First boolits today!

[tddeangelo]

Finally cast a few boolits. They are from a Lee 457405F mold, a 405gr Flat Nose 457 bullet.

I kept some of the better ones for measuring diameter and weight. They averaged at 408.8gr (SD=2.3), and sized out at mostly 0.458, with a few at 0.459.

A pic:



Comments/suggestions are most welcome! I noticed they got a tad frosty. In the moment of casting, I was thinking I didn't have the mold warm enough. Oops, lol. These will get remelted anyway, as I just wanted to practice casting a bit and wanted to see what my mold produced.

So, with the mold throwing mostly 458's, and with my Marlin likely to be best served with 460's (I have to slug it yet, but almost every 1895 shooting cast boolits I've heard about is best with 460's). So....how do I go about getting them up to 460? I have a Lube-A-Matic coming soon, so I have the ability to size/lube, but I'm not aware of a way to size "up"?

I've read a little about beagling, and a little about different alloys making the boolits "grow" a little? Not sure I understand that stuff real well just yet, though.

I may just want to move this mold out and get a different one, as I had hoped to GC the boolits, too. Maybe not necessary? Seems like a good idea, though, to keep from having a job of mining lead out of my barrel. That's another area where the more I read, the less I understand, lol.

[osteodoc08]

Look shootable to me. Size/lube and shoot. Welcome to the addiction.

[Keyston44]

I have the same mold. They drop out of mine at .459 with straight wheel weights. I shoot them as cast. I dip lube them with 45-45-10 and have pushed them to 1600fps without any leading but they group better at about 1300fps.

Key

[tddeangelo]

Interesting. What rifle are you running them in?

So, when the lube-a-matic arrives, if I got a 460 sizer for future boolit use, and ran these through it to lube them, that's gonna make a bit of a mess, I think?

[pworley1]

Good start. There is no need to recast the frosty ones.

[tddeangelo]

I didn't really mean to recast only because they are frosted. I had wanted to start looking into water-quenching them, and that would require me, if I understand it right, to size them very shortly after casting. I did not water quench these, and they are somewhat soft. I have no idea what content is in the lead I used for them. It came to me with the pot. It was in ingots, so I felt ok using it, and I know and trust the person I got the pot from, so I felt ok using the ingots, but I have no idea what they are, lol.


At any rate, I had planned to use COWW lead for these boolits for actual use. I just wanted to get an idea of size, but I guess since the alloy changes the sizing slightly, I need to cast some from the WW lead to get the sizing they produce? If I'm lucky, maybe I'll "grow" them to 459-460?

For lubing, if I run these through the lube-a-matic I have inbound, what sizing die would I use? If I got a 460, I imagine that'll make a bit of a mess?

[Keyston44]

Interesting. What rifle are you running them in?

So, when the lube-a-matic arrives, if I got a 460 sizer for future boolit use, and ran these through it to lube them, that's gonna make a bit of a mess, I think?

I shoot them out of a Marlin Guide Gun.

If the bullet is smaller than the size die you will have a mess.

I also have a Ranch Dog 460-425 That drops out of the mold at .462 that I size to .460 when installing gas checks. I use the Lee Push Through sizer that I bought from Ranch Dog when he was having them made from Lee.

Key

[reloader28]

I havent played much with 45-70 and no longer have one, but it seems to me that air cooled might be better than water dropped. It seems to me that might be a little hard, especially if the boolit is a touch small.
Granted, I was using a gas check (with 50/50/ lead/WW) so thats kinda cheating too I guess.