Can't size if you heat treat????

[Elkins45]

So am I reading this correctly: if you heat treat boolits (water drop) then you have to shoot them as-cast and can't size them because sizing destroys the hardness?

If that's true I have a hard time understanding how they are considered 'hard'. If sizing them kills the hardness then how do they survive being sent down the barrel?

[sagacious]

Size immediatly after casting, and the hardening will not be adversely affected.

Or, size and water-quench afterward.

Best of luck. :drinks:

[Shiloh]

I cast and water quench. There are volumes cast and then stored. They are sized and loaded as needed. No noticeable detrimental effect.

From what I understand, the boolit softens only the part that touches the die.
I welcome all further explanations of what actually happens to the boolit.

Shiloh

[armyrat1970]

Size immediatly after casting, and the hardening will not be adversely affected.

Or, size and water-quench afterward.

Best of luck. :drinks:

Now that I don't understand.
Size, and then water quench afterwards? The boolits are already cooled before, or, after sizing. Do you somehow reheat the boolits afterwards to water quench?
The boolits have to be hot when quenched to gain hardness. Dropping a cold boolit in water does nothing but get it wet.

[Guesser]

The first time I heat treated a bullet, I sized and then heated them in a bread pan in the oven @ 250 for an hour. I took them out and dumped them in a bucket of water. They were allowed to dry, then pan lubed and cut out with a kake cutter. It worked well. That was over 30 years ago, I got the direction from an old Ideal pamphlet, wish I still had the pamphlet.

[ktw]

Size, and then water quench afterwards?

I don't water drop anything from the mold.

Handgun bullets get shot as air cooled wheelweights (~ 12 BHN)

Rifle bullets that need to be harder are oven heat treated after sizing and checking (1hr @ 450 degrees) then dropped into cold water. You can get wheelweight alloy up into the 26-28 BHN range this way.

-ktw

[BABore]

Cast, water drop, and size and check (if req'd) immediately following.

or

Cast air cooled, size and check (if req'd), then oven heat treat.

or

Cast air cooled, oven heat treat, then size and check (if req'd) immediately following.

Each of these methods will produce similar results. A few things you need to be aware of though.

Water dropped boolits will not be as consistent, nor as hard as the same alloy that has been oven heat treated if your casting methods are haphazard and irregular. You need to cast at a timed cadence and maintain a hot and consistent mold temperature. Done well, they will water drop to the same potential hardness as OHT'd ones.

Oven heat treating boolits that are sized and checked can cause some problems. Gas checks can pop off as the boolits are quenched in water. You can also get fractures where the top edge of the GC crimps on. Very dependent on boolit size and configuration.

Oven heat treated boolits that are presized, or water dropped boolits that are left unsized, will grow in diameter as they age. The higher the antimony content, the bigger they can grow. Sizing immediately after heat treating seems to negate this affect. Portions of the boolit that don't get touched by the sizer (i.e. a bore ride nose) will grow on you. I have had boolits that were sized to 0.478, then heat treated, grow to 0.484" after two years. It's a good habit to measure older boolits before you just shove them in cases and head to the range. This tendency to increase diameter with age can work to your advantage if you have an under sized boolit or small BR nose and have some patients. Once grown to desired size, they need to be sized, oven heat treated again, then used.

All heat treated boolits need to be aged before they are all of a consistent hardness. The higher the antimony level, the faster they cure. One to two weeks as an absolute minimum. One to two months for serious accuracy work.

Contrary to popular wisdom, I have not seen a degradation of hardness in boolits as old as 3 years. Straight OHT WW's and 50/50 WW-Pb allloy have been hardness tested repeatedly over that time span and have not shown any reduction. Anything older than that, I just don't care too much as I'm not likely to be shooting them anyway. They remelt nicely.

