Testing hardness with pencils

[popper]

Got a an email on my technique so I thought I'd post a pic. I don't care about pistol, just rifle.
Attachment 81392
i use a screw driver to preload the scale a few oz., takes the slack out. Use a business card like a feeler gauge to tell when the 'divit' is complete. I was going by feel previously and the numbers came out a little different. Very repeatable and after a calculation gives me the yield strength of the alloy. The H-T coating really softens the alloy where the PC heat treated works fine.

[eljefeoz]

Thats an interesting way too fix the scale!
thanks for the pic,Popper

[Boolseye]

Just got my set of pencils. Thank you!! Before this I had no way to check the hardness of my alloy, which is often random mixes of WW, range lead and pure.
BE

[carolina556]

Excellent....Excellent sticky! I always love when you can take simple tools and make them substitute for expensive contraptions....tomorrow I am going to get some of those pencils. Thanks for saving me a lot of money, and I love the old timey feel of this solution to estimating lead relative hardness....keep these tricks coming! The site is great because of ideas and brainstorming like this. Good work.

[texassako]

I made an interesting discovery with a set of Daler Rowney pencils I was using. I used them last year to judge how hard or soft the bulk of my lead might be. One group 2B and the other was HB, and I took that to be about 11-12BHN and about 15. This August I checked some more mystery lead I added to the collection and it was an H or about 22 BHN. Fast forward to last night when I received my Lee tester. The 2 old lots tested about where the pencils said they should be, 11 and 14.3. The newer lot that tested H was actually 14. I took out my 2B pencil and it would no longer mark the 11 BHN lead. Snapped the exposed tips off and reshaped them with a fresh tip and they worked properly again. I guess exposed cheap pencil lead can degrade in the heat and humidity of a Texas garage?

[stepmac]

I used to cast bullets like mad. Then I stopped, shooting mostly .22's and shotguns. I have been dragging my reloading/casting stuff along with me as I have moved from home to home and state to state.

I'm hot to get going, casting again. Trouble is I have no idea how hard my many little lead ingots are.

So what do you guys do in a similar situation? You don't toss all of that lead away do you? I'm thinking of tossing the ingots into my pot and fluxing them and taking pot luck and see what I get. I'm reloading for a Krag 30-40, 44/40's and 32/20's. (original guns). I'll shoot them slow. Won't this work okay?

[GunFun]

Why not test them via pencil method and set aside the harder ingots for later. IIRC, traditional loadings of 30-40 Krag call for pretty soft lead comparable to range scrap anyway. A couple of the commercial casters list recommended hardnesses for various applications, and I specifically recall one offering a bullet with optimized alloy for that caliber. At least look that up first.

Alternatively, Modern Reloading by Richard Lee 2nd Edition chapter 10 describes a method for deriving optimum hardness per max pressure in load data, as well as a multiplier method for estimating pressure of reduced charges, using the data in the rest of the book.


Keeping to the thread topic, I tested a batch of bullets from straight linotype spacers which mostly came to HB or F. When oven to cold water tempered at nominal 400 *f to ~40* fridge water, I got varying hardnesses from f to H, with only one bullet sampled at 2H. The variation doesn't make sense to me considering carefully controlled handling of the bullets to ensure consistent alloy and temper between them, using the methods from LASC's article. I actually wasted a bunch of beautiful bullets because I heated the first batch for an hour at 450 and most of them melted.

[Hanzy4200]

This whole concept is very interesting to me. All the searching I've done, and I've never heard of anything aside from the old thumbnail test or pony up the cash for a hardness tester. Finally a method that is within my budget. I can't believe I waited this long to join here. Much of my lead is from unknown sources and leaves me guessing.

I just picked up some odd weights from a scrapyard yesterday. They look like massive square wheel weights with no clip. Each weighed 10 lbs. Also some cylindrical pieces with a long thin notch in the middle. They looked to be some sort of plumb weight. Any ideas what these are and the hardness that could be expected? Paid $.60 a lb. and only lost about 4% weight after fluxing and ingot pouring.

[douglasskid]

I'm off to office depot to buy a set of pencils.

[armedmoose]

Read about using pencils to test lead on another forum... googled it.. landed back at one of my favorite places... thanks for this info!

[Rooster59]

Darnit.....and I drove right by Officemax today!

[waco]

Just ordered a set from Amazon. It will be nice to know a ballpark of what my alloy is.
Great thread.

[Socal147]

Three different batches and super hard from Rotometals.
Ended up with 3B/4B on my three different batches. I measured 334 then 344 on different samples from each batch. Each sample was tested multiple times. Surprised at results as I thought (incorrectly) that I had some lead that was: pure lead (batch 1) and 7% antimony (batch 2). Batch 3 was the WW lead I bought here. Perfect for me as I don't want or need a very hard mix and if I want it harder, I will just add some super hard.
The super hard came in at 2H testing two different samples multiple times.

Update: received my FROZONE PID controller today. My pot was liquid at around 620ish.

[Bigslug]

. . . but some of us are froooogal......

Yeah. Sure. We're frugal. Riiiiiiight.

Basic reloading kit: @ $300
Dies and shell holders: @$50 per caliber
Casting furnace: $60-$400
Heated lubrisizer: @$200
Boolit sizing dies: @$35 per diameter
Molds: Call it an average of $70 per
Calipers, micrometers, pin gauges, wad cutters, smelting pot and burner, etc. . .etc. . .etc. . .
Cabine Tree hardness tester: Drop in the freakin' ocean!

I expect a hardness tester is faster simply because with pencils you'll have to find the line between what will and won't scratch your sample, but what I DO like about the notion of this pencil test method is it's portable/field-expedient nature, and usefulness on larger blocks of metal. I carry collector's guides for certain firearms in the glove box of my car for the purpose of addressing "purchases of opportunity". Makes sense to throw a set of pencils, a cheap sharpening stone, and select printouts from this thread in there for the same reason. Guess I'm off to find some pencils.

[Bogone]

Does anyone make an inexpensive hardness tester?

[GunFun]

The least expensive tester not made by Staedler is Lee. They go for around $65 and require a single stage press. I never see them used.

I'll be getting one eventually, but the pencils do fairly well in the meantime, and are a lot easier to use for a portable test kit when sampling lead at the scrap yard.

[Shooter6br]

Have used them for years Scratch testing

[skykingjohn]

think this chart came from lasc if some one knows please give credit

[waco]

think this chart came from lasc if some one knows please give credit

Just what I needed. Thanks!

[GunFun]

I made a vidja about this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfsEDav4Sbg