My first time.........

[Catsmith]

Today was my first bullet casting. I poured fome 150 gr flat nose for my 3030 and some 158gr round nose for my 38. The 38 came out ok but I did the 30 over and am still not happy with them. I was using clip on wheel weight ingots and a corner off of a bar of 50/50 tin. I am using Lee molds and a lyman pot. I have more questions after my first time than I did before. LOL544465444754448

Don't hold back. I want to get better.

BTW I think I might be hooked!

[462]

Wrinkled and poorly filled out boolits are caused by the moulds not being up to their optimum casting temperature. A hot plate makes a good mould pre-heater -- adding a mould oven makes an excellent pre-heater.

(I usually attach a picture of my mould oven, but can't figure out how to do it, with the fourm's new format. However, a search should show you one.)

[Catsmith]

thanks, i will try a hot plate. i set the mold on the top of the pot for a few minutes. worked on the 358 but not the rifle rounds.

[OnHoPr]

I am not sure if your are using a ladle or bottom poor but the 150's, the mold was not hot enough. If you take a look at the boolit (158's) just to the left and bottom of the far right boolit you will see a little wiggle between the TL grooves and the nose where it doesn't seem apparent on the other boolits. That is where you wiggled a bit and disrupted the pour. Actually the 158's don't look to bad for your first time. The 150's look like you had inconsistent pours as well but hard to determine with the cold mold. Also. you might be cutting your sprues at different stages in the cooling process. You'll learn a cadence and get better and with more experience you will be able to identify some problems more readily.

[Catsmith]

ok a hot plate and timing exactly what i am looking for.

[Catsmith]

new question, is ww lead with a snijen of tin a good mix for 38? what about 3030?

[Jeffrey]

I use straight WW for my 30-30 boolits: LEE 150gr flat nose gas checked. I load them un checked or sized over a light charge of bullseye for cat sneeze plinkers. Tin helps mould fill out. Dip the mould into your alloy to heat it. Mould is hot enough when alloy stops instantly freezing on area dipped into alloy.

[Wayne Smith]

Ditto what the others said. Go back and do it again and you will be pleased with the result. Those 30/30 boolits deserve to be re-melted and tried again. That's one of the nice things about casting, we re-use our mistakes!

For both you can go from what you have to adding as much as 75% pure lead. Many of us use a 50-50 mix. In the 38 you can use pure lead, that's what the swaged wadcutters you can buy are. Those are for light loads, though.

[Catsmith]

so if i am loading 158gr round nose for my 357 at just under 1000 mv, should i stay with ww? can i soften it up some?

[turmech]

If you have mostly WW and want to use it that is fine will work good if fit is right. Many use a WW mix to conserve WW as they are getting harder to come by. Or they want more expantion of the bullet either on target or in the barrel. WW + 1.5% tin could handle most all of my needs (air cooled, water dropped, or heat treated) problem for me is I have more other types of lead then I do of WW