Just Casted My First Boolits

[hylander]

Thanks to all the help here I finally Cast my first Boolits today :grin:
I was hoping to get with a freind to show me the ropes before I dove in, however being the
impatiant cuss that I am, I could not hold out any longer. I cast with straight WW lead as I have nothing else
to add to the mix yet. My setup is a Lee 4-20 Pot, Lee mold.
I turned the heat all the way up to melt 4lb. of WW lead. After it was a molten puddle I fluxed with a pinch of wax
and turned it down to number 6. I do not have a thermometer yet.
Was funny because I have read that the pots sometime drip. Well before I started casting I looked down and there
was a small puddle and I was thinking great here we go :mad: However that was all that dripped, worked perfect after that.
I only casted 10 and I let a freind cast 4 and I water qenched them. My first couple cast were not to great but after that they started looking much better. I loaded up 8 rounds to try tomorrow, hand lubed with LLA.
A few dissapointments but will save those for other topics.
I cant beleive the casting part was so easy and I'm pleased with my first try.
Overall I am a Happy Camper, or is it Happy Caster, I actually feel like I belong on this Forum now :cast_boolits:

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b193/hylander7/Bows/Goodies/da346dd1-2c42-4a88-a9b4-3f212ac763be_zpsa6e75b43.jpg

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b193/hylander7/Bows/Goodies/cb690bb2-3727-46e8-9daa-ec1347adb4dc_zps76d45150.jpg

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b193/hylander7/Bows/Goodies/8fbb7e26-d8f2-494b-8511-3431e260318e_zps741d4af0.jpg

[hickfu]

Great job on your first casts! Unfortunately now you are hooked and will spend countless hours casting and forget to spend any time with the Wife/Girlfriend.

Doc

[hylander]

I will do my casting while my wife does the mopping inside since she runs me out of the house anyways

[runfiverun]

when you start dropping good boolits like that, you keep on going.

[DrCaveman]

when you start dropping good boolits like that, you keep on going.

Seriously, how did you stop at 10? Those look damn nice for straight WW. It appears your mold was up to temp too, you must have preheated it or dipped it in the melt.

Though to be picky, i think the edges of the driving bands could be a little more square. Maybe a touch of tin or hotter mold.

Nice job! Is that 30-06 you are loading them in? For what gun?

Edit: what the hell am i saying, those edges look great

[hylander]

Seriously, how did you stop at 10? Those look damn nice for straight WW. It appears your mold was up to temp too, you must have preheated it or dipped it in the melt.

Though to be picky, i think the edges of the driving bands could be a little more square. Maybe a touch of tin or hotter mold.

Nice job! Is that 30-06 you are loading them in? For what gun?

Edit: what the hell am i saying, those edges look great

Thanks guys,
Well I stoppped at 10 because I really have no idea what I'm doing :oops: I wasn't really ready to cast but I just got antsy and wanted to try. To preheat the mold I sat it on top of the pot while the Lead melted and then dipped it into the melt.
Yes 30-06, 1903A3 4 groove
I need to find a source for tin and also how much would I add ?

[161]

Very nice

[RickinTN]

Add up to about 2%. To make calculations easier I convert everything to grains. One pound equals 7000 grains. For 2%, you would add 140 grains of tin per pound of alloy. Roll plumbing solder is what I've found most convenient to use for tin. Just clip off and weigh it. I've found the .118" lead free solder I use weighs about 20 grains per inch, so about 7 inches per pound of alloy.
Your bullets look good. I would have had a hard time stopping there! I think you're officially "hooked" into this obsession.

PS. I would be curious to know what diameter your bullets dropped in the nose and the body. I've been trying to find this mold myself.

Thanks,
Rick

[snuffy]

What Rick said, I'll add that when buying the lead-free solder, make sure of it's metal composition. It varies a lot. What I try to find is the 95% tin,,-- 5% antimony alloy. That gives mainly tin with the bonus of a touch of antimony. There's some that has silver in it, from 5 to ten %. Also found is some that has silver and copper, but seldom more than 10%.

If you get lucky and find some old bar solder, it comes in different alloy percentages. Lead is always the first number like 60-40% lead-tin.

It's been 45 years since my first time casting, can't remember that far back! BUT I'm certain of one thing, my first boolits did NOT LOOK THAT GOOD!:bigsmyl2:

[runfiverun]

tin is the first number.
even in alloys it's expressed tin/antimony/lead.
or tin /antimony/copper, silver.

