BathCity
03-17-2013, 09:20 AM
HELLO from the water state of Michigan. I am a recently joined member and an finding many ideas in the forums. I have fairly recently begun casting boolits. I have been reading a lot of the posts here and been experimenting at the homestead. The first mold I bought is a Lee 90361 (165 gn 7.62x39, CTL312-160-2r) and began casting. I chose this mold for the better looking Ogive, at least it looks better to me anyway. These boolits are being fired from my 1903 Springfield behind 37 to 40 grains of Varget or IMR 4320.
I have experienced slight parting lines on one cavity and slightly more pronounced lines on the other. The cavity with more pronounced parting lines actually has a bit of flash at the tip. I did not wish to do anything to the mold as the boolits as cast looked ok other than the parting lines and because I am new to casting, I didn't want to a_s up the mold by pulling a newbie mistake. I began to clean the flash by hand but it was too time consuming and the results varied to much. The boolits fire ok but I thought a better method to remove the parting line / flash might result in better accuracy. I have also tried using JPW and a mix of JPW, Bees Wax and trans fluid.
I thought a bit and came up with a method that works quite well. Necessity being the mother of invention because I don't have a vibratory tumbler, I got out an old vibrating sander that I don't really use anymore and a cool whip container to see if I could make a small vibrating tumbler to use for flash removal. I don't have any special media so I used a quantity of BB's that I have as the media. After some trial and error, I worked out a method that works quite well.
I place 25 boolits in along with about a half cup of BB's and vibrate them for 3 minutes. This removes any trace of the parting lines and cleans up the base well. I water drop the boolits in water with some snow mixed in because I read on the forum this would produce a hardened boolit. I decided not to wait overnight to install the gas checks so the boolits would be softer. To install gas checks with out waiting for lube to dry, I used some Ideal Wire Lube straight, wiping the base of the boolit, put on the gas check then run it through the Lee .309 sizer right after casting them.
I then tried vibratory application of the Alox as just tumbling them by hand leaves quite a splotchy application. Vibrating the boolits in the same container I used for hand tumble lubing results in a very even, smooth and light coat of the Alox.
I apply the Alox about an hour after sizing to give the wire lube time to get tacky so that the Alox will adhere better and this seems to work well. The boolits have a even smooth amber color appearance to them this morning after drying overnight. I am unsure whether another coat of Alox is needed, I may try a second coat on a small percentage of this lot. This is the first batch I have done this way and am waiting to see how the boolits shoot with anticipation.
Best Regard - BathCity
I have experienced slight parting lines on one cavity and slightly more pronounced lines on the other. The cavity with more pronounced parting lines actually has a bit of flash at the tip. I did not wish to do anything to the mold as the boolits as cast looked ok other than the parting lines and because I am new to casting, I didn't want to a_s up the mold by pulling a newbie mistake. I began to clean the flash by hand but it was too time consuming and the results varied to much. The boolits fire ok but I thought a better method to remove the parting line / flash might result in better accuracy. I have also tried using JPW and a mix of JPW, Bees Wax and trans fluid.
I thought a bit and came up with a method that works quite well. Necessity being the mother of invention because I don't have a vibratory tumbler, I got out an old vibrating sander that I don't really use anymore and a cool whip container to see if I could make a small vibrating tumbler to use for flash removal. I don't have any special media so I used a quantity of BB's that I have as the media. After some trial and error, I worked out a method that works quite well.
I place 25 boolits in along with about a half cup of BB's and vibrate them for 3 minutes. This removes any trace of the parting lines and cleans up the base well. I water drop the boolits in water with some snow mixed in because I read on the forum this would produce a hardened boolit. I decided not to wait overnight to install the gas checks so the boolits would be softer. To install gas checks with out waiting for lube to dry, I used some Ideal Wire Lube straight, wiping the base of the boolit, put on the gas check then run it through the Lee .309 sizer right after casting them.
I then tried vibratory application of the Alox as just tumbling them by hand leaves quite a splotchy application. Vibrating the boolits in the same container I used for hand tumble lubing results in a very even, smooth and light coat of the Alox.
I apply the Alox about an hour after sizing to give the wire lube time to get tacky so that the Alox will adhere better and this seems to work well. The boolits have a even smooth amber color appearance to them this morning after drying overnight. I am unsure whether another coat of Alox is needed, I may try a second coat on a small percentage of this lot. This is the first batch I have done this way and am waiting to see how the boolits shoot with anticipation.
Best Regard - BathCity