rifle alloy

[white eagle]

I know this has been covered before but
If I want to make a alloy fairly hard for rifle use how would i go about it?
I have linotype and w/w and soft pb
I have been mixing 1/3 and 1/4 lino to soft pb
also what would the advantage be in having a alloy with a high antimony(19%)
would wqww be just as effective as the alloy's I am making ?
perplexed in Wis

[onondaga]

There is a lot of things to consider when choosing an alloy. Without anymore information from you I'd suggest the Lyman#2 alloy that can be approximated with a number of formulas. Search Lyman #2 alloy. High Antimony bullet alloys withstand higher load pressures. Bullets high in antimony are likely to resist gas jetting around them spoiling accuracy. I use straight Lino for cast gas checked bullets in .223 rem and can get accuracy at near factory velocity, of course they shatter when they hit stuff and have no expansion because they are so hard and brittle. Your questions are basic and a study of the Lee Modern Reloading 2nd Edition and the new Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook, 4th editions would answer more questions than you could ask and be a terrific benefit to you.

Gary

[white eagle]

The cast bullets 4th ed. left more q's than anything
not really a bunch on alloys
what bhn would you expect from a mix of soft say 8 bhn with the = amount of lino
a 50/50 alloy ????

[onesonek]

For a small, medium, or large bore rifle? What is the intended use? What velocity range, both at the muzzle and expected terminal?
I think that criteria needs to be addressed before the needs of alloy or hardness to be considered.

[white eagle]

what it will be is for the 220 swift ackley improved mv around 2700 fps
terminal velocity is a big question mark depends on target distance(varmint hunting)
and the 280 a.i mv 22-2300 fps again target distance unknown (big game load)
so I guess is with a given a known bhn and a known alloy percentage is there a way to calculate the bhn of the alloy being made
for instance the bhn of 22 cut to 50% plus a 8 bhn would that yeild a alloy bhn of 15 bhn

[onesonek]

ok,,,,the high 19% sb you mentioned had me wondering the use and speed. As that high of sb is likely to shatter at higher rifle velocities, (from what I have read or heard). I have seen it posted on here and I think it's on the RotoMetal site as well,,,, the mathmatical increase of sb and sn. I'm guessing at this point, where sb increases the bhn by .9 something, and sn by .3 something. I'm not sure if those numbers even if I had them quoted exact are correct however. I also don't know that dividing and adding a known alloy's together works out right.
Then too the question is,,,, is your Lino new and or used , and are you going by the industry standard as new of 84-12-4 bhn22? I have heard reports that lino after who knows how many remelts looses some sb and sn. I have some here (tested with a Lee) that is only bhn 19- 19.5 roughly. Part of that may very well be the tester.???
Do you have a tester? My thought even if not a 100% correct you have a baseline to start and experiment from. Then what I would do is to mix 1 lino to 2 ww, then experiment with small batches of varying temps of heat treat to see what shoots best. Yet have relatively tough boolit to resist shattering at the higher velocities mention.

[white eagle]

thanks
good base line like you say

[onondaga]

Yes there is a way to figure that out. The Lee manual I mentioned is a course on that. About 10% less than the yield strength of your alloy in PSI should equal the pressure of your load in PSI for an accurate load Maximum. Mix your alloy to fit that for plain base bullets, but Lyman #2 alloy or harder with a gas checked bullet will likely do it also. The velocity you are looking for really mandates a gas checked bullet anyway. The book will teach you how to work up cast loads. There is no magic answer, it takes some math and some range work. Your cartridge is not a terrific candidate for cast bullets because of the high case capacity. I can get that velocity in my .223 with gas checked Linotype alloy bullets. But your capacity cartridge will likely have ignition problems without a tight bullet and a heavy crimp.

This hard of an alloy, Linotype, really sucks for varmint hunting also. Linotype is as poorly effective on varmints as full metal jacked ammo.You will get zero expansion with Linotype, instead you might get a little shatter if you hit solid bone. Consider a load that will use a softer alloy at reasonable pressure and velocity and will expand on game. Harder than Lyman #2 alloy gives little to no expansion..that is why is is popular for hunting with it's at BHN 15. A flat nosed lead bullet at BHN 10 -12 will expand very well at 1800 -2000 fps and devastate varmints. Those, of course, will not give you the flat trajectory you seem to desire. Lead has definite borders with pressure and velocity related to your alloy and going outside them invariably results in nothing more than bigger groups and leaded up barrels.

gary

[white eagle]

thanks Gary
my velocity was derived by the Lyman #4 manual
I have never loaded cast for this particular rifle as of yet
so my velocity is an estimate
I am using the lino to harden up the alloy thats all
plan on gas checking the boolits anaway

[onondaga]

Save yourself a lot of grief. Slug your bore first before you even buy bullet molds. Bullet fit is extremely important. Sized and gas checked bullets need to be .001 to .002 inches over groove to groove diameter for decent performance. The harder alloys give better mold fill and maximum diameter from your mold.

