lead mix

[leadsmoke]

I have come into possesion of 40 lbs. of pure lead. What should I mix with it to make cast boolits for my 45 acp 200gr. How much antimony, tin etc. What mix ratio? Thanks much!

[merlin101]

Before you start mixing you might want to put up a "will trade" add in the swappin section. Reason being some guys need pure/soft for muzzle loaders and it seems to be hard to find in some places, who knows you might be able to trade it off for 2 for 3lbs of what you want. Just a thought. If ya do mix it yourself look, I forget who made up a ratio caculator but it's here somewhere. Sorry I can't help more.

[Hardcast416taylor]

A easy alloy to make that will work fine with the 200gr. swc is a 50/50 alloy of soft/wheel weights.Robert

[Defcon-One]

I agree with both posts above. Pure lead is worth at least as much as COWW which have 2-3% Antimony in them and a bit of Tin. The Antimony is what you want for hardness and the Tin is good for easier fill out when casting. So Clip-On WW lead is better to start with. I'd trade it, too!

I trade my Pure Lead for Animonial Lead whenever I can. The cost to make Pure Lead as hard as COWWs can be high. It takes a good bit of Linotype or something even more valuable to get there.

With .45 ACP running around 800 fps you do not need too much hardness! But, I still like to use COWWs plus 1% Tin.