Color and hardness?

[Timberland]

Hi all, do duller cast bullets=harder with the same alloy? I upgraded my heat source (Turkey Fryer Super Awsome!) and am finally getting dull bullets from pure PB vs the previous solid Silver look which caused me ultra leading. Ive yet to fire thees new ones but wondering if only the look has changed

[Rick N Bama]

What you're probably seeing is frosting which is not an indicator of hardness. To harden the boolits, you can drop them from the mold into a pail of water or heat treat them in your oven, then quinch in the water.

I'll just about bet that your leading doesn't have much to do with the hardness, rather it's probably the fit of your boolits. Stay tuned, others that know a lot more than me will most likely expand on your question.

Rick

[Shiloh]

Boolit size, hardness, bore condition, velocity, proper lube, are what cause leading. Then there are the combination's of these conditions that will/may augment the leading problem. There is no mention of bore condition or firearm type, so there isn't a lot to work with. Providing that the bore is good, the is item at the top of the list is boolit fit.

Some military relics with rough bores, damaged rifling near the muzzle or crown damage from cleaning, may always give problems with lead boolits.

My buddy relates a story about a fellow who swore of cast boolits in rifles due to leading. Said they were unreliable and inaccurate. Upon further investigation, he was moving an undersized boolit to fast. A surefire recipe for leading. If the boolit is rattling its way down the bore, no good will come from it.

Shiloh

[blackthorn]

Timberland said he was working with pure lead! Pure Pb will not heat treat to a harder Bhn!

[montana_charlie]

Timberland said he was working with pure lead! Pure Pb will not heat treat to a harder Bhn!
It's also hard to frost pure Pb.
That new "Turkey Fryer Super Awsome!" must be some cooker...
CM

[BPCR Bill]

Hi all, do duller cast bullets=harder with the same alloy? I upgraded my heat source (Turkey Fryer Super Awsome!) and am finally getting dull bullets from pure PB vs the previous solid Silver look which caused me ultra leading. Ive yet to fire thees new ones but wondering if only the look has changed

Pure lead will cast to a smaller diameter than a harder alloy out of the same mold, by as much as .003". Slug your barrel, and start casting boolits with repeatable alloys (or pure lead) and see what you get. Match boolit diameter as closely to groove diameter as you can, and err on the big side of boolit diameter if you must. The closer you can get these two dimensions the better off you will be. As far as color goes, I have some molds that will cast a shiny boolit, some a dull boolit, with the same alloy, same temp. If you do not have a temp guage for lead, I urge you to get one. Lead temperature variations will cause weight variations in your final product.

Regards,
Bill

[Rick N Bama]

Timberland said he was working with pure lead!

Well I missed that part, too early in the morning & too little coffee, thanks for clearing that up. That pot must have been hot if it was frosting for I don't think I've ever seen it while casting with pure.

Rick

[Shiloh]

Originally Posted by blackthorn View Post
Timberland said he was working with pure lead!



Well I missed that part, too early in the morning & too little coffee, thanks for clearing that up. That pot must have been hot if it was frosting for I don't think I've ever seen it while casting with pure.

Rick

Me too!! Looked at about 5AM, posted just before I left for work.

Shiloh

[mooman76]

You probubly have a small amount of tin in it to make it frost which will also make it harder slightly.

[Timberland]

I posted early if it makes you all feel better. The turkey fryer got so hot and very fast definatly worth the upgrade from the coleman stove. So what is the bottom line does the color have any effect?

[Bret4207]

No, color has no effect at all that I'm aware of. If you want "harder" boolits ( and I have to wonder why you want harder) and you have true pure lead then you'll need to alloy it with tin, antimony and arsenic and then heat treat/quench the boolits if you want really hard lead alloy. If you have pure lead you might be better served by trading it for WW alloy which has the aforementioned elements in it already.

Just re-read your OP and you need to determine WHAT caused your leading before anything else. A pure lead boolit can shoot lead free it it's used with a proper fit and load in a decent barrel. Why not lay out the specifics and see if we can help?