boolit love for casting

[fireaway329]

ok how many of see boolit casting as therapy?
I am fairly new to this game but i just cant help but love it so far there is something so much more satisfying to making the boolit,and then reloading, i think i like it as much if not more than shooting.
i wanted to set up a poll but new to this forum and could not figure it out, so on a rating from one to ten where do you place yourself for sheer pleasure not work doing it?

10

[Crash_Corrigan]

As a kid I couldn't get enuf ammo. Between my dad 1920 Savage Bolt Action 5 shooter and his 12 Gauge Baker double I terrorized the Racoon, Skunk and Possum populations of Ulster county NY from 1953 to 1961. Woodchucks were my favorite big game animal and squirrels and chipmonks were also valued targets.

I never could see a reason to kill a harmless bunny or deer. Likewise with most birds other than crows. The one time I went hunting officially with a license and such I was 18 and after only an hour in the woods during a fierce snowstorm along came Mr. Buck.

He was beautiful, covered with snow and with a nice pair of points on each side. He had big dark eyes and was munching his way along on some bark of trees. I watched him for about 10 minutes hardly breathing and making not a sound.

While keeping him under observation I mulled over the prospect of hauling this poor thing about 2 miles back to the road. I did not have knife of any kind that had a blade of more than 3 inches. If I possessed the best hunting and skinning knife in the world I had not a clue what to do with it. I had not a foot of rope and the deer was somewhere in the neighborhood of weighing as much as me.

At that time I was 5'4" and about 110 pounds. I had never eaten venison and I did not even like beef steak nor pot roast. My Mom was a lousy cook and burned everything. If we did not have peanut butter and jelly and bread I would have starved by the age of 6.

I just talked my way out of shooting that deer and to this day I know I made a good and mature decision which I have never regretted.

I kept watching him and eventually he meandered off into the snow and I packed up my Winchester 94 30-30 {Grandpas} and walked home. I never hunted deer again.

Later I became a NYC Police Officer, Sergeant and finally Lieutenant and retired after having to carry a .38 every day for 20 years. We were required to carry our off duty gun at all times. Hence I hardly every went into a bar and going swimming was a pain in the butt. I usually hid the gun in the trunk under the spare tire.

The gun was a tool and a valuable one at that. Over the years I had to use it many time. Mostly just as a precaution when making a traffic stop I drew it in my right hand and kept it pointed down alongside my leg out of view of the motorist.

One time that precaution saved my life as the motorist also had one and tried to take a shot at me through his window across his body. I just stepped back out of the line of fire and fired enough rounds through him to cause him to stop his anti-social behaviour. I had four other situations where I was required to shoot somebody and believe me Hollywood and TV do not have a clue about what really happens when someone is shot. Only one BG I ever shot fell down. He needed 6 rounds and was terminated with prejudice. Most people were jacked up enuf not even to notice that I had shot them. That .358 cal LWC did not have much punch and even when I had some reloads made up that went about 300 FPS faster than issue ammo the rounds did not mushroom at all and just punched a hole through and either stayed inside or fell a few feet behind the BG.

I did use the Smith revolver quite a bit as a bludgeon and it certainly took down it's share of people in that manner. I learned early on that people who are hit in the head with a steel object tend to bleed profusely and that usually gets their attention pretty quickly. I was an expert shot and actually never missed when I had to use the .38. By the way they do not make a good tool to shoot open a door. Very noisy and messy and I found a sledgehammer to be much more effective and safer to use.

In '80 they finally gave Sergeants and above a tiny can of mace. This worked well mostly but sometimes it just pissed people off badly. In '82 I got a stun gun flashlight that looked like an innocent flashlight. That thing was an excellent tool but was frowned upon by the liberals who ran the department. As a Desk Lieutenant or Platoon Commander my days of Patrol outside the confines of the Precinct StationHouse were pretty much over and I sold my beloved flashlight when I retired in '84.

I got back into shooting for fun after I retired and I spent a lot of money on ammo. One Christmas when my wife asked what I wanted for Xmas I told her. Tools to reload ammo. That was in 1990 an I saved a lot of money making my own ammo. In '95 I bought my first mold and a Lee 4-20 electric pot.

As much as I enjoy shooting I get a bigger kick out of scrounging free lead, smelting that free lead, remelting those ingots into boolits and then sizing and lubing those boolits and the final assembly of the completed round.

I can customize just about everything to suit the purposes of the shooter, target and situation which I can control. I can make a powder puff round in .38 to train a newbie or a kid and not cause them to flinch and regret shooting. They can have a lot of fun and see instantly the results of good shooting techniques.

When I work with kids I load shot rounds for the .38 with mild loads of powder and the targets are baloons at 15 or 20 feet. Since the #12 shot had a pattern of about 3 to 5 feet wide at those ranges they seldom miss a baloon. INSTANT FUN.

I start newbie shooters out with shot loads and they have mild recoil and report. Later as they get better we move up to lead SWC boolts of 135 gr with 3.2 gr of W 231 with a Smith 586 6" bbl revolver. Shooting a human sized target at 20 feet with such a load is pretty easy and again the mild load and instant gratification keeps them coming back.

When we advance out to 25 yds we start using the steel reactive targets that fall down and then get up, flop up or clang with a good solid sound. Since we paint the targets with yellow or white spray paint they also can see where the rounds hit. Bowling pins on light chains hanging down from a 2 x 4 are fun as well as railroad tie plates hung inbetween the bowling pins. A small tank of Helium is handy to give the baloons a chance to swing in the breeze and if you put some talcum powder inside the baloons prior to inflating it really gives the shooter some incentive to hit the target.

Lately I have been messing with a 1954 M-1 Garand and trying to get some accuracy with it. Now I am playing with paper patching these boolits to achieve a higher level of accuracy. I am also planning on getting into shooting BPCR in a sharps 45-70 in the near future.

Since I fully retired last year my days have been filled with many worthwhile activities including riding my new Triumph Motorcycle, training my new dog RAMBO {an attack Chihuauhua}, moving into my mobile home {new to me}, raising roses, shopping, cooking, cleaning, scrounging lead ww, smelting, photography, reloading ammo, cleaning guns and shooting. I might even try to find a lady to spend some time with but I an not in any rush about that.

Casting boolits is addictive and every bit as enjoyable as shooting those guns for which you make your own ammo. You will never really save any money by casting or reloading because you will find yourself shooting more and always trying to improve on your past performances and thereby also spending more money.

[mag44uk]

Best read I have had in a long while..........!
Thanks,
Tony

[fireaway329]

a perfect response to what i was asking i am glad to know other people enjoy it as much as me.

[Echo]

Way to go, Crash. BTW - any relation to Douglas (Wrong Way) Corrigan?