simple Hi-Tek coating

[Thompsoncustom]

To answer some questions:

Gunoil: I live in the Iowa but work for a vet clinic so using ml's just seems super easy to me. My last question was not about the ratio I got the 5-1-10 down was just wondering if Ausglock was using less of that ratio on the first coat compared to the other coats and if the ratio was thinned for the first coated for more even spread.

Ausglock: I'm not sure on the hardness of my bullets but I can't tell you I was using some lead my brother found by the river that appeared to be sheets of lead all smashed up. The thought on here was that was close to pure and causing my problem so I alloyed it with WW now the alloy is 1/3 river lead and 2/3 WW. I can pour some out of my pot and add more WW if you think that would help also my cousin can bring me some linotype if I need that.

Added: Better yet I'll put that pot off to the side and cast up 500 straight WW bullets so I can check alloy off the list of possible problem or maybe that is all that's going on. I will say there has been a improvement since I went from all river lead to only 1/3 but I'm not sure if that was from changing the coating or the lead.

Popper:Well I can't tell you if they are being cooked right or not but I have went this route to determine time and temp. After I coated a batch of bullets I put a hand full in the oven at 400(oven dial temp) for 8 mins and did the wipe test, and they failed. Worked my way up to 12 mins and they all pass the wipe test. Undersized bullets or a light load and crimp, Nope my pulled bullets measure .357 and my bore is .3555 so should be plenty over and no signing of crimping problems. My load is 4.7grs of bulleye under a Lee 124gr TL bullet OAL 1.125 quickload has it coming in just over standard pressure and about 1200fps.

ryokox3: no I have not used the above method to get the bullets to pass the wipe test.

Now on the smash test I have mixed feelings on if they pass or not. On the second coat no doubt they pass but on the forth coat when the bullet gets really flat you can see lead in the tumble grooves that doesn't appear to be from the hammer impact in anyway. I've still got the bullets I'll try to get some pics up.

[gunoil]

dont pay no attention to my 11th grade edjumacation TC. I always keep it simple. IAM ALWAYS CONSIDERING THE NEWBIES CYFER CURVE.

Ben u can do it, hell,, i can! Just a lil practice. Dont forget to take the lid off and look as they start to go off. I just did 300. I saw your web site before, wild and beautiful talent. I know u enjoy it.

[Thompsoncustom]

4th coating bullets on left and 2nd coating bullets on right. The shown lead on the 2nd coated bullets are from impact I don't think any of the lead shown on the 4th coated bullets are or maybe just a little.



To add to the madness these were water dropped on the 3rd and 4th coating.

Also if you want a close up of any of these bullets I can repost a real close up.

[gunoil]

looks like its thin and working. How long have you been casting.

[Love Life]

Keep trying, you'll get it.

The you, your firearms, and your reloading equipment will be super happy.

[swheeler]

Got home tonight about 6pm and had to try it out. 5-1-10 red copper, nice and even first coat, titty pink 8 miniutes at 375, second coat nice and even 8 minutes at 375, copper look, 3 rd coat 10 minutes at 375, dark red copper color, lube grooves filled with what appears to be metal flakes, nice even coat. I tried the acetone test, not a trace. If it is this easy and works like I hope, nelly bar the gate!

[Ausglock]

4th coating bullets on left and 2nd coating bullets on right. The shown lead on the 2nd coated bullets are from impact I don't think any of the lead shown on the 4th coated bullets are or maybe just a little.



To add to the madness these were water dropped on the 3rd and 4th coating.

Also if you want a close up of any of these bullets I can repost a real close up.

Coating looks OK.
were this squeezed in a vice?
I like to place mine on a lump of rail line and smash with a sledge hammer.

[HI-TEK]

Got home tonight about 6pm and had to try it out. 5-1-10 red copper, nice and even first coat, titty pink 8 miniutes at 375, second coat nice and even 8 minutes at 375, copper look, 3 rd coat 10 minutes at 375, dark red copper color, lube grooves filled with what appears to be metal flakes, nice even coat. I tried the acetone test, not a trace. If it is this easy and works like I hope, nelly bar the gate!

Good work. They look great.
My only two cents worth is, that if you ended up with coating in the lube grooves, you may have applied a little too much coating.
Just cut back a little, or dilute a little further with Acetone and use same amount in volume that you used to coat this lot at each stage.
If it smashed OK and sized OK and passed Acetone test, you are close to 100% efficient.
Well done

[HI-TEK]

'Murrica!!!

Now that that is out of my system I can add something productive.

I must agree with Popper on the leading only half the barrel issue. I'm thinking either undercooked, poorly coated, or undersized.

I plan to freeze some boolits this weekend and then do the hammer test to see if below freezing temperatures cause the coating to become brittle. It is a concern for me because we get cold winters. I'll post about it.

Some time ago, there was a test carried out, where the coating was frozen down to minus 49C, then allowed to come to room temperature, and no problems with coating.

If projectiles are used at sub zero conditions, you must keen to go out in those conditions.
It will be interesting with what you find.
Looking forward to your posts.

[Thompsoncustom]

Good, no they weren't put in a vice the imprinting you see on them is from a shirt I put them in to help with rubbing of the hammer or the concert floor.

[swheeler]

HITEK I think you are correct, for each coat i just eyeballed a squirt, first and second coats I only had to swirl for a minute, third coat I had to swirl quite a while until the sound changed, my eyeball must have been way of. I will hammer test later.

