Cheap(er) convection toaster oven

[Tazlaw]

Hello all. I’m very new to the forum and hope I’m doing this right. I have never casted a boolit but have been reading a bunch on the forums gathering information. I have seen many posts where people use toaster ovens to bake their PC’d boolits. Well I’m not a fan of Wal-mart but they have an oven on sale for $59 with two shelves! I thought this was interesting for whatever it’s worth.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/BLACK-DEC...yABEgJtKvD_BwE


The link is for a BlacknDecker convection oven for $59 at wallyworld. Just thought I’d share.

Taz

[dbosman]

I paid $6 for my convection oven. At one of the thrift stores I visit looking for pewter. Food dehydrators run under $10 about once a month.

[res45]

Hello all. I’m very new to the forum and hope I’m doing this right. I have never casted a boolit but have been reading a bunch on the forums gathering information. I have seen many posts where people use toaster ovens to bake their PC’d boolits. Well I’m not a fan of Wal-mart but they have an oven on sale for $59 with two shelves! I thought this was interesting for whatever it’s worth.

https://www.walmart.com/ip/BLACK-DEC...yABEgJtKvD_BwE


The link is for a BlacknDecker convection oven for $59 at wallyworld. Just thought I’d share.

Taz

Good price on that oven, about the lowest your going to find. Another item you might want to invest in is an oven thermometer, those temperature dials are not always accurate an I have to set mine at 425 degrees to actually stay at a constant 400 degrees, some oven dials will be more some less.

I got mine for free when my mother got here a fancy one with all the bells and whistles and was going to throw the old one out. I've been using it for several years now.

[daloper]

Something else you will want to get will be some silicone baking sheets to line your tray with. They are cheep on Amazon. On my tray I cut one in half so I have both tray covered. I also went a nd after measuring my tray, went and bought a couple of spare trays so I can have one batch cooking, one batch cooling and one batch getting ready to go. Make sure you get good powder to start with. I get mine from Smoke 4320 here on this site.

[res45]

Something else you will want to get will be some silicone baking sheets to line your tray with. They are cheep on Amazon. On my tray I cut one in half so I have both tray covered. I also went a nd after measuring my tray, went and bought a couple of spare trays so I can have one batch cooking, one batch cooling and one batch getting ready to go. Make sure you get good powder to start with. I get mine from Smoke 4320 here on this site.

Never used the silicone baking sheet, still have a big roll of non-stick foil and parchment paper to go through but I will give it a shot. I second the additional tray or trays especially if you're curing lots of bullets so you can keep the process going, I run two sometimes three trays.

As daloper stated a good powder goes a long way to getting good coverage an having less frustration. I highly recommend Smoke 4320's powders, some of my favorites are Carolina Blue, Signal Blue, Transparent Copper and Super Durable Clear if you just like looking at your lead bullets with no lipstick.

Some clear coated 215 gr. FN bullets for the Mosin rifles.

[6bg6ga]

I paid $6 for my convection oven. At one of the thrift stores I visit looking for pewter. Food dehydrators run under $10 about once a month.

Second that

[Huskerguy]

My wife bought me a very basic Bella toaster last year and it worked fine. Kind of small, trays are not the best, certain amount of guessing on temp. Someone on here linked a hamilton beech with a basket and digital controls for $69 at Target. I got the last one here and it works way better. More room, two levels, trays fit better, nice controls with no guessing. It does take up a bit more room on my bench.

Just a few minutes ago my wife handed me a brand new hot plate I have been talking about for my moulds. I have it made!

[Conditor22]

You did good Tazlaw Sharing what you thought was a good deal.

Jeez, Louise!!! only one person referenced/commented on the OP's post, the rest went off on a tangent.

[Walks]

I went and checked the # with the one I got from Wal-Mart 3yrs ago. $32 w/s&h & taxes. Guess it was on sale, Gift from the Wife.

It is the same. You should get a separate oven thermometer. Mine will bounce around a bit when 1st turned on. Once you start make sure you Do Not let the oven Turn Itself Off. It does settle down after 10min and will maintain a steady temp.

And that top shelf. It "runs" hotter then the bottom.
I take the top tray out at 15min. The bottom at 20min when set at 400degrees.
If you go the whole 20min on the top shelf, the bullets will start to melt.
And Don't use it in direct sunlight, it Will Increase the temp for the upper shelf.

Once you learn how to use it, It's a dream.

[Dragonheart]

I would suggest passing on B&D. In fact I have a Quartz Elements Black & Decker oven I picked up new for $7 at the Goodwill store because I wanted a second and backup oven. I tested it out and it wouldn't come up to 400 degrees and it has temperature downward swings as much as 40+ degrees. This oven is totally worthless for PC unless you install a PID. A PID is not difficult but by the time you do that you could have bought a good oven. I don't want to spend the time and money as I have all the ovens I need, so if any of you guys live in the Katy/Houston, Texas area and want this oven, it is free. Hard to beat a price like that.

[Sig556r]

Never used the silicone baking sheet, still have a big roll of non-stick foil and parchment paper to go through but I will give it a shot. I second the additional tray or trays especially if you're curing lots of bullets so you can keep the process going, I run two sometimes three trays.

As daloper stated a good powder goes a long way to getting good coverage an having less frustration. I highly recommend Smoke 4320's powders, some of my favorites are Carolina Blue, Signal Blue, Transparent Copper and Super Durable Clear if you just like looking at your lead bullets with no lipstick.

Some clear coated 215 gr. FN bullets for the Mosin rifles.

From that angle, I thought that was one big boolit at 2nd row bottom center...

[Dragonheart]

I went and checked the # with the one I got from Wal-Mart 3yrs ago. $32 w/s&h & taxes. Guess it was on sale, Gift from the Wife.

It is the same. You should get a separate oven thermometer. Mine will bounce around a bit when 1st turned on. Once you start make sure you Do Not let the oven Turn Itself Off. It does settle down after 10min and will maintain a steady temp.

And that top shelf. It "runs" hotter then the bottom.
I take the top tray out at 15min. The bottom at 20min when set at 400degrees.
If you go the whole 20min on the top shelf, the bullets will start to melt.
And Don't use it in direct sunlight, it Will Increase the temp for the upper shelf.

Once you learn how to use it, It's a dream.

I would suggest getting a Taylor Oven Guide thermometer and place it where you can see it through the glass door. If you are getting melted bullets that is over 621F degrees!

[Phlier]

I would suggest getting a Taylor Oven Guide thermometer and place it where you can see it through the glass door. If you are getting melted bullets that is over 621F degrees!

Second that.

I suddenly started having problems with my brand new oven and incomplete cures. For some reason, my barely a month old oven started having a much larger temperature drift during use, and the accuracy also shifted by 30 degrees.

Now I have the Taylor Oven Guide thermometer in there, and have to monitor the baking process the entire time, constantly adjusting the oven temperature dial to keep the temp a steady 400 degrees. It's a bit of a pain, but the results you get from making sure your oven temperature is accurate and consistent are worth the time investment. Properly curing your polymer jacket is the key to PC'd boolit performance.

Looks like it might be time to wire up a PID to the new oven.

[Dragonheart]

Second that.

I suddenly started having problems with my brand new oven and incomplete cures. For some reason, my barely a month old oven started having a much larger temperature drift during use, and the accuracy also shifted by 30 degrees.

Now I have the Taylor Oven Guide thermometer in there, and have to monitor the baking process the entire time, constantly adjusting the oven temperature dial to keep the temp a steady 400 degrees. It's a bit of a pain, but the results you get from making sure your oven temperature is accurate and consistent are worth the time investment. Properly curing your polymer jacket is the key to PC'd boolit performance.

Looks like it might be time to wire up a PID to the new oven.

If the oven will come to temp, but won't hold it a PID should solve the problem. The thermostats on most of these small ovens are definitely not the best, however the Hamilton Beach Countertop convection Ovens seem to be better than most.

I have had good results with the Inkbird PID Kit (166-VH $40) from Amazon, which includes everything except wire. Of course you can add switches, lights, fans, ect which add to the cost. If you go for a PID and any need help I can tell how to wire it up. The question is whether it is cheaper to go with a PID or a new oven or put a PID in a fulls size oven.

[bdicki]

I too paid $6 at Goodwill and have had for a few years with no problems.

