Newbie alloy help

[Bashby]

Im just getting into casting and working on making 9mm boolits for my Glock17 size Polymer80. I have collected about 200 lbs of range scrap that I believe is around 10-11 bhn. I used artists pencils and fingernail test as my scientific means of coming up with that #. It is my understanding that 15 bhn or so is needed for 9mm. I ordered a 5lb ingot of superhard from Rotometals that should arrive today, and i bought a 17oz pewter tray from Goodwill for $2. I cant get any of the calculators to work on my old Ipad. Im not sure what % lead/tin/antinomy will get me to 15bhn. Ive looked through the stickies but cant quite figure this out.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

even if you could get the calculator/spreadsheet to work, your problem is you don't know what's in your range scrap. And depending on how that was processed, your range scrap will have batch to batch differences...unless you smelted it all in one large pot?

But luckily you don't have to be super precise about this. I assume you have some knowledge of how to use the pencils for judging hardness, if you aren't confident in that, you should get a hardness tester. I use the Lee kit, and find it is well worth the $50 it costs, if you are going to be mixing alloys, in a experimental way, which is about what I am gonna recommend.

What I would do, is start with a 20 lb batch (one pot full) and add one pound of super hard to that, then measure hardness. If it's over 15, then you can just dilute the alloy with more range scrap. It it's under 15, then add more super hard. Be sure to use precise measurements and take good notes, so you can repeat whatever you find is successful.
Good Luck.

[Dusty Bannister]

Any consideration to HT/Q the alloy you have and just go have fun? Bullet fit is more important than hardness. Just use some common sense and work up the load until you find reliable cycling and accuracy. The alloy of 2-6-92 (tin-antimony-lead) will get you to your goal. Trouble is, you have range alloy, and pewter so really do not know your starting percentages anyway. Just make sure they are fat enough to seal the barrel.

[bmortell]

id probably start 20 pounds range scrap to 1 pound super hard and about 4 oz pewter. should be very roughly 3-4% antimony 1-2% tin. id try it air cooled, then if its not hard enough water drop or heat treat and try again, if neither works its probably not the alloys fault

its not exact science, you don't know what the range scrap is, or what hardness the gun actually wants, and theres different hardness available from air cool or water dropping.

[Kraschenbirn]

Dunno 'bout needing 15 Bhn for 9mm...maybe it's a Glock thing...'cause I cast 2 parts range scrap/1 part COWW + 2% Sn (measured 11-12 Bhn) for about everything except rifle cartridges over 1600 fps. My only 9mm - a Kahr CW9 - gobbles 125 gr. TCs cast from this like a goose scarfin' down shell corn...no leading with reasonable accuracy for a 3" carry piece. Load the same boolit, sized .358, to around 1150 fps for my Ruger Match Champion with equally good results.

Bill

[Bashby]

I tried using straight range scrap and got leading. Ive been talking about it through PMs with a member here and it seems part of my problem is swaging of the boolit when I crimp. A harder alloy should help. Ive also have been told that 9mm is a harder caliber to cast for and needs a harder alloy, I think because of the higher pressures involved. Here is some info on what Im working with:
Factory Glock barrel slugs at .3555.
Im casting 358-105 SWC and am powder coating.
The throat is tight, boolits sized to .357 dont plunk but can be pushed into throat with finger pressure. I will probably send it to Dougguy to fix that.

Like I said, I am new to casting and have very little reloading experience, so any advice is appreciated. I might just need to play around with it and see what I get. Between the pencils and fingernail testing maybe I can get something close enough.

[Dusty Bannister]

If you have not read through this thread, you should do it now.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...s-in-a-new-9mm

[Bashby]

Any consideration to HT/Q the alloy you have and just go have fun? Bullet fit is more important than hardness. Just use some common sense and work up the load until you find reliable cycling and accuracy. The alloy of 2-6-92 (tin-antimony-lead) will get you to your goal. Trouble is, you have range alloy, and pewter so really do not know your starting percentages anyway. Just make sure they are fat enough to seal the barrel.

What is HT/Q?

[bmortell]

heat treat/water quench from the mold

[RogerDat]

Not sure you can run it on an Ipad but Open Office Calc will work fine with the alloy calculator. I know it is available for Mac, Windows, Nix but tablets are sort of their own thing.

