Somebody Please Explain Their Reasons For Water Dropping

[44man]

Two reasons for me, better accuracy from my revolvers without fliers.
50-50 alloy will be oven hardened to make the surface tougher for accuracy without changing expansion. Still a few fliers. I hate 3 in a ragged hole at 50 yards with 2 out.
Next is the lack of room on my bench for piles of hot boolits. A 5 gallon bucket of water on a short stool is just easier. I cast standing in the garage and a short twist to drop in water can't be beat by moving hot boolits around on towels. Call it lazy but I do get better accuracy from plain old WW's.
Air cooled gives me at least 2 fliers from every five. I have shot too many groups down to 3/8" at 50 yards and 1/2" groups at 100 to ever change.
Boolits harden faster and expand a little faster then waiting for air cooled to get right. They never do.
I will even water drop pure lead balls although it has no effect at all, just easier then a towel on the little space I have between the grinder and drill press.
Something to be said about a bucket of water for an old, old caster!

[Any Cal.]

HeHe...My reasons are exactly the opposite. I drop my bullets from the mold directly on a folded up towel. When they are cool (about 1/2 hr. later) they are ready for the next step. With water dropping I'd have to bring a bucket of water into the room, drop from waist height (or rig up some sort of stand for the bucket) dry the bullets before the next operation and get rid of "lead poisoned water" (JK). For me, more hassle than it's worth as I've never needed any WW alloy to be harder than stock for my boolits, standard and magnum...

I will do it either way, but usually air cool when it is below freezing, as the boolits don't dry, they freeze...(but the a/c boolits lead badly in my hot loads) I usually fill a bucket half full of water while the pot warms, and dump the water off while I put things away. Usually you can start lubing by the time you are done, and the boolits keep drying while you lube. Usually do about 400 at a time like that. An hour to set up and cast and an hour to lube.

Doing rifle boolits with a single cavity mold I usually air-cool, as they get paper patched, and the sc mold is so slow one boolit is cool before the next one hits the towel...

[pergoman]

I tried water dropping some Mihec 9mm hp's today and found it just as fast as dropping onto a towel. They dried out in a few hours while I loaded something else. My experiment will be to see how they harden with time. After 4 hours they averaged 13.5bh. Others I cast a month ago with the same allow but air cooled just averaged 17.5bh. I have no leading issues but decided to try the water thing after reading this post. 5.5gn HS-6 gives me over 1100fps and sub 1.5" 5 shot groups in several 9's off the bags. It doesn't get any better than that.

[nagantguy]

The real reason I water drop is because as a boy I watched an old man cast 30-30 boolits and water drop them he winked and said it was his secret. All the racks hanging on his barn made me think this guy must know a thing or two. Now I water drop because I don't like a pile of hot boolits on the table with me.

[357maximum]

I keep a few of them mesh laundry hamper bags around. They make a great "liner" for your 5 gallon bucket. I cast one "lot" and use another bag for the next "lot" by the time I am done with a good casting session...the first lot has mostly dried hanging from a nail anyway. CAUTION...them laundry bags do have a weight limit of about 1K 175gr 8mm boolits though.....the seam will split iffin ya get it too heavy.

My 30/30 and 30Badger plinker boolits, my 38special/35REM plinker boolits and stuff for the frontstuffers are about the only things I aircool anymore.....I just like what waterdropping does for me and thanks to certain members of this forum I can manipulate alloys to do whatever I need with a bucket of water and proper alloying choices. "It's a good thing"

[brotherdarrell]

I have several hundred lbs. of pure lead; however, I don't do much shooting that requires pure.

My ww lead air cools around 13-14 bhn. If I mix the ww with pure 50/50 and water drop I end up with a bhn around 15.

I can take 200 lbs. of ww and turn it into 400 lbs. of alloy by water dropping. Math may not be my strong point but I will take 400 over 200 any day.

Using pure, ww and tin in various proportions I can get alloys with a bhn from dead soft to 30+ by air cooling, water dropping or heat treating. For me it is about options and maximizing available materials.

Darrell

[canyon-ghost]

I see absolutely no reason to water drop my pistol boolits;HOWEVER, rifle boolits are a different matter.

That's right, rifle bullets are better water dropped unless you go to the trouble to cast with linotype. I hardended some 7mmTCU bullets but, these are 7mm bullets in an opened up .223 case for 200 yards. Not your average 50 meter popper there.

