]

Crash, that has to be one of the funniest things I have read, so I read it to my missus and she said it sounded like something I would have done, except I would not have had enough sense to by the mould with the handles on.

[Chargar]

About the time you think you have read and heard everything, along comes a post like this!

[Shotgun Luckey]

Doing it for 2 years like that, and you are still doing it....I think you have the fever....and bad

[Big Tom]

LOL - that was a great post!! Actually, it was the second post I read on the site and it makes me really feel comfortable here - no not that way, my molds came with handles and I was using them ;-) But the set up sounds very similar to what I started with today.

Tom

[Charlie Sometimes]

This reminded me of that ol' bluegrass song where the fella looking for a job got one driving a truck, but had never done it..... found reverse and backed that truck all the way to his destination! Told everyone that he just got tired of going forward!!
LOL- you are a VERY dedicated boolit caster! The lead is defintiely in your veins.

I LOVE this site! There is so much KNOWLEDGE and FUN floating around here that I'll never be able to skim all the clips off the melt!

[Edubya]

Crash, many compliments on your story. I don't care if one word of it is true, it is very funny and you do have a skill in the story telling. I enjoyed your replies as well as the original.
Thanks,
EW

[Brick85]

Wow, this makes me feel very lucky that I've started into this while the Internet is around. I actually thought moulds always came with handles (I'd looked into Lee moulds, mainly) until I saw some Saeco stuff.

I guess the stories about walking uphill both ways with no shoes and no feet really do have some truth to them, us kids have it so easy nowadays. . .

Reminds me of my friend's father's setup. He had a 6-cavity .357 mould mounted on two boards that he would screw together, or so it appeared. This was with a stash of several thousand bullets, so obviously he used it plenty well.

[labdwakin]

Thank you thank you thank you thank you!!! I belly laughed for 20 mins when I read this. Very very well-written sir!

[Ron.D]

That's a great story. Probably a few more around, if only you guys would fess up, lol. When I started shooting and handloading, it was back in the 70's. When there's no gun club, and you don't know anyone that reloads, it's a long shallow learning curve. It took me 2 yrs. to find out what dacron was. I had to finally call Dupont, where it was made, and only after getting in touch with a chemist old enough to remember the stuff, was it finally confirmed as polyester fiberfill. I wish Lyman had changed the name when the rest of the world did.
I don't post much. Mostly keep my eyes and ears open. This site is extremely valuable to those of us that don't have access to a bunch of guys who learned from a bunch of guys etc. Great story, great site. Ron.D

[Hammer]

I absolutely love this website. I have been using computers and the internet since they first appeared on desk tops.... (We got some of the first "secure" desktop computes distributed in the Air Force). I have NEVER enjoyed any facet of this amazing tool as much as I have with this forum. It is stories and experiences like this that have returned laughter and enjoyment to this experience. Thanks for sharing and we all learn form each other... God Bless and be careful.

[johnlaw484]

[QUOTE=Buckshot;436587]..................Gee Crash, casting like that must have been about like driving a truck with a 318 Detroit Diesel. For it to work like it's supposed to you need to drive it completely pissed off. So if you see a truck driver slam his fingers in the cab door, then open it and get in screaming and yelling, you know he has a 318 under the hood :-)

..............Buckshot[/QUOT

318, man that's high tech. I ran a 671/238 for years. I have to admit that was the only truck I ever made any money with. It had a RTO 9510 with 9th and 10th reversed. I was capable of 9 miles a gallon but top end was about 60 mph (down hill)

[wiersy111]

When I first started casting a couple months ago all I could afford was the molds and not the handles right away. I had read this post giggling the whole time. Since I am not a patient person when I have a new toy I figured if Crash could do it for 2 years I could handle it until I could afford handles. My first couple of sessions didn't last to long, so I figures I would move up in the world and buy some welding gloves that helped a lot but production just wasn't up to full potential. Pouring big 535gr .458 boolits with a spoon and welding gloves was quite an experience. It didn't take long to squirrel away a few bucks to buy some handles no matter what mama said. Needless to say production has increased greatly since the addition of handles.

[Greenhorn44]

I Did the same darn thing. The box should say. Handles not Included