[hylander]

Thanks guys, I will get some Tin today.


PS. I would be curious to know what diameter your bullets dropped in the nose and the body. I've been trying to find this mold myself.

Rick:
Body dropped .3115
Nose dropped .298

I was hoping the nose would be over .300
I sent an email to Lee, they said it will if I change my alloy.

[captaint]

Nice job, really. Your wife is gonna hate this site.... Mike

[popper]

Looks like a lot of LLA. try thinning it & tumble lube or use recluse. I think the Lee moulds are designed for #2 alloy. How close to 185 did they drop? There is a sticky about what to add to get different dropped size. They look good to me, I'd maybe cut with some pure, straight for hotter loads. IMHO, the comment about tin and sharp edges is to make sure they all drop the same weight & size. Easier to inspect & cull. I don't use any.

[hylander]

Looks like a lot of LLA. try thinning it & tumble lube or use recluse. I think the Lee moulds are designed for #2 alloy.

Will to much LLA hurt ?

[mikemc]

Those look great! It will just smoke more with that much LLA...at least that's what I have found out.

[gwpercle]

hylander,
Welcome to the club, You are doing just fine. If you clean the crud out of the bottom of the Lee pot ever now and then it won't drip. Stuff gets in the seating stem and it cant shut all the way. I have cast since 1967 with straight, air-cooled wheelweights and as you can see from your boolits they come out fine. Don't let not having anything ( tin ) to add to wheelweights stop a casting session. I never knew you had to add stuff ,so like you just cast them and they come out fine. I think a good fluxing helps with the casting.
It's so satisfying to take old dirty lead stuff , melt it and cast it into things you would have to pay good money for. You're going to enjoy this hobby.
Is that the mould Lee sells for the 303 british enfield? I need one for a No4 MKI 1942 BSA but need a 312-313 dia. to fit the bore. .3115 might be a tad small, I was hoping the Lee would throw a larger boolit.

Gary





Gary

[popper]

I was going to comment that you would have a 'smoke pole'. Won't hurt any but coverage is more even and complete when you thin & tumble lube. They should turn from bight & shiny to dull when coated properly. Did you use dacron filler with the 2400 loads? You might get vertical stringing without it. Use the inside of kid's or dog's stuffed toys. Download Bumpo's lead calculator to see what to mix in the alloy and what the 'standards' are. But - YOU DID GOOD. Go see how they work and adjust what you need. Oh, sawdust is a better flux. Lots of threads on it here.

[hylander]

Yep, this is Lee's 303 Brit mold.
They dropped at about 183.6 gr.

Just checked locally for Tin Solder to add, $30 lb. :shock:
I have a Pewter mug, will that work ?
I also have soem Dutch Boy lead free, ocording to the online MSDS it is 95% Tin, 5% Copper
Will that work ?

[FredBuddy]

I'm a couple of months behind you.

I'll be bragging all over town if I do that well first time !

[Shiloh]

Now your hooked.

SHiloh

[hylander]

And this is my first 4 boolits fired @ 50yds. Iron sights.
1943 1903A3 4 groove.
I did have some very light leading at the ned of my session but I don't know if it was from my Boolits or the ones
I fired thatsomeone else made.
I'm happy but I will add some Tin to the batch and see if that helps with the leading.

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b193/hylander7/Bows/Goodies/af7a5267-8363-40d1-a048-43e25bd3e2d3_zps04b0161b.jpg

[gunoil]

local plumbing supply warehouse and buy lead free solder, RickinTN SAID ABOUT ABOVE. He said 7 inches per lb. of lead. I buy bismuth on ebay and add a lil'. See if ya can find some logs of lead around somewhere. Public works retired people, junk sail boats,etc.. A retired man from ft bragg brought some incredible lead to my shop and iam casting for us both now. He told me a story: "he said some years ago he took 3000 lbs of lead to salvage",,, bothers him ever time he thinks about it.

[chirodr1]

Nice group for your first time and open sights. I am new to casting also and will be shooting my cast pistol bullets soon.

[RickinTN]

I also have soem Dutch Boy lead free, ocording to the online MSDS it is 95% Tin, 5% Copper
Will that work

It will work just fine. The Sterling solder I'm using is 4.95% copper. There is an ongoing thread about copper "toughening" your bullets, which I think is what you want.
By the way....Your results are excellent for your first time. They're excellent for an experienced caster.
Good Job!
Rick

[snuffy]

tin is the first number.
even in alloys it's expressed tin/antimony/lead.
or tin /antimony/copper, silver.

