Casting at 25 degrees

[singleshotbuff]

Gentlemen,

Spent most of the day in my unheated garage making boolits. Temperature was a balmy 25 degrees :-D . Oh well I always hated casting in the heat of summer!

Made a couple hundred 358156 and a hundred or so U311241. Interestingly, the U311241, which is supposed to cast undersized, casts at .313" from my mold, with my alloy (50/50 wheelweights and range lead). It weighs right at 160grs. I think I'll try it in my M44 7.62X54R, which slugs .312"

Any suggestions for this boolit in the 7.62x54R? I have Unigue, Blue Dot and rifle powders such as IMR-4320, IMR-4198 & IMR-3031 on hand. I'd really like to find a Blue dot load, as I have quite a bit left over from loading 3 1/2" 12ga shells :shock:


Also smelted about 50lbs of wheelweights and 50lbs of range lead in to ingots.

All in all a pleasant, although cold, day at the casting pot. I plan to repeat tomorrow and most of this week. Need to lay in a supply of 358156 for the 38 Special. My stock is low.

SSB

[Rod B]

Like yourself I usually end up casting in the colder weather.

I always say I'll do it in the spring, but before I know it we are into the hot days of summer. Seems like every year I try & get it done prior to the cold weather but I've not been successful in doing so.

Next year however will be different.:mrgreen:

Rod.:)

[floodgate]

Singleshotbuff:

"Interestingly, the U311241, which is supposed to cast undersized, casts at .313" from my mold, with my alloy (50/50 wheelweights and range lead)."

Part of the endless amusement provided us by them folks in Middlefield - or is it Middletown?*

floodgate

* It's both, they moved from "-field" to "-town" in 1995, just to see if we were watching.

[9.3X62AL]

Floodgate et al--

Interesting factoid about the town name--which sort of follows on track with Lyman's apparent credo--"Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative." I sometimes think that Lyman makes boolit molds with the same mindset that Duesenberg made automobiles--"No two are alike".

Cooler weather has prompted some casting here, too. I have all of Onceabull's "mold rent" assembled now, months ahead of schedule. This often gets done 3-5 hours before departure for NCBS, so a little uncharacteristic foresight and planning has creeped into the hobby work lately. The recent relative absence of brake jobs and other daughter-inspired automotive adventures figures highly in that outcome, I should add.

[klausg]

SSB- I live in an apartment, so my casting is done on my tailgate. This winter has seen a lot of interior weather here in the Anchorage bowl, i.e. damn cold. I discovered earlier that when the wind is blowing it is nigh on impossible to get your mould/melt hot enough to cast. Currently we're in the middle of a heat wave, around 30. So if this holds, I may get to try out my GB 32K this weekend, other wise I may have to wait until spring :cry: . It wouldn't be so bad, except I'd like to get around 500 or so done for my best friend's dad, (who just bought a .32 H&R), in time for X-mas.

[Hunter]

I myself casted about 50 pounds of ingots this evening as the temp. dropped to below 50 degrees (I am casting outside) and I noticed that I had to turn the burner up a little to keep the top from cooling as I do have a fan blowing across the pot. I did get it done though.

[texas tenring]

I have all those powders on hand also but havent tried them in the 7.62x54, I just got started in cast boolits and tried alliant 2400 as suggested by other members. I've had great results in my 91/30 with .312 bore. Also I shot only four shots,( because thats all I had left) at the range thru my M44 that got on the paper and it shows some promise too!!!

[robertbank]

Cold casting is when your hemroids shrink down to nothing and you use your molds for hand warmers...now that is cold. I now do my casting in the garage to get out of the wind. I figure anywhere from 25F to 35F is just about right. Much hotter than that and the garage gets stuffy. I can take the cold but not with a wind.

Take Care

Bob

[joeb33050]

I like to cast in the winter also, even with the chill. It will be down to about 78 degrees today, so I'll fire everything up and get to it. I find that a sweatshirt keeps off the worst of the chill winds.
joe brennan

[robertbank]

Down to 78F! Joe you are killing me. Trust your sweatshirt keeps the "chill" off you.:)

Take Care

Bob

[singleshotbuff]

Yeah Joe, must be rough at 78 degrees !! Actually can't complain, it was 55 degrees here in Ohio today. Should have fired up the casting pot, but decided to shoot instead.

SSB

[44woody]

well I had to play with the weilder the other day and now I must have 12 good ingot moulds that the ingots don't get hung up in I had 3 buckets of ww about 400 lbs of them to melt down so I got to work on them I now have a nice stack of ingots to work with when I get my pots back from magma that are beeing fixed they started to leek some and it got to be a pita and this is how I spent my day in hot sunny Florida :castmine: 44Woody

[mag_01]

:coffee: --I casted today also---made some 200gr. boolits for my K-31--In the garage at about 34 degrees -----Everything went fine cleaned my Lee pot out good before using and it paid off very little drip and for Lee thats good--WW and Babbitt and then water dropped ------Then loaded some 7.5x55 rounds with 33grs. of 3031 and the 200gr. boolit all in all a good day.------------Mag