Fluxing With Sawdust

[btroj]

What are these things that are better than sawdust? Please limit it to 10, I don't have time to read a list of the entire billion.

[LeRoy.Beans]

How about beeswax, candle stubs, crayons, rosin, canning wax, junk lubed bullets. I'll let you work it out from there.

[NavyVet1959]

How about beeswax, candle stubs, crayons, rosin, canning wax, junk lubed bullets. I'll let you work it out from there.

None of which are as common as sawdust and used motor oil around *here* at least.

[btroj]

Ah, reducing agents. And how are you removing the undesirable material from your melt?

[LeRoy.Beans]

None of which are as common as sawdust and used motor oil around *here* at least.

That's too bad. Keep using sawdust if you want. Doesn't bother me in the slightest.

[bangerjim]

How about beeswax, candle stubs, crayons, rosin, canning wax, junk lubed bullets. I'll let you work it out from there.

All of those are great REDUCERS as btroj said, not fluxes. Both have their place, but a reducer will not clean the garbage and gunk out of your dirty filthy COWW's in your re-melting pot.

I use beeswax exclusively in my casting pot to REDUCE the Sn back in because all my feed ingots are 100% clean. That is because I used SAWDUST 3X as a flux when making the clean ingots. Final time - a small piece of paraffin along with the sawdust.

The aforementioned items may appear to be cleaning all the gunk out but they do not......at lease for my high standards for alloys and past experimentation. I do not want gunk in my feed ingots and in the bottom of my bottom pour pots and in my cast boolits.

This has been cussed and discussed way too many times to count on here.

banger

[NavyVet1959]

That's too bad. Keep using sawdust if you want. Doesn't bother me in the slightest.

Great... I was really concerned that it might hurt your feelings...

[cbrick]

How about beeswax, candle stubs, crayons, rosin, canning wax, junk lubed bullets. I'll let you work it out from there.

Not a chance that ANY of those will flux your alloy. Why? Simply because they are not fluxes and your deciding to call them flux changes nothing. But I don't believe for second that you will believe that so carry on.

There are others however that would like to learn and expand their knowledge so for them don't fall for the old wives tales.

For those who would prefer some actual knowledge on the subject I highly recommend chapter 4 in the following. I recommend the entire book but chapter 4 is on fluxing.

From Ingot To Target by Glen Fryxell

Rick

[LeRoy.Beans]

All of those are great REDUCERS as btroj said, not fluxes. Both have their place, but a reducer will not clean the garbage and gunk out of your dirty filthy COWW's in your re-melting pot.

Well, strangely, you are wrong - at least in MY pot. I'm only interested in best quality bullets and so they prove to be in matches all the time.

Must be magic, but it works nonetheless.

In the end, they are all organic hydrocarbons, wax, sawdust, rosin, whatever. I don't think the "garbage and junk" much care where those hydrocarbons come from actually, they are just glad to see'em and glom on and out they go.

[LeRoy.Beans]

Great... I was really concerned that it might hurt your feelings...

Nope not a problem at all, but your ego seems to be badly bruised.

So funny how some people get all upset about folks that don't care to follow their gospels from on high, but I'm sure you will get over it. Time heals all (if you don't catch any moisture in that sawdust anyway)....

[btroj]

I give up

[bangerjim]

I give up

I am with you.

[LeRoy.Beans]

I'm cool with that.

Onward and I'll continue to hope the best for you.

[cbrick]

I give up

No Brad, don't give up. We both know that there are people that know more than anybody and everybody and the thought of them learning ANYTHING from the unwashed lesser people couldn't possibly occur to them.

However, we both also know that there are people both willing and eager to learn and they read these posts also. Thus the reason for my posts, certainly not to try and pry open a closed steel trap which as we both know is a waste of time.

Rick

[NavyVet1959]

Nope not a problem at all, but your ego seems to be badly bruised.

So funny how some people get all upset about folks that don't care to follow their gospels from on high, but I'm sure you will get over it. Time heals all (if you don't catch any moisture in that sawdust anyway)....

LMAO! I don't care what anyone uses for flux. I use what is convenient for me and what seems to work. Sawdust and used motor oil is what is most readily available for *me* and it seems to be good enough for my uses. A long range shot for me would be maybe 50 yards though -- the brush is just too thick to see very far. So, as long as my bullets and loads are accurate to MOH ("minute of hog"), I'm satisfied.

[LeRoy.Beans]

Then you're good! For me, a long range shot is 1000 yds. It's gotta be at least a 9 on average to win.

[NavyVet1959]

Then you're good! For me, a long range shot is 1000 yds. It's gotta be at least a 9 on average to win.

Just curious... Where are you located that you can have shots like that? Definitely not typical for the hunting that I do.

[LeRoy.Beans]

I shoot all around the country. From Tennessee in the East to Arizona in the West, and many places in between.

[ballistim]

deleted

[NavyVet1959]

I shoot all around the country. From Tennessee in the East to Arizona in the West, and many places in between.

I just hunt close to home. The brush is so thick locally that I'm luck to see 50 FEET, much less 50 YARDS. There's a couple of ranges around here that have the distance that you mention, but I just don't see the need for it. Besides, I'm usually hunting with a .45-70 and at the distances you are talking about, that's not shooting, that's ARTILLERY...