I used a sledge hammer to check the difference, I tapped an air-cooled bullet and a water quenched one, from about the same distance and force (not real scientific, I just wanted to see). The air cooled bent all the way to center, the water quenched only deformed the first 1/4th of the bullet. It's dramatic, there's quite a difference.

[Green Lizzard]

i am with darrell i like his math

[Lloyd Smale]

Im with 44 man. In more cases then not harder bullets give better accuracy. If nothing else it gives you another way to tweak a load. Having two differnt hardness of bullets is like having two differnt powders to try or two differnt primers or even two totaly different bullets. Bottom line though is in most cases i will try a couple differnt hardness of bullet but i usually do it by alloying.

Two reasons for me, better accuracy from my revolvers without fliers.
50-50 alloy will be oven hardened to make the surface tougher for accuracy without changing expansion. Still a few fliers. I hate 3 in a ragged hole at 50 yards with 2 out.
Next is the lack of room on my bench for piles of hot boolits. A 5 gallon bucket of water on a short stool is just easier. I cast standing in the garage and a short twist to drop in water can't be beat by moving hot boolits around on towels. Call it lazy but I do get better accuracy from plain old WW's.
Air cooled gives me at least 2 fliers from every five. I have shot too many groups down to 3/8" at 50 yards and 1/2" groups at 100 to ever change.
Boolits harden faster and expand a little faster then waiting for air cooled to get right. They never do.
I will even water drop pure lead balls although it has no effect at all, just easier then a towel on the little space I have between the grinder and drill press.
Something to be said about a bucket of water for an old, old caster!

[Shiloh]

Harder boolit. Also if it's wet, it isn't hot.

Shiloh

[gwpercle]

Just remember that if you size and lubricate your water hardened bollits in a lubri-sizer :
1) They will be harder to force thru you lubri-sizer die. I have read of damage to the linkage.
2) Resizing works the lead alloy surface and softens it back to the hardness you started with.

I can see where a hardened boolit might be useful in hunting, making the portions not sized tougher for deeper penetration. But for target / plinking it may be more trouble than it's worth. I like 50/50 wheelweights and range lead air cooled. Straight ACWW is plenty hard for most use. Even in rifle applications.
Gary

[1Shirt]

I water drop all of mine for convenience. I also size and usually lube on the same day that I cast, because have had some that hardened up quick after a day.
1Shirt!

[badboyparamedic]

Water Drop because its quicker, I can dry them and use 45/45/10 almost immediatly

[Any Cal.]

Just remember that if you size and lubricate your water hardened bollits in a lubri-sizer :
1) They will be harder to force thru you lubri-sizer die. I have read of damage to the linkage.
2) Resizing works the lead alloy surface and softens it back to the hardness you started with.

I can see where a hardened boolit might be useful in hunting, making the portions not sized tougher for deeper penetration. But for target / plinking it may be more trouble than it's worth. I like 50/50 wheelweights and range lead air cooled. Straight ACWW is plenty hard for most use. Even in rifle applications.
Gary

I think that as long as you size right afterwards, the boolits aren't hard yet, so not much more difficult. Also, I understand that if you size before they harden then you don't lose the hard shell, as it hardens after it is the final size, over the course of hours+.

[PbHurler]

I keep a few of them mesh laundry hamper bags around. They make a great "liner" for your 5 gallon bucket.

Great idea!, thank you for the tip.

[pergoman]

The first batch has hardened to 19bnh from 13.5 avg in 2 days. I sized then about 4 hours after casting and they presented no problems or strain on my old Lyman lubrisizer.

[H.Callahan]

I water drop almost 100%. This is solely because I want a cold boolit as fast as possible. I do, however, use it to "extend" my lead by mixing pure/ww at about 50/50. WC causes them to come out somewhat near AC WW hardness. Pure lead is currently easier to find around here than WW, so mixing allows me to stretch my supply of WW farther.

[Foto Joe]

Probably a dumb question or maybe I'm just not awake yet but what is "ACWW?"

[Jim]

Air cooled wheel weights, indicated boolits cast from wheel weights and air cooled as opposed to water dropped.

[Foto Joe]

As I suspected, I'm not quite awake yet. Nothing like starting the day off with a DUH moment.