a trick for tumble powder coating

[Rangefinder]

Back to something a little odd-ball... Cut a new mold--here's my 275gr. "pointy" in .50 cal for the smoke pole with a nice little cameo paint job. ought to be able to sneak right up on my doe with these! Well, maybe these. I'm thinking of cutting one more and HP'ing it to make a shallow cup-point, but haven't had time for that yet since I'm still playing with this one. Haven't recovered one yet--they keep punching too deep into the berm :P They're tilting a little because I couldn't get good light for the photo. So thinking fast I had the paper in my hand holding them up under the light--not the flattest base, but the bullets are darn near perfect. Hoping to run them a little in the next couple days. The 225gr's were shooting really well, but they weren't heavy enough for my liking, so now they put on a little weight. They load really smooth, these don't even get bore butter to get 'em started.

[jwber]

Was out and about for work, passed a Harbor Freight and I was able to score some Red along with a cheap scale to weigh out my ingots for mixing up alloys. They had about 5 more lbs and several lbs of each of the other colors.

Now I just need to get an oven, not in a mega hurry so I'll have to look around and see if I can find a good deal.

Question is...can you be lazy and dump them on like some hardware cloth trays like I've seen in HiTek videos? I'm not looking for perfect finishes, just eliminate lube / smoke for this winters indoor IDPA/USPSA matches.

[dickttx]

jwber, that is the exact question I was getting ready to ask as soon as I finished reading the thread!!

I have shot about 1K of the coated bullets I bought from Bayou Bullets and really like them. I have two 38 Supers and both are a little picky about loading lead bullets. Neither one of them have missed a single time using the coated bullets.

I have just about accumulated everything I need to start casting again after about a 45 year absence. I have been able to acquire range lead ingots at my club at a very good price and am about ready to try it again. It seems like powder coating using this method would be the simplest way to "lube" them.
After reading all 21 pages of this thread over the last few days, my biggest question was the same as jwber. From reading the posts it seems like picking the bullets out and setting them in the pan to bake is pretty time consuming and I had also wondered about just sifting them out and laying them on the baking sheet however they fell.
I saw this referred to a couple of times, but no discussion on it.

[bangerjim]

jwber, that is the exact question I was getting ready to ask as soon as I finished reading the thread!!

I have shot about 1K of the coated bullets I bought from Bayou Bullets and really like them. I have two 38 Supers and both are a little picky about loading lead bullets. Neither one of them have missed a single time using the coated bullets.

I have just about accumulated everything I need to start casting again after about a 45 year absence. I have been able to acquire range lead ingots at my club at a very good price and am about ready to try it again. It seems like powder coating using this method would be the simplest way to "lube" them.
After reading all 21 pages of this thread over the last few days, my biggest question was the same as jwber. From reading the posts it seems like picking the bullets out and setting them in the pan to bake is pretty time consuming and I had also wondered about just sifting them out and laying them on the baking sheet however they fell.
I saw this referred to a couple of times, but no discussion on it.

I have tried dumping them on 1/4" HW cloth and, if you like lumpy spotty-covered boolits...IN THE IMPORTANT AREAS, the grease grooves, go ahead and dump. Wherever the boolits touch/lay, there is a gap in coverage and big ridges of PC built-up. NOT what I want!

I just did 150 45's and it did not take but maybe 10 minutes to BBDT them and pick them up with hemostats and set on NSAF. Hemos are the important part.....much better than tweezers and needlenose. They get a GOOD grip and leave virtually no marks. I use the ones with curved jaws so you can get at all angles of laying boolits. If that is not fast enough, then maybe powder coating will not meet your huge volume usage of boolits. Just stick with commercial coated boolits. Have not met anybody yet that shoots such a large volume of boolits on a regular basis that PC cannot satisfy their hunger. I normally do 5-600 at a time...38's and 45's.

Good luck.

bangerjim

[jwber]

bangerjim

I don't shoot a super high volume (around 800-1000 per month). I'm just trying to see if it was possible. I was looking at a Black & Decker convection oven on Walmarts website for $40. If I can do 150-200 9mm's at a time I can probably make it worth it. Right now I'm using 45/45/10 with 2 coats and sized between each coat.

Between reloading on a turret press and casting it's not the quickest thing. I am going to pick up a Dillon 550 or 650 this fall/winter so at least the reloading part will be sped up.

[doctorggg]

I agree 100%. I dip my hemostats in the powder mix as I'm sure you do as well.

[bangerjim]

Many new folks getting into coating wonder if they have the coating down right. Here is a batch of 45cal 230gn TL boolits I did this morning.

Everything is done in a #5 coolwhip container and with black ASBB's:

Here is what they look like after about 1 minute of fast swirling and then 30 seconds of rapid up and down shaking (very important):

Attachment 108630

Pick up with hemostats and put on NSAF to bake for 10 min at 400F in a convection oven.

Here is what they look like cooling in front of my evap cooler:

Attachment 108634

Since I am getting tired of red everything (!), and these look like little lipstick tubes in 45LC cases, I mixed HF red and yellow 50/50. They do not mix as much as the blend and give a mottled orange-red effect. Still a perfect hard coating!

Simple and easy. There are 120 boolits there done in only 2 swirls! Note I only use enough BB's to cover the bottom of the bowl.

bangerjim

[bannor]

would pouring them on ratwire work for separating out the bb's from the boolits? Why would it matter about marks on the coating? it's going to get burnt up when you fire it anyway, correct? Are you selling these bullets, or why would such marks matter any?

