How long till FULLY hard

[charger 1]

weather their in the freezer,room temp,or on the surface of the moon,how long is it before these things(and I know it varies with alloy) are as hard as their going to get????

[felix]

One year at room temp. At 200 degrees, about two weeks. ... felix

[HTRN]

I thought they reached their maximum hardness after a coupla weeks? Have to check that.

I do know that if you leave them around long enough, they actually get softer, think it's like 2 years before that starts happening.


HTRN

[tomf52]

HTRN - Are you talking about bullets or bananas?

[charger 1]

Seriously fellas, I'm getting to be of the impression that the batch of alloy I threw out because it was falling 5 brin short of my other batches was all for not. Cause I made a new batch, and the same thing. See I didnt get the hardness tester till the first batches had sat about 2 weeks. I'm starting to think thats the amount of time it takes

[Dale53]

About 95% of the hardness will be obtained in two weeks. I use two weeks as the max hardness because I don't wish to try to keep track any longer for a minimal gain.

Just use the two week period and you'll hit it "close enough". Incidentally, that was reached after actual hardness tests...

Dale53

[bmblong]

I didn't know that it took time to harden. (Other than the seconds that it takes when I drop them in the water.) And I read somewhere on here that they start to soften again after a couple months. How does that work? If that's the case, why does your water/oil quenched knife not get softer as time goes by? Just asking more questions because the more I delve into this casting thing the more questions come up.:hijack:

[Dale53]

I should have mentioned that my hardening times are for air hardened. I do not water drop or heat treat. When I run out of alloying metals I will probably do that but don't have to now.

Dale53

[Edward429451]

Hey, one of you gents want to test my boolits for me? I have a fresh batch of 429421's some water quenched, some air, and I wanted to see if there was really a diff.

If you have a hardness tester and wouldn't mind if I sent you a few to test, I'd sure appreciate it. No return needed, just want the numbers.

To answer the question, I usually let mine age 2 weeks before use.

[waksupi]

Two or three weeks will do it. When bullets are fresh cast fropm Ww's, or most other alloys, they will test as nearly pure lead until aged.

[HTRN]

HTRN - Are you talking about bullets or bananas?

Bullets. I remember reading it in Paul Moore's book on Commercial Casting. I'll have to go looking through it for an exact quote.


HTRN

[rebliss]

So with the 2-weeks in mind, do you fellows wait until that period of time before you lube, size, or load them, or just to shoot them?

[454PB]

Hey, one of you gents want to test my boolits for me? I have a fresh batch of 429421's some water quenched, some air, and I wanted to see if there was really a diff.

If you have a hardness tester and wouldn't mind if I sent you a few to test, I'd sure appreciate it. No return needed, just want the numbers.

To answer the question, I usually let mine age 2 weeks before use.

Send them to me and I'll test them. Send me a PM and I'll give you an address.

I recently tested some heat treated boolits that are at least 20 years old, and they were 26 BHN. These had been cast of wheelweights and heat treated at 425 degrees for 2 hours after sizing and gas checking. I didn't own a hardness tester when they were heat treated, but I suspect the idea that they resoften is incorrect.

[HTRN]

So with the 2-weeks in mind, do you fellows wait until that period of time before you lube, size, or load them, or just to shoot them?

I would suggest sizing them immediately, as it requires more physical effort the harder they get. You can them wait a coupla weeks for them to "set up", before using them.


I recently tested some heat treated boolits that are at least 20 years old, and they were 26 BHN. These had been cast of wheelweights and heat treated at 425 degrees for 2 hours after sizing and gas checking. I didn't own a hardness tester when they were heat treated, but I suspect the idea that they resoften is incorrect.

Found what I was referring to - Page 92 of Paul Moore's book - "The Handbook of Commercial Bullet Casting" - It seems that the alloy in question that softens are Lead/Tin, not the more usual Lead/Antimony alloy in WW's.


HTRN

[Bucks Owin]

Well now, that depends on the gal and the circumstances but..........

Couldn't resist, sorry :roll:

Dennis

[Paul B]

I size my boolits before I oven treat them. I lube them with a die .001" larger than what I sized them to.
Paul B.

[Char-Gar]

Some years back I did a series of tests and measured the same bullet cast from six popular alloys at one week intervals. I found that some alloys reached max hardness in three weeks and some others took four weeks.

I have not found the extra force need to size after they have hardened to be noticable.

I just cast and put them up and size and load them as needed. The extra hardness is not enough to make any difference in performance. At leas none that I can notice.

[raymond johns]

Hi Guys
following this tread I see the question of sizing before or after heat treating if sized after heat treated I was under the impression that the hadening is only surface deep and sizing after negates the tempering.mee thinks , can get into trouble thinking, mee thinks that too

[charger 1]

Hi Guys
following this tread I see the question of sizing before or after heat treating if sized after heat treated I was under the impression that the hadening is only surface deep and sizing after negates the tempering.mee thinks , can get into trouble thinking, mee thinks that too


You've mentioned one of many reasons why you sould only be sizing tenths of a thousandth of not multiple thousandths

[raymond johns]

Hi Again
I don't have the capabilities to measure lead in tens of thousands. I go a thou one way or another and find this OK.
Ray

[omgb]

OK, c'mon guys, all of this concern about hardness seems like so much over kill. I mean really, unless we are shooting for big beans at some national match; cast, size and shoot the sh&t. Let some other guy worry about how hard things are. If worried about leading at the velocity you are loading, drop back a couple of hundred feet per second and relax. Yea, I know, some guys like to see how fast they can push lead and that's OK by me. But really, aren't there more fun things to do than worry about bullet hardness? For hunting you don't want them too hard or they fragment. For plinking it doesn't matter a hoot how hard they are. For informal competition or any of the Cowboy events, bullet hardness isn't a big deal either.

My fear is that lots of newbies will read all of this and feel driven to go out and buy the latest thremothrocle gizmo so that they will have the ultimate control over bullet hardness. In the quest for better metallurgy, the fun factor will diminish and all that will be left is a bunch of elitists on one side and casual plinker's on the other. When something looks too complicated to be fun, public interest drops off pronto.:castmine:

I'll get off my soapbox now. I'm not trying to say folks shouldn't strive for the ultimate control over the ballistic process, far from it. It's just that sometimes "we" make things so much more complicated than they need to be. For me, most of the time, gimme some lead and powder and leave me alone. Sometimes I've just got to chase the elusive perfect 100, but dang guys, if things get to be too much like work they they probably are and that's no fun at all.

Now, if the the order of the subject and object were reversed in that original question, that might be the beginning of a really interesting "Extendz" commercial.[smilie=1: