I got my Lee Magnum Melter--Yes!!!!!!

[Willyp]

What a nice,quick way to melt down a pile of wheel weights. I am happy!!!!! I cast up over 30 pounds,into ingots,in shot time.

[edmehlig]

What setting would you use to get the proper temp to cast pure lead?

[Willyp]

Ed,i just got it last week and i am still playing with it. I am sure some one else,here,can help you out.

[Baron von Trollwhack]

It just doesn't matter to melt bulk leads/ lead alloys. If the pot is full and cold turn it on wide open. if its empty and cold put a little of what you want in the bottom and when it melts, add your remaining ingots as they melt, all again wide open. Place a coffee can lid one the top to retain heat for speed.

I run several and thus keep one full for 30/35 rifles @2100., one for slow pistol alloy, one for RB lead. A small one for fiddling around. If you play alloying or need small batches, dip out when finishing into ingots, then pour out the last bit. That pot is always empty and ready. Develop a marking system to identify melts/ingots. Mark the outside of the pot with marker so you can gauge volume in the pot.

The alloy matters for proper temperature to melt to for CASTING because that is how you keep your mold heated correctly to cast perfectly the metal you have melted. There is a relationship. If you start casting with the melt too cold................crummy boolits, too hot, alloy smears, too much change from start to finish casting, too much weight and diameter variation.

The settings are NOMINAL ! You must match casting speed to temperature maintenance. I listen to the Lee recycle on/off to get it right, slowly turning the heat up or down till casting is good, according to casting tempo and amount in the pot.

For WW, start slowly, scrape out the crud when near full, make ingots keeping them seperate. When all is done, mix ingots to make the total batch homogeneous. Better to get with casting buds to bulk up your periodic ingot making and do 60-80 pounds per melt. The Lee is too small for much WW ingot production. Too much diversity from the WW & scrap bucket is not good.

Bvt

[edmehlig]

I don't know of anybody who casts bullets. I'm a complete novice and only cast 465gr pure lead or as close as pure as I can pure lead connicals for my ML.

[geargnasher]

Ed, do two things: Get yourself a copy of the Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook, third edition, and run your near-pure alloy AND mould quite hot. If you have a thermometer, I'd say run it at 800 degrees or more if you don't have much tin in there. If you have some tin, keep pot temps below 750. Get your mould really hot by casting fast over and over and pouring a large sprue puddle on top of the plate. When it takes only about three seconds for the sprue to freeze, then it's probably about right and you can slow down a bit to maintain the mould temperature. If you start getting poor fillout and wrinkles, speed up the casting pace until they smooth out and get sharp again.

Gear

[milprileb]

Melting down Wheel weights in your pot ?

Yes, have done it when I first started and fishing crud and
clips out of Lyman pot was a pain. Keeping crud from jamming
up pour spout was a issue.

When you reach the point that you just want to work with ingots
and drop them into pot and drop bullets, then you will arrive at
what most folks here have found is the solution.

Solution: Smelt your metal and flux it, pour to ingots as stage 1,
then drop ingots into your pot and drop bullets.

Equipment: you need a separate burner and pot to do the smelting
and there are many threads on the forum to help you along. I took
the advice of this forum and got a Dutch Oven and Turkey cooker
burner. I spent 70 bucks in this but I flat out think its worth it for the
gain I get in great metal ready for casting.

Lots of ingot mold ideas. I really like the corn stick cast iron molds by
Lodge as sold by Walmart for ten bucks. Far superior to my Lee ingot
molds in production, cheaper in cost than Lee or Lyman ingot molds and
the corn stick mold cools quicker, easier to dump out and the corn
stick ingots fit my Saeco furnace easier than Saeco, Lee or Lyman igots do.

Lots of ways to skin the ingot Cat ! However, you got to decide how much
pain you want to bear in making clean metal. For many on a budget, the time
is not right yet for a turkey cooker and dutch oven or..... OR... you don't shoot
enough cast bullets to make the leap. If so: melt raw metal and clean it in your
pot and make things work for you.

The thing is: make what you have work and if upgrade becomes desirable, check
forum threads for ideas.

Lastly: muffin pans for ingots. I kept buying wrong ones and they all failed badly: metal
would stick. I gave up on them. However I know folks who got the right ones and have success. They are usually very cheap to find if you get ones that work.

[BossHoss]

+1 on the Aluminum Muffin pan ingot molds!! I have a 8 place mini muffin pan made out of aluminum that makes perfect little lead discs that plop right out.

Fit perfect in the Lee 10# I use.