[milkman]

I did some testing on tumble lube boolits cast from wheel weights. Specifically the Ranch Dog .35. I could detect no change in hardness after sizing, no matter how the hardness was achieved - water dropped, oven tempered or air cooled. The hardness was checked after sizing at 1 day, 3 days, 1 week and 2 weeks. The hardness stayed the same within my ability to read the tool. (Lee)

The small tumble lube bands may be softened by sizing, but they are cut off, to achieve a large enough flat to use the tool, but the interior to the boolit stayed the same hardness and I can detect no difference in how they shoot.

Milkman

[243winxb]

If sizing them kills the hardness then how do they survive being sent down the barrel? Bullet hardness is essentially uniform throughout, not just on the surface. Some very large thick bullet may be softer in the center. Lyman tells us to lube the bullets with a die that is .001" over bullet diameter so as not to work soften the bullets. You can air cool, size*, oven heat treat, lube in oversize die. *Very had to size a dry bullet.

[sqlbullet]

Lead does work soften.

However, sizing a bullet generally works the top .0005" to .001". This would correlate to a size reduction between .001" and .002". In extreme cases we may drop .005", which would work the lead to a depth of .0025".

Lead testing tools indent the lead .010" - .040" or more for some. That is twice the depth of the sizing process.

Worrying about work softening affecting the bullet hardness is not worth the effort.

However, harder bullets are harder to size. Harder on you, equipment, etc. I generally size water dropped bullets for my M1 Garand within five hours of casting. Usually I will cast a pile in the afternoon, then size them that night while I watch a movie with the wife.

[BABore]

Bullet hardness is essentially uniform throughout, not just on the surface. Some very large thick bullet may be softer in the center. Lyman tells us to lube the bullets with a die that is .001" over bullet diameter so as not to work soften the bullets. You can air cool, size*, oven heat treat, lube in oversize die. *Very had to size a dry bullet.

I would only buy that if your boolits are heated to just below the slump point, they are small enough in diameter, and they are quenched extremely fast. I specifically try to heat treat at a temperature that is just above the point where the alloy will harden when quenched. This leaves the core as soft as possible. A hard shell and soft core makes for a tougher boolit and also allows for expansion. The lower you keep the antimony level, the better the effect. I test the outside hardness with a conventional hardness tester that gives a direct brinell reading. I then use expansion tests to calibrate the proper HT temperature for a given alloy. It doesn't give you a hard bhn reading on the core, but the proof is in the degree of expansion. Anything below 30 caliber is hard to control core hardness. Torch annealing the nose is used there.

The reason the bbl friction and sizing done there doesn't affect hardness is twofold. One is the time factor. Work softening the alloy takes a certain amount of time. The boolit is setting in the dirt somewhere before it softens. The second is that any work softening that does occur is only a few thousandths deeper than the rifling.

[DLCTEX]

I WD boolits for 45-70 (RD 460=350 and and 460-420) and 480 Ruger (Lee 476-400) and cast them fast and hot. I lube them through a lubesizer, don't really like tumble lubing and I have to seat gas checks anyway, that really doesn't size, just kisses the surface. The few boolits that I have recovered hit large rocks, the others penetrate deeper than I want to go. The recovered ones are largely intact with a small portion fractured off. The air cooled ones are much softer, and mushroom a good bit under the same conditions. I am still testing to see if there are any accuracy gains either way. I will be swapping the scope from the Raging Hornet pistol to the Raging Bull 480 R this week end to take old eyes out of the accuracy equation.

[fredj338]

Size immediatly after casting, and the hardening will not be adversely affected.

Or, size and water-quench afterward.

Best of luck. :drinks:
How is water quenching after sizing do anything? The hardening comes from the rapid cooling.
I size the same day I cast if water dropping. No issues.

[StarMetal]

I agree pretty much with BABore, but water quenching can be very effect and very consistent IF you run your melt hotter and cast fast enough to use the sprue shear method that 45 2.1 and I used. Contrary to certain member's belief the sheared sprue bullets can be very accurate as showed by my 6.5 groups in all the 6.5 calibers I should, among other calibers and also by the groups that 45 2.1 shoots with them. Personally I don't see degrees of hardness making that much of a difference in accuracy.

