My first time casting - need a few quick tips

I've been reloading for a long time, rifle/pistol/shotgun. It wasn't until I bought a S&W 500 that I decided to start casting. The projectiles were just too much money. So, I've been lurking on the thread searching topics for the last few months learning what I can and I made my first batch last night.

I'm using wheel weights which I melted into ingots and then fired up last night for my first batch. I used a lee 440gr .500 mold and cast about 50 rounds, they came out pretty good looking - some were a little frosty. I waited about 5 seconds, knocked the sprue off, opened the mold and had to shake to drop them. They went directly into a bucket of water with a towel at the bottom to quench. Afterwards, I lubed with LLA and installed a hornady .500 gas check and ran them through my .501 resizer. They sat over night and they are pretty much ready to rock now I presume.

My WW should (correct me if I'm wrong anywhere in here please) be around a 10 on the Brinell, after being quenched and sitting for 18 hours it should be around a 20 hardness. With these being gas checked as well, is it safe for me to start my loads at 1,400fps and move up to 1,600fps? Of course I will check for leading, but I just want to make sure it's safe in these velocity at this perceived hardness.

I don't see any reason why they would not be safe as long as your loads are within published parameters and you work up to max loads. Don't get hung up on reaching a certain velocity, look for accuracy. That is, unless your 500 is for grizzlies at 5 yards...

ummm the 18 part comes in about 18 day's.
put another coat of lube on them while you are waiting.

Welcome to CastBoolits Pyrex,

Looks like you started off pretty well. Quenched boolits aren't harder coming out of the water, after quenching they will age harden, how fast depends on the percentage of antimony in the alloy. The lower the percentage the slower the age hardening. With clip-on WW assume 2% antimony or at least a week to get up to their hardest.

I don't load for the 500 but your bullets should work well for you assuming proper fit in the revolver.

Rick

Awesome, that's good to know. I did not know it will take that long to get hard (that's what she said). I assume the 400 degree oven method is the quicker of the two ways? Should I wait a week or two before I load them, or is it okay to load the round but just sit on it. They have been lubed twice now. I'm here to learn runfiverun!

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Originally Posted by cbrick

Welcome to CastBoolits Pyrex,

Looks like you started off pretty well. Quenched boolits aren't harder coming out of the water, after quenching they will age harden, how fast depends on the percentage of antimony in the alloy. The lower the percentage the slower the age hardening. With clip-on WW assume 2% antimony or at least a week to get up to their hardest.

I don't load for the 500 but your bullets should work well for you assuming proper fit in the revolver.

Rick

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Sure, you can load them up. They will age exactly the same in a box or loaded in brass. Shooting them right away depends on what your shooting and how hard they need to be. Dunno if the oven will be faster but it will be more consistent. When water quenching it is impossible to keep the mold at exactly the same temp throughout a casting session or to get all boolits to fall from the mold at exactly the same time. Temp at the time they hit the water determines the final BHN. By oven HT they all come out of the oven at exactly the same time and hit the water at the same time thus more consistent.

Rick

I seen the price of .50 GC's and spit my coffee out---OUCH!
Lee should have made a PB in that boolit too. You really don't need one with WD WW boolits.
I would dump the Alox and use a good lube. I stuff Felix into the grooves by hand before using the lee die to remove excess.
A good suggestion was to load for accuracy, forget looking for velocity.

I don't have the Lee mold, but I think the NOE 440 gr RN is pretty close.

Eyeball your gas checks carefully to make sure they are seated equally deep and straight. I found using the push-through sizer did not properly seat them. I switched to seating using a 2 oz nylon-faced hammer.

I used finger-packed Carnauba Red.

Everyone seems to prefer carnuba red for lube and less smoke. That's going to be my next lube.