[Love Life]

Does it matter if you have too heavy of a coat? I have some of my 1st 45 ACP boolits that have HEAVY 1st and 2nd coats, and the passed all the tests, sized fine (had to hit with one shot due to added diameter), and shot fine.

Easy peasy.

HI-TEK- We had a cold snap last winter where it never got above freezing during the day and was in the negatives all night through the mornings for about 29 days. That is the best hunting weather!!! 7 layers of clothes, mickey mouse boots, and some snow shoes! Those temperatures are also the reason I don't invest in those super cool looking aluminum rifle chassis...

[HI-TEK]

Does it matter if you have too heavy of a coat? I have some of my 1st 45 ACP boolits that have HEAVY 1st and 2nd coats, and the passed all the tests, sized fine (had to hit with one shot due to added diameter), and shot fine.

Easy peasy.

HI-TEK- We had a cold snap last winter where it never got above freezing during the day and was in the negatives all night through the mornings for about 29 days. That is the best hunting weather!!! 7 layers of clothes, mickey mouse boots, and some snow shoes! Those temperatures are also the reason I don't invest in those super cool looking aluminum rifle chassis...

I can imagine that cold, and how folk would like to venture out in such beautiful weather. lol.

Coating thicknesses are usually built up using very thin coats each time.
Using diluted coatings, and doing it twice or 3 times, end us using less coating and provides best looking and performing product. (you really do not need huge thicknesses of coatings on alloy to work, as long as it is coated and baked OK. Sizing test, (or smashing) will usually show up with any problems with coating or techniques)
If applying too thick a coatings, sizing then becomes more difficult as coating is very tough and resists pressure more.
Some folk like thick coats, some like to just stain coat, and they all work in majority.
The difference in during sizing with amount of pressure required to push through the projectiles.
Using Extreme or 2-Extreme catalyst makes the sizing process very easy irrespective of coating thickness.

I suppose the idea is costs as well, as using minimum of coating will end up costing very little to make many projectiles.

Once you have done this a few hundred times, you will soon know what can be achieved with minimum coating use that works for you.
Thanks much for your blogs.

[gunoil]

Iam a stain'er, not a coat'er like hi-tek noted. Stained 380's last nite and still out there.

Custom mold i had made local:

Shot them today in 4 different 380 pistols.

Below is sizing last nite:
http://i1113.photobucket.com/albums/...ps3d3f0e3c.mp4

[prickett]

Added: Better yet I'll put that pot off to the side and cast up 500 straight WW bullets so I can check alloy off the list of possible problem or maybe that is all that's going on.

Great move. Eliminate as many variables as possible. If/when you get no leading from straight WW's, then start cutting your alloy with soft lead, a little at a time, until you resume getting leading. At that point you know what does and does not work.

[leadman]

I have been conducting some tests on water quenching and heat treating lead alloys along with the HT coating. In some cases the hardness survives the baking of the coating, sometimes it does not. Same ovens, same time, same mixture of the coating.
What is different is the alloys. My normal batch of alloy I cast from is a mixture of isotope containers, coww, linotype, and some misc. alloys. All the batches were weighed out and melted #145 at a time, #1,800 total. This measures 11 BHN air cooled, 15 BHN water quenched. IIRC heat treated was around 22 BHN. This mixture when water quenched and then coated does not survive the baking at higher than 11 BHN.
I tried another alloy of 50-50 COWW/linotype that I heat treated to #32 BHN. It was 15 BHN after coating. I heat treated some straight linotype to 35 BHN and it did survive the coating at 32 BHN.
So if you have an alloy that will not retain the level of hardness from water quenching or heat treating try another alloy as it might work.

[Thompsoncustom]

Well cast up 250-300 last night of straight Clip on Wheel weigths. Coated these bullets 3 times using 5-1-10 raito and about 7ml's per coating. Bullets were shaking with lid on and off so that the coating started to setup and then dump on to tray and waited about a hour. cooked at 400(oven dial) for 6.5 mins took out and shook them around and back in for another 6.5mins. All coatings were cooked the same way. Load data is the same as before 4.7gr of bulleye lee 124gr TL bullet OAL 1.125. Bullets pass the wipe and smash test with no problems.

Went and shot 20 when the sun came up. Again the first 5 were spot on but seems to drift soon after that. Still leading the barrel seems like it might be a little less than the last batch of 2/3 WW and 1/3 Pure. Gonna get some linotype coming my way and see if that makes any difference tho I'm guessing people are running straight WW without problems.. Also probably gonna take the load down to 1100fps and see if that helps maybe it's just to hot for the coating.

[Love Life]

ThompsonCustom- Hmmm. By all accounts you shouldn't be getting leading. Do you have a super rough bore or is there no throat? Maybe a sharp entrance into the barrel is shaving your boolits or at least knocking the coating off?

I ran some 358429 full tilt in the 357 magnum and had no leading issues using a hodgepodge (I have no idea what alloy is in my pot as I add stuff) alloy and had no leading or coating in the barrel.

[Thompsoncustom]

I thought about that and a couple days ago I loaded a bullet with only a primer and launched the bullet into the barrel. After beating it back out the same way it came it the coating was all still on there and no exposed lead no pits in the bore and it looks smooth not sure how i would tell? Also fells fine when pushing a patch through.

I've been using the CZ for the most part but when I started having problems I was using my glock 17 and 75b that day and they both leaded but I haven't tired the glock since.

[gunoil]

TC, your bullets seating correct with no shaving?

I would cook 8 mins. Thats what i do.