High Copper Alloys- Lets discuss this further

[badgeredd]

I might have missed it along the way but Edd what is your railroad babbit? Thirty years ago we had one junk dealer scrapping old railroad cars here. The old cars had babbit axle bearings and I was lucky enough to get 50 lbs of it. Is that the same stuff as yours?

Yes, that is exactly what I have. My father was a car repairman on the NYCRR, PennCentral, Conrail RR by the time he retired. When repairing "hot boxes" he'd scrape out the burnt journal box packing and save the babbit that had melted and accumilated in the bottom of the journal box. Of course since all modern rolling stock has roller bearings, the source died out probably 20 to 25 years ago. The babbit was analyzed and has the same components and make-up as Rotometals #2 (Rotonickel-.15% Monel).

A side note, we (Dad and I) collected so much babbit in summer of 1964 when I went with him to work (because he was on the road and had broken his hand) that I was able to buy my first car from the proceeds of selling the high tin babbit as scrap for $0.33 a pound. The car cost a whopping $100! I'd guess Dad and I had smelted and sold at least 2000# of the stuff while I was in high school. Wish I had known then what I know now, I'd have a lot more in a stash.

Edd

[Iowa Fox]

Edd, Thanks for the info and the intersting history of you and your Dad.

[badgeredd]

Rgnvi

[303Guy]

Might I suggest annealing a few just to see what happens?

[badgeredd]

mnbbbbbbbvc

[303Guy]

Good idea. Any testing to see how the alloy behaves would be fun.

Another thought - with oven heat treating the idea is to harden the boolits, right? Well, one can age the boolits in the oven. I've no idea what the ageing temperature should be . It may be below the boiling point of water or above. Thing is, if the alloy takes a month to harden then ageing could reduce that to hours or days. Mmmm ..... I'm thinking of an insulated low power oven like a modified table top oven (and I happen to have such an oven It has a hot plate which I use for smelting). I've used 5 watt power resistors as heating elements powered by a transformer for melting my 'waxy-lube'.

[felix]

Aging can be anything under 300 degrees, but much safer at 200 degrees MAX to be ABSOLUTELY safe as NOT to excite the elements as individuals or composites. Increase TIME in oven to go faster. You can put boolits in water, and when the water starts to boil as an indicator, turn the temp down a tad. ... felix

[felix]

That is correct, Popper! ... felix

[badgeredd]

ok

Edd

[felix]

Only if you feel like it, Edd. Take half of the boolits out at bed time. Leave the remainder in the stove at 200 until 1:00 tomorrow, for a 24 hour heat soak. Of those taken out, water drop half of them and leave in the water until 1:00 tomorrow. Now, at 1:00 measure each batch you have, including those from the initial casting session. Test hardness of each batch. Purpose is to test the progression of hardness. If they are all about the same, you can ASSUME the alloy was such that it hardened naturally early on and the new oven treatment was a waste.

Repeat the entire process twice more when absolutely bored: one lead batch with a very slushy mixture of elements, and another with a mix of stuff that is linotype in "name", or approaching that of genuine linotype made from scratch at home which must exhibit a very minimal slush stage, hopefully zero slush upon freezing.

The zero slush batch will exhibit absolutely zero hardness increase with any kind of heat treatment, or theoretically so. ... felix

[badgeredd]

Sounds like a plan, Felix. That sounds like a test that will tell me quite a bit about the process.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Edd

[303Guy]

This is fun!

I reported before that my new alloy which is high in tin and is supposed to have a fair amount of copper in it was soft and easy to bend with my fingers once cool enough to handle but hardened to rather strong alloy over a week or two. It's that week or two I would like to bypass. Looking into the crystal ball, I can see a hardness tester with my name on it! I'm playing a guessing game here and it's no fun no more. But I still think there are better ways of testing alloy strength.

[felix]

Yes, there is a much better way for accuracy. A sizing die! Rig up a pressure handle gadget. You really don't care to measure point-on-hardness, but scraping hardness instead. That's what the gun is going to see!!!! Don't forget to measure diameter, before, just after sizing and waiting for a day or so for a repeat. The amount of growth tells you the toughness rating. ... felix

[303Guy]

Thanks, Felix. Just to figure out a load system.
A standard reference will need to be developed.

[felix]

Yeah, the barrel itself is the best sizing die. It's too bad nobody has figured a way yet to attach the needed instruments which capture the boolit changes throughout a firing cycle. That is what is needed, and then info can be sent back to the casting operation for alloy improvement. ... felix

[runfiverun]

wow a continous strip strain guage.
i could see a horizontal graph of what the readout would look like in my head.
engraving pressure,pressure rise and fall off,muzzle pressure....

[badgeredd]

zzzzzzzzzz

[303Guy]

P.S. One additional thought. I am also checking these to see if an idea I had has any validity. The idea was that the closer an alloy is to being balanced the shorter time it will take to come to full hardness/toughness/size.

I would support that idea, even to making it the definition of a balanced alloy. The implications are obvious. Toughness and ductility are my objectives, reaching full 'maturity' in a few days would make it balanced.

[badgeredd]

Update:

[felix]

That won't be a WAG, Edd, if all individual elements are "married" as a single unit. Zero slush stage? ... felix