Oh? Then #2 lyman alloy is 5-2-95? Maybe different for solder, but boolit alloys, lead is always first.

As for the length of lead-free solder to add, it depends on the gauge of the solder wire. I got some lead-free solder on flea bay about 6 months ago. It's 1.0 mil, or .040. It has a 96.5 tin, 3 silver, and .5% copper alloy. I find that a yard of it is 85 grains. So, I cut it all the same length IIRC 46 inches is 100 grains. So I know how much tin goes into the range lead I'm trying to sweeten.

I do not consider that coating I see on those boolits to be too much lla. That's what I want to see on a dipped boolit. If it needs to be less, just heat the LLA before dipping, or warm the boolits before dipping.

The Recluse 45-45-10 that I made up, also has to be heated before dipping. I just made some 7mm 120's, used rooster lube for the pre-sizing lube, ran them nose first through a .284 Lyman die using the perfessors nose first system. That applied the GC, and ended up @ .285, ( those were cast of 17 # linotype, 3# pure and water dropped.) Then dipped in the heated Recluse lube. I'll load them in my 7-30 Waters contender.

[ghh3rd]

Before I got my first boolit cast I set my hand on fire with gasoline from my coleman stove... I lit the stove and pumped a little more air into the tank, and the pump failed and spewed gasoline over my hand. About 30 minutes after finding a pain pill, I fixed the pump and tried again successfully. Welcome to the addiction...

[hylander]

Going out to the garage in just a few minutes to cast my second time.
I will be adding some Dutch Boy solder by weight, 840 grs. to 6lb. of WW

Hopefully I won't set myself on fire :razz:
I already badly burned three fingers on my left hand 2 weeks ago grabbing a hot exhaust :shock:

[runfiverun]

no lyman no-2 is 5/5/90.
terracorp magnum is 2/6/92.

if you make 5/2/93 alloy you will have problems [not with fillout] but problems such as hard/soft spots on the surface of the boolit, and age softening of the alloy.


95/5 solder is expressed this way also as tin first.
so is 50/50 and 60/40, 63/37 etc.

[hylander]

So I had about a 3-4 hour casting session.
Cast about 400 Boolits or more, however I only yielded 106 usable. I measured every band on every bullet.
Problem was undersized Boolits and not getting sharp edges.
The main thing I did different was to add Tin. I added 140gr. Tin per pound of WW lead.
My pot was set the same as last time on number 6 and I preheated my mold. After casting over 100 boolits I added more Lead to cut the Tin, after doing this about 3 times my Boolits got better. I also re-smoked my mold.
Does the melt need to run hotter when adding Tin to it ?
Also I noticed my bullets improved if I left them in the mold longer, how long do you guys leave them in the mold
before you dump them ? I left them for about 15 seconds.
Water quenching seemed to work better as well.

HELP

[snuffy]

I also re-smoked my mold.

Smoke is for flavoring meat or signalling other indians. Clean that mold of any trace of that smoke, especially the vent lines. That's the main reason you have undersize noses, that smoke takes up space by means of the layer it deposits in the cavity! Shasam!


1 to 25 Bullet Alloy Ingot (96%-lead, 4%-tin) Lyman #2 Bullet Ingot (90% Lead, 5% Tin, 5% Antimony)
1 to 20 Bullet Alloy Ingot (95%-lead, 5%-tin)
Price per INGOT $15.45

Looks like roto metals does it both ways as to which metal in the alloy is listed first.

Hardball Bullet Casting Alloy Ingot (2%-Tin, 6%-Antimony, and 92%-Lead)

So does that mean we're both right? Or both wrong?

[hylander]

Smoke is for flavoring meat or signalling other indians. Clean that mold of any trace of that smoke, especially the vent lines. That's the main reason you have undersize noses, that smoke takes up space by means of the layer it deposits in the cavity! Shasam!


LEE instructions say to smoke the mold before it is used and anytime the bullets start to stick.
Seems I have read that elsewere as well.
What do recommend for cleaning it ?