Seating cast bullets is different also. The Lee universal expander die flairs case mouths well or the Lyman M die enlarges inside neck diameter optimally for cast bullets and also flairs the case mouth. Either one will give you a good start as an addition to your die set for great loading of cast boolits. Don't ignore case mouth expansion for seating cast boolits.

I looked at the Swift loads in the #4. The 5744 loads look good, also consider the loads with the powder that has the lowest pressure for the desired velocity, that usually works better for lead.

gary

[white eagle]

let me ask this
will alloying linotype with a base say of w/w harden the
resulting alloy up
or is adding linotype a waste of time ?

[onondaga]

The classic Lyman #2 is 90% pure lead, 5% tin and 5% antimony and is 15BHN

You can mix what you have and get very close:

1 part pure soft lead with 1 part Linotype is usually very close to 15BHN

There are other formulas also that will get you close to 15 BHN. Ask around here or search. Consistency of your mix from batch to batch is more important than the exact number, but keep it close to 15.

Melt the higher temp melting pure lead first and add the lower temp melting Linotype to it. Flux ,then cast.

Gary

[454PB]

I went nuts when I finally bought a hardness tester......but I had fun and learned a lot.

Linotype can be all over the place, depending on it's history. If it's virgin, it is probably close to the 22 BHN we see published all the time.

I have a lot of type metal, both ingots and in letter form. I can manipulate the end result by mixing the ingots and letters, but there's even a hardness difference between small "lines of type" and the large, single, block letters (monotype).

If you REALLY want to know what hardness you end up with, you need a hardness tester. If you just want a nice casting alloy that is relatively hard, use a 50/50 mix of linotype and pure lead, or 75/25 WW's and linotype. Either one will put the boolits in the 15 to 18 BHN area.

[Ole]

With a HV .22, just go with jacketed bullets @ $.07 each and be done with it.


...unless you're looking to experiment.

I have two mini 14's and I love casting, but everything has it's place and with gas checks costing .02-.03 each it's hard to imagine a scenario where a 2000+ fps cast bullet would offer anything resembling a good return on effort and cost versus a good quality jacketed bullet available for 7 cents.

[white eagle]

I do not care what the cost
I am concerned about doing it myself
thats why I started handloading in the first place
for that matter I can just go buy a box of ammo too
the 2700 fps is what I used for an example only (Lyman #4)
I will of course start way slower and work up to my sweet spot then stop

[onondaga]

Multiple sweet-spots can give you a headache when you start real low too so be aware of that and keep testing unless you see pressure signs, Pressure signs would not be likely working right up to the maximums in the Lyman cast loads because Lyman bases their Maximums for cast bullets on specified bullet alloy strength and gas check use when specified, not maximum pressures for MODERN fire arms. Some specific calibers have lower Maximum pressures because of specific firearm type but not so for the Swift. You won't see Lyman pressures for cast loads go much over 45,000 CUP but many manuals show Jacketed bullet pressures in the Swift up to 53,000 CUP.

Lyman does assume a good bullet fit of .001 to .002 overbore. Severely oversize bullets and the hardest alloys can spell trouble so keep that in mind when using different alloys than the alloy you see in the suggested loads from Lyman.

Gary

[Lloyd Smale]

ive pushed 5050 ww/lino to 2500 fps without major problems

[white eagle]

thanks fellas
I mixed up some #2 based on Lyman's #4 manual
6#ww and 4# lino
let me ask this using that alloy what will w/q bring the bhn up to
(the best guestimation anaway)
thanks for all the help
merry Christmas

[markinalpine]

The Rotometals article referenced by onsonek is copied here: http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showpost.php?p=1083526&postcount=15

I know 'cause I posted it! :coffeecom Cut and Paste is so much fun!

Merry Christmas,
Mark [smilie=s:

[Kraschenbirn]

My "standard" rifle alloy is 3 parts Lyman #2 to 1 part linotype and, water-quenched, boolits run consistently 20-21 bhn. Been using this mix for three or four years and had no leading to speak of in the 1950-2100 fps range.

Bill

[runfiverun]

the problem with 22's and water quenching is surface area and heat retention.
i use a 4/6 alloy made by cutting lino 50-50 with soft then adding 2% tin to the mix.
or by adding ww's to the lino 3-1 and adding 2% tin again.
this insures i don't go over the antimonial content with the tin.
i do water drop them but it's to cool them down and contain them, more than for the added hardness.

white eagle:
i just done a range report on my 223 and there is some good info in the thread.
it's in the cast boolits section.

