First casting session with pics

[yobohadi]

After we put the kids to bed I fired up the Lee furnace and let the silver stream flow. I used a single cavity Lee .358 140 grain mold (which drops at .3575 x .3580 so I won't even need to size these) and a six cavity Lee .401 tumble lube swc 175 grain mold(which drops on average at .405 x .404 so I will have to size those).

I used some old bullet alloy from shot range 357 hollowed WCs for the .358 which are close to 8 bhn and wheel weights for the .401 which I water quenched to make them harder. From what I have read glocks apparently like them hard and I have to feed a new S&W M&P 40C I bought just 3 days ago.

I ran the furnace at full blast and got the 40s pretty frosty. I will be using LLA to lube these. I noticed that you empty that 10lb pot pretty fast with that Lee 6 banger, I see a 20lb pot in my future.

I had a good success rate with the single cavity mold. Once it heated up most all were keepers. The 6 cavity was a different story, I think I only kept 2/3rds of the bullets since I had a hard time getting all the cavities to fill fully, I usually had one per cast where the base of the bullets were not flat out to the edges but rounded.

I also need to speed up my casting, I seem to be spending a lot of time waiting for the mold to cool, I may need to get a sponge and water to cool the mold between casts.

Here's some pics tell me what you think, I have a long ways to go to get as good at casting as all you folks.

[bishopgrandpa]

Looks good from here. Keep up the good work.

[JesseCJC]

Not bad for your first time, hope mine goes so smoothly

[yobohadi]

Not bad for your first time, hope mine goes so smoothly

It took some time to get used to, I didn't show you all the messed up bullets I had when I was first doing the .358s.

I learned tons from this site so I felt I had experience already before I started.

One thing that made a huge difference I found was to keep your mold lubed. A lubed mold is a happy mold. :) By keeping it lubed, especially for the old used .358 mold, it would line up and close better. Speaking of lube here is a plug for Bullplate sprue lube, I used it and it worked great!

[Recluse]

Dang!

Good looking boolits for any casting session, let alone your first foray.

I reckon you're hooked now? :wink:

:coffee:

[yobohadi]

Dang!

Good looking boolits for any casting session, let alone your first foray.

I reckon you're hooked now? :wink:

:coffee:

Yep! Very Hooked. I spent 5 hours casting (and recasting) from 9pm till 2am which netted me about 600 usable boolits and had a great time doing it.

[Shiloh]

Great looking boolits!! I have a LEE SWC 140 gr six banger on backorder!!

Shiloh

[Ajax]

great looking boolits.

[snake river marksman]

It looks good to me too. When I can finally order my stuff, it's going to be a Lee 4-20 bottom pour and probably a couple of six bangers.

[DLCTEX]

Looking at the pic of your melt in the pot I wondered if your took the pic before the melt was complete, used kitty litter on top of the melt, or had some zinc in the alloy. The surface looks lumpy, like I get when I have some zinc in the melt.If that's the case it could account for the fillout problem you described.

[johnvid]

They look real good to me. Looks like you did your homework before you cast for the first time.
Congratulations

[Wayne Smith]

Pretty boolits! I'd suggest a hotplate in your future. It does take a while to heat up a 6-banger without one.

[wistlepig1]

NICE BULLITS, first try or not!

[Nate1778]

Looks good, I love it when the kids go to bed, mommy and daddy get to play. There have been several evenings when I have walked in at 1am on a Mon night not even realizing I had to be at work in a couple hours. Casting gets addictive.

[yobohadi]

Looking at the pic of your melt in the pot I wondered if your took the pic before the melt was complete, used kitty litter on top of the melt, or had some zinc in the alloy. The surface looks lumpy, like I get when I have some zinc in the melt.If that's the case it could account for the fillout problem you described.

I took the pics the next morning (this morning actually) so that WW alloy in the picture is well solidified. :)

[yobohadi]

Pretty boolits! I'd suggest a hotplate in your future. It does take a while to heat up a 6-banger without one.

I just sat it on top of the pot for 10 mins and it only took a few casts to get it to throw non-wrinkled boolits. But it doesn't sit up there all that well you almost have to balance it.

[yobohadi]

Looks good, I love it when the kids go to bed, mommy and daddy get to play. There have been several evenings when I have walked in at 1am on a Mon night not even realizing I had to be at work in a couple hours. Casting gets addictive.

Yes, I always lose track of time out in the garage reloading/tinkering (now I will be doing it casting) and am always getting in trouble with SWMBO. :oops: I keep telling her that men are creatures of habit, she just has to get used to my habits. :)

[plus1hdcp]

Congrats and the boolits look great

[JIMinPHX]

I'd shoot those with pride. Nice job.:Fire:

You say that you had a fair number of rejects from the 6-banger. I've got a few questions about that.

Was it always the same hole that gave you trouble? Or did the bad boolits come out of random cavities?

Did the boolits fail to fill out at the base, or somewhere else?

Did it get better, worse, or stay the same as you continued to cast?

[Phat Man Mike]

I see a problem with the .401 boolit's pm me and I'll send you a address where to ship them. LOL:bigsmyl2: wow I wish my first casting session went that well!!! keep up the new found hobby![smilie=s:

[yobohadi]

I'd shoot those with pride. Nice job.:Fire:

You say that you had a fair number of rejects from the 6-banger. I've got a few questions about that.

Was it always the same hole that gave you trouble? Or did the bad boolits come out of random cavities?

Did the boolits fail to fill out at the base, or somewhere else?

Did it get better, worse, or stay the same as you continued to cast?

I noticed the rejects seemed to be coming from the second cavity away from the handle and the cavity at the end furthest from the handles the most. It didn't happen all the time maybe every other cast or so and it seemed to jump around to the 4 outer cavities, it never seemed to do it on the middle two.

All my rejects failed to fill at the base exclusively. Rather than it being pretty flat against the sprue around the circumference of the base of the bullet it was a rounded bevel of sorts.

It seemed to stay the same as I continued to cast. Although I am casting tonight (I just added some ingots to the pot so I have time to check my email and this website) and I have turned the heat down to 6 or so and it seems to have helped with the fill out problem. I am getting less base rejects it seems, but I have not looked at the rest of the bullets to see if fill out is a problem.

Tonight is going much more smoothly, I am casting faster and getting a better rhythm down I have gone through about 15 lbs of WWs so far and it has only been 2.5 hours. I think I barely made it through 5 lbs by this time last night.

[HORNET]

Like most of the better vices, casting is one of those where you get better at it the more you do it....[smilie=w: Welcome to the fun. [smilie=s: