My Very First cast boolits

[oley55]

Well not really since I didn't use a true boolit alloy. I used pewter only because I was testing my PID thermocouple installation and was crunched for time. The molds are a lot I picked up locally a year or so ago and am finally in a position to try them out. I only had three pounds of metal in a Lee 4/20 and it didn't take long before my pour rate was more of a trickle.

The wad cutters were poured last. I suspect the trickle is why the bands are all rounded or it's just that mold's design. Also the last SWC pic are from an old Lee mold that shows a good bit of wear and abuse and just wouldn't pour a pretty boolit.

Perhaps because of the straight pewter, cutting the sprues took way, way more effort that I expected. Especially the (RCBS ) Lyman four cavity WC mold. I tried cutting the sprue a moment after color change, but was still damn difficult.

[lar45]

Looks good to me.
They will get easier to cut the sprues when the molds get hot and up to temp.

[Three44s]

Man, I wish my “firsts” had looked that good!

Congrats on a job well done!

Three44s

[Bull-Moose]

Very nice.

[Conditor22]

You did a great job for the first time out

RCBS didn't make a 4 cavity, the mold says Lyman on the side

It looks like the molds aren't closing all the way.

I would save those boolits in a bag marked PEWTER and use them to "sweeten the pot" if you aren't getting a good fill out you can throw a couple of those pewter boolits in the pot, mix well and try again. pewter/tin helps the lead/alloy flow better

All the boolits are shootable but I wouldn't waste the pewter that way.

[Taterhead]

Great idea Conditor about keeping those pewter bullets for adding to the melt.

Yep, more heat will fill out those bullets and the sprue plate will open easier. A hot plate is a boon for that. I use one of those with the solid burners.

[JoeJames]

The internet book, Ingot to target, had a great idea at least for me; turn your mold upside down on the pot. That'll heat 'er up fast!

[oley55]

RCBS didn't make a 4 cavity, the mold says Lyman on the side.

You're correct of course, one of the two cavity molds was/is an RCBS and I'm easily confused...

I would save those boolits in a bag marked PEWTER and use them to "sweeten the pot" if you aren't getting a good fill out you can throw a couple of those pewter boolits in the pot, mix well and try again. pewter/tin helps the lead/alloy flow better

That's the prezact reason I was casting the pewter into boolits. I had previously hand poured scrap pewter into an aluminum sinker mold with 5 different weights, but they turned out really, really bad (inadequate gloves to grip and hold the aluminum handles equaled a way too cold mold).

Reference cold mold and a hot plate. I picked up one of those cheapo Wallmart hot plates and put a couple 8" circular saw blades over the coils (being worried about melting an aluminum mold). Frankly I remain concerned about damaging a mold. The thermostat on the hot plate seems to have a huge gap between it's heating cycling. Once the element kicks off, it goes into a prolonged 200 degree cool down. So to get a mold up to 400 degrees it seems like I will need to be heating to 600 anticipating the long cool down to 400 before it kicks back on. I ended up with a rough setting of 400 and the molds never got hotter than 290 (again, fearful of ruining my aluminum molds). I need to experiment some more with the hot plate or go a different route.

[JoeJames]

I got a cheap hot plate from Walmart a couple of months ago. Did the same thing; about the time it was hot enough, the thermostat would shut it off. Not recommending this at all, but I sort of re-arranged the wiring a bit to where there was just one setting: unplugged or full bore. Then I started turning my molds upside down on the pot, and stopped using it, and put it back in its box. Thieves made a raid on my reloading area the day before Thanksgiving, and stole the hot plate, box and all. Does make me grin when I wonder if they tried to cook dinner with the altered hot plate.

[robg]

good looking boolits shoot em

[Old School Big Bore]

If your hot plate is an IMUSA brand, just put it about at the 'medium' mark and it'll be the right temp to heat any mould you have, brass, iron or aluminum. I also prop my pot-stirring retired screwdriver and ladle on the hotplate (on the 'low' setting) to keep them from collecting humidity while cooled down between fluxings. The tinsel fairies won't roost on hot steel. When I'm returning sprues to the pot or removing newborn boolits from the quench bucket, I set the mould on the hotplate, sprue plate down for most moulds, pin side down for Cramer designs, and never have to cycle through castings due to cooling.
Speaking of ladles, my good Lyman is too bulbous to fit in the top of the 20 lb dripmatic for skimming, and my cheapo Lee is too short to reach the bottom when the pot is anywhere near full. Why would Lee make their own ladle too short to work with their own furnace? I'm sure it's great in their small melter, but the length being insufficient to reach the bottom of the ten and twenty pound bottom pour furnaces is the reason I have reassigned a beat-up old screwdriver for stirring and scraping.
Ed <><

[copdills]

Great JOB

[oley55]

If your hot plate is an IMUSA brand, just put it about at the 'medium' mark and it'll be the right temp to heat any mould you have, brass, iron or aluminum.
Ed <><

Well I putzed for a couple hours trying to get my Walmart branded hotplate to work for me, but no luck. With a single circular saw blade on the coils I tried heating up the Lyman 4 cavity and could never get it up to 300 degrees. Every time I looked, it had cycled off until I went to max and then in a short while it went into full shutdown mode. Can't say if all of these are junk but this one sure is. Guess I'll have to build another PID to control a $20 hotplate (someday).

In the mean time I guess I'll just have to deal with the 'cast until it warm' method.

[Winger Ed.]

Looking good!

I'd sure save that pewter and put it into the alloy as sparingly as I could to still get good mold fill out.
You don't really need much, and its getting real expensive as time goes on.