40 lb of pure lead.

[ruger-p94]

I have collected about 40 lbs of pure lead and plan to start to make some boolits after christmas. I have a lee 158 gr wadcutter mold for a 357 magnum. All I do is target shoot so I want to find a nice easy load to shoot. I have been doing some reading and what I gather I can get away with a med soft lead bullet, I noticed at rotometals they have linotype by the pound. Will two pounds added to my pure lead bring me up to a good hardness for a target round fired out of a 357. Also no luck with the ww in my area. I was also looking at bar solder as well. I only shoot a box a week so that should last me for a while till I find some more....thx in advance...

[454PB]

You can make a good alloy for your purposes by mixing linotype with pure lead at a 3 parts pure to 1 part linotype. This turns out about the same hardness as wheelweight alloy, but has slightly more tin for better casting.

[dieguy59]

Ruger-p94, welcome to the forum! PM coming at you.

[bumpo628]

I don't think 2 lbs of lino is going to get there for you.
2 lbs linotype + 40 lbs pure lead = 0.2% tin and 0.6% antimony

I think you'll have to bump it up to at least 6 lbs of lino to do what you want:
6 lbs linotype + 40 lbs pure lead = 0.5% tin and 1.6% antimony
That should be close to a favorite around here for low pressure rounds - 50/50 WW-pure + a little tin.

For your reference, here a couple other mixes:
8 lbs linotype + 40 lbs pure lead = 0.67% tin and 2% antimony (5 to 1)
10 lbs linotype + 40 lbs pure lead = 0.8% tin and 2.4% antimony (4 to 1)
13 lbs linotype + 40 lbs pure lead = 1.0% tin and 3% antimony (3 to 1)

[fredj338]

For full house 357mags, you might get by w/ 4-1 lead/lino, so your gonna need about 10#. You could of course then water drop them to get them to a bit harder than clip ww.