First try casting = ugly bullets

[geargnasher]

stir it good with a dry wooden stick, maybe add some sawdust or wood chips to it and stir that in. Let it smolder to ash and skim the crud. Scrape the bottom of the pot well with a long-handled tea spoon, try to work the grit and dross from the bottom to the sides and up to the top.

Gear

[dbarnhart]

I can't thank you guys enough for your help and advice. Without this forum I'd be lost and I would have given up. With your help I feel like I'm making progress.

The results of my second casting session look much better. Here's what I did:

1. Reduced the temp to 700 degrees

2. Added 1.5 oz of TIN to the mix

3. Fluxed using sawdust and a wooden paint paddle.

4. Kept the mold hotter

Not perfect but much better:;


My casting session ended abruptly however when the pouring spout on this old Lee pot plugged up tight. (so now I'm off to read the posts about how to fix it).

[Blammer]

you added ZINC? are you sure ZINC?

Tin perhaps, but ZINC?

[Down South]

you added ZINC? are you sure ZINC?

Tin perhaps, but ZINC?

I bet/hope he used tin.

[dbarnhart]

TIN TIN YES TIN! (trying to type WAAAAAY too early in the morning!)

Yes, added 1.5oz of TIN to the mix

[geargnasher]

As for your plugged spout, either a large gob of crud migrated to it along the bottom and stopped it up, or it froze. Holding a flame from a BBQ lighter on the spout for a few seconds will get it going again during a session if it only froze, but it sounds like crud plugged it to me.

You can try reaming out the spout with a piece of bent wire, but have an old frying pan or similar catch pan handy in case you dislodge the pintle from the seat, in other words be prepared to catch the entire contents of the pot if it gets dislodged!!

700 degrees is probably about 150 degrees over full-liquidus of the alloy since you added the tin (it lowers the melt point some), so believe me it's not too cold, although the spouts can still freeze if the ambient temperature is low or you cast outside in the wind.

It might be time to empty the pot and clean it.

Gear

[dbarnhart]

>>>It might be time to empty the pot and clean it.<<<

I got it unplugged and my next step is to do just that. The pot was about 3/4 full. Fortunately I have an old RCBS ingot mold (I think I paid $2 for it at the same time I bought the pot for $5) and I emptied the pot into it.

[geargnasher]

Now that you have the pot emptied, try this: Turn it back on for a few minutes and let the liner get hot enough to melt lead. Don't laugh, but taking a wooden stick like a paint stir stick and scraping the entire inside of the pot with it is just about the best thing in the world for removing dross scum. Unless there is rust, the stick will do the trick. Let it char as you work it across the hot metal, you'll see little shiny drops of reduced alloy form out of the dross as you do this. Clean out the spout with what ever will fit in there while the pot is still hot, then let it cool. Wipe the inside out with a rag dampened with WD-40 or any kind of light oil, this will control the toxic lead dust. Throw the rag away when done. You might need to use a little abrasive compound to lap the valve pintle in the seat while you're at it, otherwise put it back together and be conscious not to let dirty ingots or the tip of your stick touch the bottom while stirring the melt, once trash gets caught under the surface tension and weight of the lead on the bottom of the pot it's tough to get it to float up and out where you can skim it.

Gear

[HangFireW8]

dbarnhart,

I have that mold, actually the third of its type, the first had warping issues (cast bullets with fins), the second was misaligned by .005" because of an improperly staked alignment pin. I cast over 380 really good looking but offset boolits with mold #2 before figuring that out- a whole casting session wasted. Lee replaced both without complaint and now I have a good one.

Anyway, that mold is a bit challenging as far as molds go, particularly for beginners. It requires Tin and somewhat hot and consistent melt heat to get the tiny little Tumble Lube grooves to fill out properly. Being .45" wide doesn't help either as it is hard to fill the cavity fast enough with a decent temp melt and not get wrinkles. By decent, I mean not so hot you're burning off all the good elements in the alloy melt.

On top of all that, if you have the 6-gang mold, they are a bit more challenging to run. But, it can be done. If you can adjust the flow rate, get it up high enough that it goes into the sprue hole quickly, but doesn't flood the hole and require all the air to vent through the mold. Follow the other good advice here, keep trying, and take notes immediately after (or during) each session about what works and what doesn't. Every mold has a preferred mold temp, melt temp, alloy type, fill rate, fill angle, etc., but some are very particular about all of these things and others have a very broad range for each of these. This is one of those "particular" molds, but it can be mastered.

[dbarnhart]

Thank you, HangFireW8. I agree. The mold is a little two 'fiddly' for my tastes. When I close it the two halves seldom align properly without some coaxing. I'll live with it a while longer but I have my eye on an Accurate 45-230B or 45-230M in brass.

[fishnbob]

Thank you, HangFireW8. I agree. The mold is a little two 'fiddly' for my tastes. When I close it the two halves seldom align properly without some coaxing. I'll live with it a while longer but I have my eye on an Accurate 45-230B or 45-230M in brass.

Set a short piece of 2x4 where you are casting, right beside the pot and when you get ready to close the mold, set the bottom of the mold flat on the 2x4 and then close it. The flat planed area of the board will guide your mold halves back together.

[geargnasher]

Watch that setting the blocks on a flat surface to close them, none of my Lee two-bangers have even bottoms and doing so will cause more misalignment issues than it fixes. I've filed a few of them flat and even so I can rest them on the bottom to close the blocks, but in the end the alignment fix was to use a slight film of Bullplate on the alignment points so they slide together perfectly. It makes a world of difference in how the moulds close up.

Gear

[HangFireW8]

Watch that setting the blocks on a flat surface to close them, none of my Lee two-bangers have even bottoms and doing so will cause more misalignment issues than it fixes. I've filed a few of them flat and even so I can rest them on the bottom to close the blocks, but in the end the alignment fix was to use a slight film of Bullplate on the alignment points so they slide together perfectly. It makes a world of difference in how the moulds close up.

Gear

Gear,

You and I must be buying Lee molds from the same place.

Bullplate is good, but it won't cure massive misaligment.

On one mold, a couple of minutes of the bottom of the mold on the belt sander took care of the problem for me. On another I had to bend the built-on pliers several times before alignment was even a word I could use in relation to that mold.

I have to laugh when I think all the work I've done getting Lee molds working. I don't blame anyone for swearing them off, but after all, they're cheap, and I've gotten really good at fixing them!

-HF