This page has some solutions that may work to allow you to use your alloy calculator on an iPad if you do not have a regular computer available.
https://forum.openoffice.org/en/foru...p?f=49&t=61238

If you can lay your hands on an actual computer....
https://www.openoffice.org/

When working with essentially "scrap" metal such as range scrap, old printing lead, Wheel weights, and whatever this sheet or pipe is you found at the scrap yard you will generally have to accept some fuzziness as to the exact alloy. Alloy calculator lists range lead as an item with a generic alloy composition and hardness. Which is probably accurate enough for most uses.

Hopefully you will manage to get that alloy calculator working it is simply an Excel file with a lot of calculations built into it. The calculator is a really valuable tool. You can put in the main ingredient (range scrap) then add the weights for sweetener alloy (super hard & pewter) on their own lines. As you make a change hit enter and at the bottom you will have the resulting alloy tin, antimony, copper, and lead percentages, and the approx. BHN given those amounts. One just keeps bumping a number up or down to get what they desire for the values at the bottom line.

Best approach I have found for using scrap is big batches. That way at least once I get it "right" for the use intended I have a 100 pounds of consistent alloy. Mixing it 20 pound pot at a time I think it would be more inconsistent.

As a side note. Balancing act between making the alloy rich enough and tying up a lot of your sweetener alloys such as super hard, pewter, or linotype I tend to try for a lot of 5/5/90 alloy that I can cut with plain but many would just make 3/3/94 or 2/3/95 alloys to use up less tin and antimony and add in more if needed. Since I know folks who shoot 30-06 made of that last alloy I'm pretty sure it would work ok for 9mm.

Last but not least look up Powder Coating. Shake and bake. Here on the forum. I think baked on powder coat really shines when it comes to auto loaders.

[Bashby]

So, just dropping from mold into a bucket of water? What about when I PC? Doesn't that un-heat-treat it? Arent there advantages to getting hardness with alloy composition over heat treating?

Ive been messing around with my crimp. I was warned that the Lee factory crimp die was a bad idea but was using it anyway to put a light crimp on it. I found that if I use the seating die to crimp instead it doesnt swage my boolits down.

[Kraschenbirn]

if your Lee FCD is actually swaging the boolits, you need to go to a taper crimp die. I'm using an old set of Hornaday "New Dimension" dies (titanium nitride coated) that came without a separate crimp die and the seating die, definitely, swaged down my boolits if set to completely remove the flair left by the powder die of my Dillon progressive. Solution was to back off the die body until it barely touched the case and screw the seating stem deeper to obtain correct OAL them apply a taper crimp at Station 4. Now, even 147 gr. RNs, sized .357, pass the 'plunk test.'

Bill

[bmortell]

ya if your PC'ing then the oven will nearly 100% remove hardness of water dropping so you don't need to do that, instead while your PC is oven curing prepare a 5 gallon bucket of water with some ice cubes, then when the timer goes off pull the tray out and sploosh it right into the bucket quickly. they will get a good bit harder, and maybe a bit more over the next week or so.

im not aware of any benefit of hardness gained though alloy only instead, I always preffered to harden by heat treating, it stretches your hard lead further, its denser cause its closer to pure, and you could go back into the oven at anytime to switch hardness back to soft or vice versa

[Conditor22]

[WRideout]

I have been using range scrap with (some) tin; hardness unknown, but not too hard. My 9mm pistol does fine with these, although it does have regular rifling, not that Glock polygonal. I have never found a need to make my pistol boolits, of any caliber, very hard.

Wayne

[Bashby]

If I were to stop using the FCD and just use the seating die to crimp, should I do it in two steps or can I get away with adjusting to crimp and seat at the same time? I am on a single stage press.

I guess my next step is to load up a handful and see if they function and wether or not I get any leading.

[WRideout]

If I were to stop using the FCD and just use the seating die to crimp, should I do it in two steps or can I get away with adjusting to crimp and seat at the same time? I am on a single stage press.

I guess my next step is to load up a handful and see if they function and wether or not I get any leading.

I would try the seating die to see if it works. The best way is to remove the barrel from you pistol, and drop the loaded rounds in the chamber (Plunk test, in the vernacular). It is pretty easy to tell if they are chambering freely. You can look up pictures here or on the internet to see what the correct spacing is. They don't have to drop all the way flush, but they do have to allow locking the barrel to breech without excess pressure. With my 9mm RCBS dies I never have to taper crimp loaded rounds.
Wayne

[Phlier]

If I were to stop using the FCD and just use the seating die to crimp, should I do it in two steps or can I get away with adjusting to crimp and seat at the same time? I am on a single stage press.