[Phlier]

If the oven will come to temp, but won't hold it a PID should solve the problem. The thermostats on most of these small ovens are definitely not the best, however the Hamilton Beach Countertop convection Ovens seem to be better than most.

I have had good results with the Inkbird PID Kit (166-VH $40) from Amazon, which includes everything except wire. Of course you can add switches, lights, fans, ect which add to the cost. If you go for a PID and any need help I can tell how to wire it up. The question is whether it is cheaper to go with a PID or a new oven or put a PID in a fulls size oven.

Thanks for that, Dragonheart. I did make my own PID a few years ago (used an Auburn unit) that I'm currently using on my casting pot.

I'm also using a one month old Hamilton Beach countertop convection toaster oven that was spot on for the first month I used it. Just this last week, it started having temperature fluctuations. But it's intermittent... sometimes it'll do a complete run start to finish and be spot on, other times it'll drift +30 to -30 from the desired 400. It's not a load issue, either, as the first time it strayed I was doing a small batch of 150 9mm.

The problem with trying to PID this oven is that you can't just on/off it. Every time power is removed and then re-applied, it acts as if you just powered it on; it won't just continue the previous cycle that it was on. Guess that's one of the problems with a digitally controlled oven. So hooking a PID up to it will require isolating the heating element wiring, and directly controlling it via the PID, while at the same time, the rest of the oven itself will need continuous power. Not a really difficult project, just kinda fiddly and time consuming. I do see a potential problem, though... if there's a logic circuit that goes to the oven's digital controller that tells it when the elements are getting power/not getting power... well, that'll have to be spoofed/fooled somehow. It'll be interesting to see how the oven senses temperature. If it uses a thermocouple (I'm betting that it does... in fact, the symptoms the oven is showing highly suggests a faulty thermocouple), it might be as easy as replacing it with a high quality (and accurate) one.

It might even be possible to spoof the oven's built in heating element on/off controller into making it work the way that you want it to, vs. how Hamilton Beach wants it to. I bet you just came up with a few ways in your head after reading that. And yup, I'm probably thinking the same thing.

Just using the Taylor oven thermometer is working pretty well right now, with the only caveat being that I have to sit there and monitor the oven temp during the entire process.

[Dragonheart]

I have a 30" wall oven that I got for free from a neighbor and I converted to a PC oven for lots of bullets or other things like tools, parts, etc. It was all digital oven and the board was out, so $$$ to replace the board. I installed a PID, separate the elements, added another fan and timer. Digital is great when it works, but a pain when it doesn't. My two HB ovens just for bullets are not digital and are spot on, so I have never had a reason to add a PID.

[Phlier]

I have a 30" wall oven that I got for free from a neighbor and I converted to a PC oven for lots of bullets or other things like tools, parts, etc. It was all digital oven and the board was out, so $$$ to replace the board. I installed a PID, separate the elements, added another fan and timer. Digital is great when it works, but a pain when it doesn't. My two HB ovens just for bullets are not digital and are spot on, so I have never had a reason to add a PID.

Great find! Man, I'd love to have a broken oven donated like that.

The HB oven I'm using right now is fantastic for PC'ing boolits... when the temp controller is working correctly. This model seems to go on sale frequently in the $60-$70 range, so the next time that happens, I think I'll buy a second one just to turn into a frankenoven of my own. I'm not particularly "electrically inclined," but I do enjoy fiddling around with such stuff.

If the oven senses temp based on a thermocouple, it would be very easy to intercept that voltage reading, and message (as in manipulate) it to a different value that is then sent to the oven. This could be used to tighten up the high/low temperature range the oven uses for turning on/off the elements. Easily done with a little add-in board. Kind of a poor mans PID.

As if I didn't already have enough projects piling up...

[Dragonheart]

Here in Katy, TX we have a neighborhood website of the surrounding areas with some 10K+ neighbors. Here we get all the local gossip, happenings, opinions, etc. etc. We also have a classified with for sale and free. I personally have given away a number of things I no longer needed on this site and in return picked up a few things I could use like a garage work desk for my bullet casting and this oven. We have ovens come up often, cheap or for free and a lot of toaster ovens. Craigslist is another good place to look. Converting a full size oven is more costly and it takes up more space, but ends up being a much better setup and a lot more versatile. Downside it is another project.