hey every one: first time posting a question on this board, (sticky molds)

[9w1911]

I have several molds and I must be doing something wrong because they all stick to some degree,
I have 3 RCBS, 1 Lee and 1 Lyman.

I have soaked all in mineral spirits, scrubbed the till my fingers bled with dish soap and smoked them many times, each time the boolits fall great on the first two or three casts then progressively worse as I continue to cast. Once they begin to stick thats it they stick, I try to slow my pace down and really let the mold cool and it still sticks, speed up to frosty boolits and they stick, slow down from there and they stick.

Alloy: 10lbs of WW ingots plus .5 lbs of lead free silver solder
heat: 600 degrees
Lyman ladle pour

what am i doing wrong

[pipehand]

Silver solder? Not lead free 95% tin 5% antimony solder? I'd have to hazard a guess that your alloy may be too rich and not shrinking enough upon cooling to fall from the mold. I use ww alloy with only enough extra tin added to help fill out. I also cast at 7oo to 725 degrees. Haven't had a boolit stick since I traded off a Lyman 457643- don't know why it stuck, the new owner is happy with it.

[9w1911]

yes its silver solder so I think it is tin and silver was given to me by a friend

ok I will go hotter and lay off the silver next time,

[tomme boy]

Turn the lead up to 700-725.

[375RUGER]

I wouldn't use any more than 3 oz of that solder / 10# of WW. Little Sn goes a long way.
Recently bought a RCBS that seemed to have some sort of oil baked on and wouldn't cast a good boolit for nothing. Scrubbed with a toothbrush and Fast Orange hand cleaner, then rinsed with hot water really well and dewetted it with Gun scrubber. Now the boolits practically jump out.

[MtGun44]

Don't smoke, don't scrub until bleed. 20 sec with Comet and a toothbrush on the
cavites, and run them naked.

Bill

[PS Paul]

I'm with MT on this: don't smoke yer molds. Never done it. CBRick is of the same opinion. Sure, lotsa guys feel a need to do it, but something else is going on.

Some sound advice above.

Oh yeah, welcome to the forum!!
PSP

[9w1911]

great!!! and yes this forum is awesome!!!

[dragon813gt]

What is the concentration of the solder? There are varying degrees of silver solder. Which in itself is a misnomer. A lot of them labeled as "silver" actually have copper as a higher concentration and very little silver. The silver is usually under .5% while the Copper can be at 5%.

All that being said, that is to much solder. Your alloy has a 5% tin content. That's just wasting money. You can cut it down to 2.5oz per 10#s to end up with 1.9% tin content. I would also turn the heat up. I don't cast at less than 700 degrees.

[9w1911]

I have no idea the concentration of the solder

[dragon813gt]

The numbers I posted were assuming it's 96% Sn 4% Ag. If you add another 20#s of wheel weights to your original alloy you end up at 96/2/2. That's what I use for hunting and it provides reliable expansion.

You can leave the tin content at 5%. But there is no need for more than 2% as it doesn't do anything beneficial in a greater concentration. With the cost of tin it's just wasting money. For plinking ammo I don't use more than 1% tin.

[KrisR]

Im no expert, but that happened to me with bullet sticking in a new mold. I took my sons non marking eraser"Pencil eraser" and went along the edge of the bullet in the mold cavity. Someone told me about this trick and wish I could credit that person but they said that there is fine pieces of metal on the edge of the cavity that could hold the bullet aka stick. also turn up the heat.

[9w1911]

these are all were used molds and I think they need a once over having looked at what others have done to clean molds.

[Janoosh]

+1 on thr toothbrush and Comet. It works! If I have a problem mold, and the boolit is sticking, I open the mold and then STOP. I let the mold cool and if the boolit remains in the mold I look with a magnifying glass to see what is holding the boolit in? Usually a small burr. Some one posted about running a hardwood stick around the edge of the mold! It works. Someone posted about running a qtip around the mold, it works. If the problem is not the mold, then it has to be alloy or temperature.

[9w1911]

will do tomorrow actually, going to cast some more.