I guess my next step is to load up a handful and see if they function and wether or not I get any leading.

IMO and IME, you can indeed crimp and seat in the same operation in certain circumstances. In 9mm, your whole goal with the crimp is simply to remove the bell/flare you put on the case before seating the boolit; you aren’t actually crimping the brass against the projectile, just straightening the case mouth. In this instance, it is OK to seat/crimp at the same time. But again IMO and IME, it is not best practice to seat and crimp a bullet that you are using a roll crimp to actually crimp the brass into a canelure or crimping groove. But with 9mm since you are just using a taper crimp to restore the original straight wall to the brass you’re just fine.

As to turning range scrap into 9mm alloy, I test the hardness of the scrap, then plug it into an alloy calculator to determine how much of RotoMetals Super Hard to add, in addition to the 4% tin I usually use. I use that much tin to get my mold to cast the largest boolit it is capable of casting. The more tin in your alloy, the less the alloy will shrink when it transitions from melted to solid.

The actual hardness you’ll need to prevent case swaging (or at least reduce it to an acceptable level) will depend on the size of the boolit drive bands, the expander plug you use, how far down you expand the brass, how deep you seat the boolit, and the headstamp of the brass.

The 14-16 BHN range I suggested to you previously was meant to give you a starting point to find the hardness that you’ll need given how your situation fills in the previous variables. Again IMO and IME, it is not unusual to need higher BHN levels in 9mm when compared to similar ballistics in other calibers, but this does greatly depend on, again, how you fill in the previous variables. The primary reason for the harder alloy is to help minimize the darn boolit swaging that 9mm brass is famous for.

When guys are successful in using softer alloys in 9mm, it simply means that in their particular situation, with their own variables applied, they’re able to use a softer alloy.

IMO, the fact that there is such a wide range of variables that need to be filled in for a guy’s own individual circumstance is why 9mm is considered to be an advanced caliber to cast for. You can’t just give a blanket answer of “use these numbers and it’ll work,” you literally have to solve all of the above variables for your own unique situation.

Don’t get hung up by the fact that one guy is able to shoot 10BHN in his 9mm while you can’t. Instead, focus on what your particular issue is... know and understand what variables are at play and how they interact. Once you get a grasp of how the various parts play together to make the whole system work, it gets much easier to nail down what needs to be changed and how it needs to be changed.

As to the Lee FCD, I do think you would be ahead to lose it if possible. I’m able to use it ok, but there are a lot of guys that say it doesn’t work for them. IMO, its an unneeded and unnecessary additional variable. Just use the taper crimp function of your seating die to straighten out the case wall and call it good at this point.

[kevin c]

I use a 95-3-2 alloy (just a bit harder than air cooled COWW's, I think) to cast my 147's, sized to .357 for my factory Glock barrels. HiTek coated and pushed to around 900 fps, I get no smoke, no leading, and all the accuracy I need.

[fcvan]

When I started loading 9mm, I applied what I learned from Dad when we first got into casting. I bought a Lee 356-125 2R and a set of Lee dies. My as cast boolits went .358 which were pan lubed and loaded. The allow was range scrap from a range that only saw swaged hollow based wadcutters as that was what my agency used. Swaged is very soft. I never saw any leading with that boolit and Javalina lube.

Some time later, I picked up a Lyman lube sizer and used a .358 die. 35 years later, approximately 16 different 9mm weapons, pistol and carbine, I only saw leading once. I had tried a .357 sizer and the gun patterned not grouped. I dropped that die like bad habit, and went back to .358 sizing. BTW, I have also shot the Lee 356-95 RF, 356-102 1R, 358-105 SWC, 356-120 TC, and of course the 356-125 2R, all sized to .358.

Size matters and a loose fitting boolit will allow my flame or plasma cutting at the base of the boolit upon firing. For the past 5 years or more I have powder coated everything. Heck, I have even launched a plain based, smooth sided 225-62 R from .223 at 2450 fps without leading, 9mm holds up and does so at 1350 from an AR 15 9mm carbine.

Elmer Kieth designed/invented the 44 Mag using softer alloy than most would use now without a gas check. The pressures of the magnum are greater than the 9mm, which of course is higher than 38 Special. 9mm can be made to fire without leading with good lube or PC, and a good fit, even at the higher velocities of a carbine length barrel.