[xr650]

How is water quenching after sizing do anything? The hardening comes from the rapid cooling.
I size the same day I cast if water dropping. No issues.

Oven heat treating and quenching. :D

[bohokii]

after i cast mine into the water bucket and i feel like quitting i pull them all out put them on a towel bring them in the house and run them through my lee sizing die sometimes they are still damp

[sagacious]

Now that I don't understand.
Size, and then water quench afterwards? The boolits are already cooled before, or, after sizing. Do you somehow reheat the boolits afterwards to water quench?
The boolits have to be hot when quenched to gain hardness. Dropping a cold boolit in water does nothing but get it wet.
Ahh grasshopper...

Cast. Size. Oven-heat to the desired temp and water quench. Make more sense now?

Good luck! :drinks:

[sagacious]

How is water quenching after sizing do anything? The hardening comes from the rapid cooling.
I size the same day I cast if water dropping. No issues.

The response from xr650 is of course correct.

[prs]

I mostly cast for revolvers and shoot air cooled WW alloy; but for the few rifle boolits I cast, I do oven treat to near slump temp and quench in cold water. I find it very difficult to size these after the quench and I now size and gas check first. I do have to cull a few that crack, but no gas checks faling off. Then again I don't do much of these. I did not realize that they "grow", I guess I shoot them up they get too fat.

prs

[243winxb]

I did not realize that they "grow", My test showed a maximum growth of .0003" over a 1 month period. Not so much that you need to worry about it. Different alloys may produce different results??:confused: This was oven heat treated water cooled. Alloy about 75% wheel weights with 25% pure, a guess. Very good info >
Water dropped boolits will not be as consistent, nor as hard as the same alloy that has been oven heat treated if your casting methods are haphazard and irregular. You need to cast at a timed cadence and maintain a hot and consistent mold temperature.

[armyrat1970]

Ahh grasshopper...

Cast. Size. Oven-heat to the desired temp and water quench. Make more sense now?

Good luck! :drinks:

Yes I understand that. But why do you need a boolit that hard to begin with?
I just cast with WWS and WD. Plenty hard enough. Then I lube, size and relube them.
I know you can achive a BHN of around 30 or more with HT boolits. I just don't know why you need a boolit so hard.
I have cast with hardball and it is plenty hard enough at around BHN 16.
Am thinking of trying a 50/50 mix of hardball and straight WWS and not water drop. Should be plenty hard enough. Should compare with WD WWS.
Really hard boolits are very brittle.
I just don't see why you would want or need a boolit with a BHN of 26 or 28 when 14 to 16 should be good enough for most applications.

[sagacious]

I know you can achive a BHN of around 30 or more with HT boolits. I just don't know why you need a boolit so hard.
Armyrat,
That's a fair question. However, one certainly does not need to harden to 30BHN by the oven-quenching process. My 480 Ruger gives the best accuracy with 400gr plain-base bullets at about 20BHN. That's just what has proven to work best for my application. Your guns may shoot best at other BH numbers, which is perfectly fine too.


Really hard boolits are very brittle.
I just don't see why you would want or need a boolit with a BHN of 26 or 28 when 14 to 16 should be good enough for most applications.
Common very hard lead alloys for casting-- such as linotype-- may be brittle due to alloy content. Quenching ww alloy does not change alloy content nor does it increase brittleness. This benefit of versatility is related within the lasc articles, "Heat treating WW alloy with 2% tin added increases hardness / strength without adding brittleness as in linotype metal." This is why one may break a linotype bullet with a whack from a hammer, but only slightly mash a quenched ww bullet. It is also for this reason of low brittleness that quenched ww alloy works very well for some hunting applications.

