Anyone else copper plating?

[#40Fan]

Spritzed with a little lube and the boat tail survived.

[RPRNY]

LOL. Noticing anything missing? Ran these through the .309 sizing die. Boy were they tough to get through.

You converted them to flat base slicks. What's your next trick?

Very cool. Way to stick at it.

[#40Fan]

I was surprised they survived without ripping the plating off. This was going from .316" down to .309" in one shot.

My camera must be really **** good too. If you were looking at these with the naked eye, the sized area looks like glass copper. Camera sure does bring out the minor defects.

I went ahead and sized 3 more without lube, 5 total and 9 others were lubed. I loaded them all up and will test sometime this weekend if not before if the weather cooperates.

[lefty o]

I am sure I am over powered then. Found some other videos on youtube, not dealing with bullet plating, that described using a low current as well. I'll wait and see how these bullets shoot before making the decision to step up my power supply situation.

How thick of a coating were you applying, lefty o? The way I see, and lack of better way to describe it, is I am only putting a condom on these bullets and hoping it doesn't break. I really think the better way to go, if feasible is to start with a .277" bullet and find a way to get .035" coating on it and then size it down to .309". Figuring out how to do that is going to be the problem. I guess I should ask too is how long did you leave the barrels in your bath?

it all depends we had stuff that was thin, and stuff that was thick all depending on the application. we plated anything from 1hr up to 16hrs. curious what you are using as your copper source?

[popper]

I don't do plating but looking into wet PC. It appears that a minimum current is needed to activate, above that current is dependent on surface area of plated items. The actual plating voltage requirred is ~ 1.5 VDC but higher is needed to overcome the resitance of electrodes and solution. Kinda sounds like the TSP is providing a coating over the lead which is more conducive to plating.
from Wiki - "The flux(sic TSP) is applied as a concentrated water solution and dissolves copper oxides at the temperature used in copper brazing. Residues are water-soluble".

[#40Fan]

it all depends we had stuff that was thin, and stuff that was thick all depending on the application. we plated anything from 1hr up to 16hrs. curious what you are using as your copper source?

A roll of 1/4" copper tubing I picked up from Lowes. I have it sitting directly below the bowl. It is still wound in a circle with one end sticking up out of the bath that the positive wire is hooked to.

[#40Fan]

Wow! While I can't say it was a great group, it was a group and not a pattern. The bullets that got flattened out while sizing were absolutely horrible. Two didn't even make it on paper at 50 yards. The boat tails were the improvement.

I can't believe I haven't thought about it until on the way back from shooting today, but I need to load up some of these in my .308 and see how they shoot. Only been using my 300 BLK up to this point.

Next plan is to go thicker on the plating and see what happens. I might have to invest in a .312" sizing dies so that it isn't too hard on the bullet going from .316"+ down to .309". Thanks to Mustang, I'll have some GC bullets to test, too.

[OS OK]

Why not get a mould that cast cores the size you need? Then when sizing you wouldn't be elongating them and having the possibility that they could banana somewhat? These Lee dies don't support the sized portion of the cast body going straight as it goes through the die. Lee's just run the casts through a narrow spot in the die.
I dunnoh...your going to end up being the expert on this business...

[lefty o]

i tend to agree, the core should be undersized so that you are doing very minimal sizing of the plated bullet.

[jmorris]

What is your process?

When I did it, if polarity was reversed (DC current) the bullets came out looking sand blasted looking like some of your photos.

[#40Fan]

Why not get a mould that cast cores the size you need? Then when sizing you wouldn't be elongating them and having the possibility that they could banana somewhat? These Lee dies don't support the sized portion of the cast body going straight as it goes through the die. Lee's just run the casts through a narrow spot in the die.
I dunnoh...your going to end up being the expert on this business...

I was thinking that earlier. Getting a .277" bullet and coating the piss out of it to get up to .310"-.311" so sizing would be minimal.

If I had a 9mm mold, I'd even try plating to get up to .40/10mm! Anyone want to donate some as cast to the project?

What is your process?

When I did it, if polarity was reversed (DC current) the bullets came out looking sand blasted looking like some of your photos.

I am positive I have the polarities correct. After some reading I am really leaning towards the power supply being over powered resulting in the rough finish. Also found that adding stool softener (polyethylene glycol) will help with getting a smooth finish. Will have a better power supply tomorrow and I'll add the MiraLAX.

Biggest issue I have right now is finding a way to heat the bath more efficiently with stuff that I have available. This last time I took a wort chiller, if you make your own beer you'll know what that is, and used it in reverse to heat a tub of water that the plastic bath tub sat in. To help make more sense... Large tub with water in it. My plating tub sitting in the larger tub. Circulated the water in the large tub through a copper coil that was in a turkey fryer full of water with the flame going to heat the water. :/ I am sure if I tried to drop a heating element into the plating bath, I'd just corrode it to powder in a few days of use. I did find a youtube video where the guy used a coffee maker to heat and circulate the water. I only saw a few videos. Maybe I should go back and look for any long term reviews. Still can't help thinking that the heating coil in the coffee pot wouldn't last with the plating bath chemicals being circulated over it. There are some stainless steel screws that I used to bolt a few pieces together that sit in the bath that were discolored (not copper colored, but black and crusty) within minutes of running it.

[#40Fan]

I asked if anyone would be willing to donate some 9mm as cast to the project, but what I think would be best for me is to have some heavy 7mm as cast bullets. It'd be easier to get .025" than .033", if either are possible.

[NoZombies]

Accurate molds will cut you a custom mold in a few weeks at whatever diameter you'd like. I'd be pretty tempted to have him make me a smooth sided mold at .300 or .302

[#40Fan]

Too many $$$ to have a mold made at this time. Still seeing if it is even worth doing.

[#40Fan]

Today I am using a power supply with an output of 1.5V 1A. With those voltages and/or the adding of MiraLAX has made the coating look like this after 30 minutes.



I have only noticed a couple of bullets with the liver spots on them.

Earlier this weeks 30 minute run (previous picture).



What does everyone think? Todays bullets seem to have that speckled egg look to them. I didn't have the bath water over 135° when I started either. Maybe that is an issue too.

[#40Fan]

Here is how today's bullets turned out. Tumbled for two hours. Two leftover bullets from the last plating.



Hard to tell from the picture, but they turned out a lot brighter....not that it means anything.

As cast next to newly plated.

[JimB..]

Very interesting stuff! For heat have you considered a cheap aquarium heater? One that clips on the edge of the tank will just have glass in your solution. Removing the thermostat so it’s always on should be pretty easy.

[OS OK]

WELL? . . . Well...well well..? How thick was the plating this time?

[popper]

Find a big electrolytic cap to put across the power supply. At high loads they tend to get ripple in the voltage - doesn't reverse polarity but causes some problems in plating.

[lefty o]

Find a big electrolytic cap to put across the power supply. At high loads they tend to get ripple in the voltage - doesn't reverse polarity but causes some problems in plating.

reverse polarity will unplate what you want plated.