[hylander]

OK: I think I see what ya'll mean about not smoking, I think I smoked mine enough to give it cancer :shock:
I made it Black and not just the cavities, I'm sure I plugged up the vent lines :oops:
I scrubbed it with Comet, Acatone, brake cleaner and comet again.
It still has some black around outside edges of the cavities, just a little, but dark.
I will try another short casting session in the morning.

[snuffy]

OK: I think I see what ya'll mean about not smoking, I think I smoked mine enough to give it cancer :shock:
I made it Black and not just the cavities, I'm sure I plugged up the vent lines :oops:
I scrubbed it with Comet, Acetone, brake cleaner and comet again.
It still has some black around outside edges of the cavities, just a little, but dark.
I will try another short casting session in the morning.

Yeah, I think you got it. Lee has some crazy ideas about how to use his molds. Smoking the cavities is a band aid for poor machining. It makes bad molds release boolits better, but it makes the mold cast smaller boolits via the layer of soot on/in the cavities. The vent lines are always clogged, leading to poorly filled-out boolits.

Lee also tells you to use boolit lube to lubricate the positioning pins and sprue plate hinge. Saying the 50-50 alox/beeswax will work. That **** forms a black mess when it burns on, and most times migrates to the mold cavities. Making for wrinkled boolits.

Best lube is sprueplate lube sold by a member here called bullshop. it's simply high temp synthetic 2 cycle oil, sold at most automotive stores. It won't oxidize at casting temps. Only a tiny, light film is needed, too much will make for wrinkled boolits.

[Cherokee]

Congrats on our first session.

[hylander]

I cast about another 250 or so, had a little over 100 keepers, I check each one twice.
I lubed the sprue plate with 2 cycle synthetic, however I guess I used to much because it must have got in the cavities.
I have wrinkled bullets.
Rescubbed with comet again, took about 20 cast before I had any keepers because I was not getting good fill out.
After about 60 keepers I added some Pewter and got a touch better fill out.
The bodies look pretty good but the noses still are not like they were before

[cf5757]

Looking good! I too am a new caster. What a great hobby! and what a great forum for info.

[CobraMan]

thanks to all the help here i finally cast my first boolits today :grin:
I was hoping to get with a freind to show me the ropes before i dove in, however being the
impatiant cuss that i am, i could not hold out any longer. I cast with straight ww lead as i have nothing else
to add to the mix yet. My setup is a lee 4-20 pot, lee mold.
I turned the heat all the way up to melt 4lb. Of ww lead. After it was a molten puddle i fluxed with a pinch of wax
and turned it down to number 6. I do not have a thermometer yet.
Was funny because i have read that the pots sometime drip. Well before i started casting i looked down and there
was a small puddle and i was thinking great here we go :mad: However that was all that dripped, worked perfect after that.
I only casted 10 and i let a freind cast 4 and i water qenched them. My first couple cast were not to great but after that they started looking much better. I loaded up 8 rounds to try tomorrow, hand lubed with lla.
A few dissapointments but will save those for other topics.
I cant beleive the casting part was so easy and i'm pleased with my first try.
Overall i am a happy camper, or is it happy caster, i actually feel like i belong on this forum now :cast_boolits:

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b193/hylander7/bows/goodies/da346dd1-2c42-4a88-a9b4-3f212ac763be_zpsa6e75b43.jpg

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b193/hylander7/bows/goodies/cb690bb2-3727-46e8-9daa-ec1347adb4dc_zps76d45150.jpg

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b193/hylander7/bows/goodies/8fbb7e26-d8f2-494b-8511-3431e260318e_zps741d4af0.jpg

beautiful......................................... .

[sthwestvictoria]

Yep, this is Lee's 303 Brit mold.
They dropped at about 183.6 gr.

Just checked locally for Tin Solder to add, $30 lb. :shock:
I have a Pewter mug, will that work ?
I also have soem Dutch Boy lead free, ocording to the online MSDS it is 95% Tin, 5% Copper
Will that work ?
Yes it certainly will work. The copper component is neglible and the pewter will add lovely tin to your alloy.


Going out to the garage in just a few minutes to cast my second time.
I will be adding some Dutch Boy solder by weight, 840 grs. to 6lb. of WW

840grains of tin will get you to just under 2%, due to copper content (by weight).

Lovely boolits, keep up the good work. Scrounge for lead and pewter at charity shops and yard sales and you'll soon build up a stash. Let friends know and they'll bring bits of flashing, old fishing sinkers and the like.