Most of my casting is with done within the 12-14BHN range, even for magnum calibers, and that almost invariably works well for me. But on occasion, something much harder is required. Others may require even higher BHN numbers for their applications, and I am happy to let them enjoy their successes-- as they know their business best.

Hope that explains it better. That's just what works for me, and how I see it. :drinks:

[Char-Gar]

Bullets cast of the correct alloy for the job at hand do not requre heat treatment of any kind. But, if you feel you just must heat treat your bullets because so many others think it is necessary (which it is not), then follow the advise and counsel of xr650.

Remember this ... No where is it written that harder bullets are always better.

[xr650]

xr650 wasn't giving any advice. Just answering Fred. He thought Fred missed the above post about oven heat treating.

Chargar,
If a fellow only has WW and pure, isn't heat treating a way to get to your desired hardness?

[sagacious]

This is just my experience, but harder cast bullets are always better for my 480Ruger and 454. Through a lot of testing, that's what I've found, and that's what's written in my range binder. I have found that the expert advice written on the Freedom Arms site about using harder bullets for the 454 and some other calibers is worth reflecting upon:
"ALSO ANOTHER IMPORTANT FACT IS, THE FASTER THE VELOCITY AND THE SOFTER THE BULLET, THE QUICKER THE FORCING CONE AREA IN THE BARREL WILL WEAR OUT." The original quote is all caps.

Similarly, the Lyman #48 Handbook data for the 454Casull states,
"Cast bullets should be cast in linotype or a similar stength alloy"
And that handbook again repeats the advice later for the 454Casull:
"Cast bullets should be produced from linotype or it's equivalent."

I just follow that published reloading advice, and it works well for me.

I wish I could get the same accuracy for full-power loads in those calibers with acww, as it would make casting for those calibers somewhat easier. WW alloy quenched to linotype hardness gives me zee-ro leading and great accuracy.

In my case, for the 480 it's either linotype (which shoots so accurately it's spooky), or ww alloy quenched to equivalent hardness, which also shoots great. Since I can get ww's for free, but linotype costs $2/lb, I don't reckon I'm using the wrong alloy by following published instructions and quenching ww alloy to linotype hardness for those calibers-- and these cast/quenched slugs will do any job I ask of them.

Your mileage may vary, but I like my mileage just fine. Good shooting. :drinks:

[fredj338]

Oven heat treating and quenching. :D
You are assuming.

Size immediatly after casting, and the hardening will not be adversely affected.
Or, size and water-quench afterward.
This doesn't sound like he is oven heat treating?
I haven't tried oven heat treating but I understand you should size first, then heat treat (which of course requires quenching).

[Char-Gar]

xr650.. Well, if a fellow has and will have only ww and for some odd reasons thinks he needs something harder, then oven tempered ww will get him there.

I don't limit myself to just one alloy. In my shop I have WW, Linotype, 50-50 solder, tin and pure lead. I can cook up anything I want with no need to heat treat.

The question is..what does a fellow want to do that requires something harder than WW? What I have found is;

In handguns WW is good for any purpose up to about 1.1 or 1.2K fps., slap a gas check on it and you are good for anything you care to shoot out of a handgun.


On a plain base handgun bullet anything ACWW won't handle takes No. 2 or 50/50 (Lino to pure lead). There is no NEED for anything harder.

In rifles, a gas checked ACWW bullet is good to 1.9 or 2K fps depending on the firearm. Faster than than Lino gets the nod or a fellow could heat treat the ACWW bullets, but I don't.

[Char-Gar]

IMHO forcing cone erosion in handguns or rifles is caused by hot gas and not by the alloy.

In the interest of honesty and full disclosure, I don't shoot the .454 or big 48 or 50 caliber handguns. Shooting heavy recoiling handguns has given me tendonitis in my elbow and bad arthritis in my shooting hand. Somedays, just holding a pen or pencil is all I can muster. Of course I am as as deaf as a post to book and have to be careful of my shooting shoulder as well.