[ghh3rd]

Hey Jim - I see that you are doing the shake-n-bake method. I think you were experimenting with an ES PC Gun for a while. Have you decided that this method coats well enough and offers a good 'production' rate?

I have a PC gun, and tried a couple of batches with it, and also have tried this shake-n-bake method, and think I'll use the gun for other jobs around the house... this method seems to work well.

Randy

[bangerjim]

would pouring them on ratwire work for separating out the bb's from the boolits? Why would it matter about marks on the coating? it's going to get burnt up when you fire it anyway, correct? Are you selling these bullets, or why would such marks matter any?

Those "marks" as you call them are probably bare lead exposed to cause leading in your guns!!!!!! You definitely do NOT want lay marks and exposed lead on the tops of the grease grooves. And, sorry, it does NOT burn off. The PC stays on the boolits, even after they hit. I, as many others, have recovered slugs they have fired and the PC is still there! Now that is tough stuff.

You can dump and bake, but you are defeating the purpose of the all-encompassing hard coating the PC provides if you have exposed lead from lay marks caused by wires and flat sheets.

Pick them up and set them down.

bangerjim

[bangerjim]

Hey Jim - I see that you are doing the shake-n-bake method. I think you were experimenting with an ES PC Gun for a while. Have you decided that this method coats well enough and offers a good 'production' rate?

I have a PC gun, and tried a couple of batches with it, and also have tried this shake-n-bake method, and think I'll use the gun for other jobs around the house... this method seems to work well.


Randy

I use both BBDT and ESPC gun. The gun is especially for the HF matte black. I just love the Ninja Black boolits!!!!!! I also am glad I have the gun....always wanted one to coat tools and stuff around the house and shop. This was just a good excuse to buy one.

I am getting about 90-95% quality with BBDT. Guuud nuff fer gubmint werk!

I can crank 5-600 hundred an hour depending on the cal and how fast I feel like doing it! After all, for me this is a relaxing hobby, not a timed exercise race. I really do no care how many I do in an hour. I just enjoy messing around with it.

Either way your still have to pick them up and set them down if you want good quality boolits, so the thru-put is about the same.

Sometimes when I am lazy, it is just easier to sit there and "shimmy-shimmy-coco-bop" in my air conditioned shop than drag the ESPC gun outside in the 105F heat!


Have fun! Life is not a race.

bangerjim

[Beagle333]

I agree with banger.... you really should stand them for baking if you want the driving bands protected. You can use pliers, tweezers, nitrile gloves, and some even use PC-dusted bare fingers.
If you really want to just shake em, toss em on some wire and bake.... there is a coating for that...... Hi-Tek. And that's actually the way it's supposed to be done with that one.

There are coatings for almost any level of involvement you want to put into it.

[prickett]

Question is...can you be lazy and dump them on like some hardware cloth trays like I've seen in HiTek videos? I'm not looking for perfect finishes, just eliminate lube / smoke for this winters indoor IDPA/USPSA matches.

Absolutely.

[prickett]

would pouring them on ratwire work for separating out the bb's from the boolits? Why would it matter about marks on the coating? it's going to get burnt up when you fire it anyway, correct? Are you selling these bullets, or why would such marks matter any?

I dump mine directly onto hardware mesh. If you are careful and remove the tray immediately after the oven's buzzer goes off, you can shake the mesh tray side to side and you'll not get any boolits sticking to it. It also tends to break boolits sticking to other boolits apart.

As far as blemishes go, I get almost none (not that I care that much anyway). Any exposed lead is so minuscule that it causes no barrel leading at all. See the three boolits on the right side of the photo in the first post http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...-powders-don-t for an idea of how smooth you can expect to get.

The size of the mesh will determine whether the bb's will separate or not. Unfortunately, .25" is too small to allow the bb's to pass through and .50" is large enough that the boolits fall through.

[jwber]

Absolutely.

Thanks, after looking at the photo you linked to below that is good enough for me. I'll try both ways and see however. I need to get an oven first though

[jwber]

Thanks, after looking at the photo you linked to below that is good enough for me. I'll try both ways and see however. I need to get an oven first though

Acquired $9 at Salvation Army, it's not convection but I figured it'd be good enough to give it a try. I just need to get BB's and something to pick them up with. Sunday I should be able to cast some up and give'em a coat.

[ZyonG47]

If your arm gets tired try this method. If you already have a vibratory cleaner this takes the hand work out of it for the most part. Somewhere between 5 to 10 minutes works. I'm sure the time can vary due to powder used, humidity, size, contours of bullets used....etc. It's much easier to just watch the video than explain in text here.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fxn-cbDikRk

Ebner

Wonder if this method would work with the HF matte black?

[bangerjim]

Try it.

banger

[hunserv]

What about the idea of using lead shots instead of plastic BB?
By its weight it might give a better impact for applying powder on the bullets...

[bangerjim]

What about the idea of using lead shots instead of plastic BB?
By its weight it might give a better impact for applying powder on the bullets...

Impact was the old thing used with applying moly.

We are now working with static charges here and metal BB's do NOT work.....I tried it.

In the old moly days, you wanted the metal BB's to pound the moly into the lead. Not so with PC.

The black plastic Airsoft BB's help (somehow) to distribute/generate a little more static and help with even coating. It works!

bangerjim