[onondaga]

6:4 WW:Lino will be nice and hard,, high 20 something without quenching needed.
A small batch will let you know if it is too hard to size. Look out for that. If you can size it and gas check at that hardness you should be able to load at the 2700 fps you want.

gary

[Trifocals]

IMHO, WW is the most useful alloy we have. Add 1% - 2% tin, cast your boolits, size them, heat treat them at the appropriate temperature for 1 hr and quench in water. You can obtain any hardness from that of basic WW up to BHN of 28 - 30 and the boolits remain ductile, unlike linotype. Try it, you'll like it!

[white eagle]

Gary
Lyman lists that alloy(6#ww/4#lino) @15 bhn a #2 look alike
so w/q will put me over 20 bhn????
I think I need a wee bit more bhn my boolits are getting a bit nose deformed
when sizing and lubing
should I coat those little 22's w Lee allox there isn't a whole bunch of lube in the lube groove

[madsenshooter]

If the percentages of tin and antimony are known, I have an old typemetal chart I took from the American Rifleman years ago, that will give an approximation of the final hardness. Now if I could remember which book I stuck it in. Ah, found it, Sharpe was keeping track of it for me! This is just air cooled, not what's possible by water dropping or heat treating.

[onondaga]

Nose deforming on sizing can be helped with more BHN. The Lee sizer uses no nose punches and pushes bullets through from the base, That would work also. I use the Lee and tumble lube before and after sizing. If you are looking for 20+ BHN from #2 alloy, Put those bullets on a cookie sheet and in the oven at 350 degrees for 1 hour then dump them into a bucket of ice water. That will do it real well. You can do that before or after sizing but some lubes can get messy if they are already on at 350 degrees. Your 6:4 WW/Lino alloy has plenty of antimony and will harden dramatically with heat/quenching I mentioned. I haven't heard of LLA being applied after traditional groove lube, but I don't see any harm could come of it other than more stinking smoke out of your muzzle. Good luck and Merry Christmass.

If you haven't tried the 45-45-10 lube made with LLA/Johnson Paste Wax/mineral spirits for tumble lube, look it up-- no sticky, dries in 5 minutes and way less to zero extra smoke. I really like it and so do my rifles.

Gary

[onondaga]

You really use that chart! I'd like to see a video of how you make coordinates meet. In fact, I'd like to slap the guy that made that chart, the low percentages of tin and antimony never meet at a BHN# on that chart, the lines are all curvy and stop before you get to the percentages of tin and antimony that I use. I am dead stinking serious. [smilie=1:

Gary

[madsenshooter]

Well let me see if I can get more of the credentials for you. It does work, no matter what your beef with it or the maker, the men who used it knew a hell of a lot more about their alloys than we do. I know, simply because I've been in printing long enough that hot type was just on it's way out. Let's see, "Adapted from: Type Metal Alloys" Weaver", Journal of the Institute of Metals. Making the coord's meet is just a matter of following the lines, which is a lot less bother than using the Lee Macroscope, and it get's me close enough to sail my boolits around 2450fps with a reasonable degree of accuracy. I guess you have to be one that thinks on a slant, nevermind the straight up and down. Think on the slant, yet follow the curve. It tells a lot, really. As an example, it tells that if you only use 2% Sn, you can add all the Sb you want, up to 24%, and it isn't going to get any harder than 18BHN. The curves are the BHN obtained, percentages of Sn are at the bottom, the most I've used is around 7%, and that makes some folks here aghast, but it works for me. Oh, actually the 3 formula in the upper left are plotted, 3 dots in the 25-28BHN range. The ends of the lines were still there, I just connected them with the red dashed lines. Some printers learn to read upside down and backwards too!

[grumpy one]

When you get above a certain level of antimony, the hardness increase you get in response to heat treatment decreases. Linotype hardly responds to heat treatment at all. After quite a lot of experimenting, the hardest alloy (after heat treatment) I have tested was about 1.6% tin, 4% antimony. Additional antimony reduced the effectiveness of the heat treatment more than it increased the hardness of the as-cast alloy. The 1.6/4 alloy heat treated to an average hardness of 33 BHN. The same heat treatment applied to an alloy with 8% tin and 7% antimony only produced 22 BHN - from an alloy that was 18 BHN as-cast. This is partly because tin moderates the natural heat treatment response of antimonial alloys - a 6.4% tin, 14.5% antimony alloy could be heat treated to 26 BHN (as-cast it was 19.5 BHN). The toughness (resistance to impact fracture) of all of the high antimony alloys was poor, though adding tin improved it greatly.

I suggest you work with a versatile alloy that responds strongly to heat treatment, and use various heat treatments to develop test samples of various hardnesses. That should let you find what hardness you need to get optimum accuracy and high velocity performance. When you know that, you will have another exercise to do, deciding how much toughness you need for your intended applications of the bullets. When you know both the hardness and the toughness required, you will know both the alloy and the heat treatment that will give you what you need.

[felix]

Very good, Grumpy. ... felix