I know many older shooters who thought shooting should be some sort of puberty test in their younger years, and lived to regret all of that unncessary, recoil and blast.

Anway... I like to stock to talking about things with which I have had personal experience, and that does not include those big blaster sixgun. These days the 45 ACP and factory level 45 Colt loads are as heavy as I shoot on any kind of regular basis. The 22 lr and 38 Special are great handguns that I enjoy muchly.

[xr650]

You are assuming.


You may be right. Although I would rather ammuse, unless you will let me be both donkeys.

[xr650]

Chargar,
Good info.
I thought #2 was softer than ACWW? Is it tougher to handle higher FPS?
Thanks,
Larry

[runfiverun]

#2 is 5/5/90 alloy the tin antimony alloy makes a tougher harder alloy.
it is the same bhn as 2/6/92 alloy but is better suited to hanging together in tough animals.
quenching and heat treating has it's uses in hunting higher velocity issues.
for instance.. i use a nei loverign design from 25% pure and ww's quenched in my 30-30 pushed to just over 2300 fps.
if i were to hit a deer with that nose and treated alloy it would just pencil it's way through, however if i de-temper the nose back to the 9-10 bhn of the original alloy it now becomes an expanding boolit with a harder shank...
for regular type shooting i do not have to de-temper the nose..
the base and bearing surface is better able to hold the rifling and withstand the launch.
the alloy is certainly not brittle but is tough enough to do what needs to be done without the addition of costly additives.

the other advantage of quenching an alloy to harder bhn's is that i can use say ww's and pure to gain a heavier smaller diameter boolit. that pours right at 3105.
vs's a lighter more brittle alloy that comes out at a lighter weight.
i use the same nei mold in some of my 313 bores but need to change the alloy to 4/6/90 to gain the larger diameter.
yeah i could beagle it, but why, if i get round nicely filled out boolits.

[sagacious]

IMHO forcing cone erosion in handguns or rifles is caused by hot gas and not by the alloy.

In the interest of honesty and full disclosure, I don't shoot the .454 or big 48 or 50 caliber handguns.
Chargar,
I hear where you're coming from, and you are generally correct. The 454 and 475cal guns are a little different-- and that's why different solutions work for different folks. You may not have a need for harder bullets, but others do.

Several references, such as the Lyman Handbook, suggest sizing to .451" for the 454Casull. This provides confirmation that the warning on the Freedom Arms website is intended to prevent damage (such as a big crack) to the forcing cone caused by oversized bullets. A cracked forcing cone isn't a product of gas-cutting. When you consider that a lot more lead must be displaced by an oversize 454Casull or 480Ruger bullet hitting the forcing cone, than say, an oversized 357cal bullet hitting it's forcing cone, you'll see why the Freedom Arms warning is important advice.

Not preaching, just trying to shed some light.

Like you, I very much enjoy shooting target-level 45ACP loads. Great fun, and that's the bulk of my shooting. But I also enjoy shooting the larger calibers, and I very much enjoy the 480Ruger. Even with higher-end loads, I find that there is a lot less blast and muzzle flash with the 480 than the 454, and for me this makes the 480 considerably more enjoyable to shoot. With a 7.5" barrel and good grips, and not fighting the gun, it works well for me. Shooting the 454 for me is enjoyable, although it's definitely work. But shooting the 480 is just fun.

Regards, and good shooting. :drinks:

[sagacious]

Size immediatly after casting, and the hardening will not be adversely affected.
Or, size and water-quench afterward.

This doesn't sound like he is oven heat treating?
I haven't tried oven heat treating but I understand you should size first, then heat treat (which of course requires quenching).
Fred,
You and others are right-- the wording is not as clear as it could be. Xr650 was correct in his reply, as I noted above.
What I should have written is:
Or, size and oven-heat and then water quench afterward.

Regards. :drinks:

[armyrat1970]

http://www.lasc.us/HeatTreat.htm