PC PROBLEMS / OVERCOMING the WEATHER / RESOLVES

[OS OK]

I posted this poll > http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...lt-lt-lt-lt-lt < 'The Devil's in the Details' > that deals with all the various methods in our PC'ing efforts...but...it does not deal with the one problem that many members seem to all have in common . . . 'WEATHER'.

In this post I would like to address 'weather', the problems it causes & what you have done to 'resolve' the problem. Lately there have been numerous post of wild ideas about PC'ing our casts...perhaps in this post we can deal with the weather problem alone.

Here's the bullet points that I can think of...in your response try to address them if you will...

* What weather causes you the most problems? Rain, Humidity, Cold, Snow or anything else you attribute the problems to.
* What coating equipment, bowls, containers, the triangle markings ect. do you use?
* Best/Worst PC coatings by name brand.
* Any comments 'weather related' that you will share?
* Any efforts you have tried that turned out to be a disaster that you will spare others from making?
* Preheat, don't preheat...what's the scoop here?
* Do you tumble or spray or both, depending on the cast to be coated? Any 'tips' here?

PICTURES WELCOME...remember, a picture is worth a thousand words!

[runfiverun]

I usually PC when it's 65-70 in the shop and about 40-45% humidity.
usually the humidity is lower, and sometimes the shop is warmer.
but that's pretty much the average.

my cup has a 5 and the lid has a 2 on it.
the BB's are the ones the kids had [glow in the dark]
5-6 shakes and a swirl then 5-6 more shakes and they are covered.
then I dump them in a pan with some holes in it and take the bullets out and stand them up on a tray with parchment paper on it.

I guess that's all the fancy I got.
no washing, no nuthin.

[LAKEMASTER]

I bought a harbor freight vibratory tumbler.

I took (dead) powder that wouldn't work with BBS,preheat,pvc pipe NOTHING gave me coverage.it built static coated the bullets in 5 minutes. 10 minutes gave me the perfect coating.

I'm going to stick to this method mainly due to the fact that it works no matter the condition.

When i drop a bullet 2ft off the ground into concrete and the powder still sticks i feel its suffice

[Walter Laich]

cold weather is not ideal for me.
#5 containers
Doubt I'll ever go back to spraying since tumbling with ASBBs has developed

now I cast so I can PC--shooting is in there somewhere too

[OptimusPanda]

Humidity it seemed gave me the most trouble. I put a pan on top of the toaster oven to warm the bullets up before they get coated. They stay up there while the previous batch is baking. They get pleasantly warm and dumped straight into the shaking container with powder. No BBs required. Maybe 30 seconds of shaking.

[P Flados]

I live in a location with lots of humidity (Southeast NC, ~ 5 miles from the Atlantic as the crow flies).

I use mostly the early standard approach, black ASBBs, a #5 plastic container and HF Red.

At times I really struggled with boolits needing L O N G shake/swirl sessions and still not getting good coverage.

I tried pre-warming boolits one humid day based on a suggestion from the forum. It worked.

Next few sessions were less humid & I skipped the pre-warm and got away with it. I kind of forgot about it until I had a few more sessions where getting the powder to stick was a pain.

Since then, I pre-warm most every time unless it is cool and real dry.

Preheating the boolits until very warm (120 °F to 140 °F) works for me every time. The first batch coats real good and real fast while they are still warm. Later in the same overall coating session, the boolits still coat good after they have cooled off. I think that getting them warm eliminates any hint of condensation or dampness on the boolits that kills the static buildup.

The only other improvements from the early days are in how I process the boolits from the powder to the cooking tray. I use forceps to toss the boolits upside down into the plastic trays that come with factory ammo boxes. I then flip the tray over onto a ~3" X ~7" piece of sheet metal covered with cloth & then slide the tray onto the aluminum cooking sheet. This wipes the powder off of the base and eliminates the need to use anti stick foil or parchment. It also lets me work faster & I can get 500 in one batch.