xsquidgator
12-19-2007, 11:47 AM
New caster here, just got started a few weeks ago or so with casting. Pretty much a Lee melter/mould setup for 45ACP, 357, and 9mm boolits. I've been reading around here about water quenching, alloying and the like, but I have some doubts or odd things that I can't explain, thought I would seek some advice here.
Most of my casting material is some medical waste lead, that I thought at least would be just pure lead, pretty soft. (This stuff used to be radiation shielding containers for prostate implant seeds) Maybe not though, when I follow the instructions on using my Lee hardness tester, I get imprint dimples ranging from 0.060" to 0.070" diameter, which corresponds to BHN 11-14. This is for air-cooled ingots and boolits that are air-cooled.
I got some wheel weights the other day, finally, and melted/fluxed/cast ingots from them. I guess you'd call these ingots air-cooled, although I tried to speed up the ingot casting process by setting the ingot mould on a wet towel to force-cool the mould faster. Anyway, I was surprised last night when I put a WW ingot of mine into the hardness tester and got the exact same dimple size and Brinell hardness numbers that I did for this air-cooled scrap lead of mine. Ok, so maybe I got lucky and my scrap lead is really an alloy close to WW composition?
Here's the other weird thing: figuring I'd need all the help I could get hardening up my boolits, I water quench them by dropping them into a coffee can with some water in the bottom. I cast at about 650F to 750F (I'm still learning how to adjust the melter rheostat for consistent temperature) and after a few boolits, the mould and the boolits are hot enough to get me that sizzling sound when they hit the water. Ok then. When I hardness tested some of these water-dropped boolits, once again I get dimples about 0.060" to 0.070" corresponding to BHN 10-14.
The only other physical data I have is my first test firing of boolits that I cast and loaded myself this last week. I loaded up some light 45ACP 230LRNs, 9mm 125LRNs, and 357 158LSWCs all lubed with Lee liquid alox, run through a sizer die, and re-lubed again prior to loading. By light I'm talking about in the ballpark of the recommended starting loads, like about 4 grains of W231 under the 230LRN for instance. Ran of box of about 50 each through some of my pistols and had decent accuracy (as good as my store-bought lead hand reloads anyway), and only a little bit of leading (only with the 158LSWCs, in the throat/chamber area of a Ruger SP101 with a 2.5" barrel). So I was pleased with that, heck, if nothing else, this whole casting thing is worth it if I can make ok 45ACP boolits for myself. I'd heard you need hard boolits for 45ACP (shallow rifling grooves) and these made from my scrap material seem to be ok.
Sorry for the rambling, but I'm trying to be accurate in my presentation. So, my questions are:
1) all things considered, is the Lee hardness tester this inconsistent, or is my technique poor/down on the learning curve so that I'm getting inconsistant results?
2) IIRC, doesn't water quenching usually result in an increase of about 5-10 BHN numbers? I'm a little annoyed or concerned that it doesn't seem to be having any effect when I try it, unless I'm messing up the water quenching or the hardness testing.
3) any idea or way to tell what kind of alloy I might have from these old shielding "pigs" that I'm melting? If it matters, the material has a silvery appearance at room temp, and that's not a surface coating, that's just what the bulk metal looks like. It melts by 650F per my lead thermometer. Maybe I got lucky and it's something like wheel weights?
I have some more work to do with my scrap lead melting to keep investigating, but I'm a little concerned about whether or not I'm getting accurate BHN numbers when I use my equipment. Tonight I'll try melting down and casting some of what I think is pure lead from a different source. This other stuff I'm going to hardness test and cast into ingots is a dark gray color, and is very soft (it was once radiation shielding for x-rays and is in the form of heavy bricks, a single brick is >20# and I have to think of a way to melt it w/o overwhelming my Lee magnum melter).
Question 4) The Lee hardness tester guide has some recomendations for max load pressure as a function of BHN number. IIRC, BHN 14 is supposed to go no higher than about 17,000PSI. Do you "buy into" these handload pressure recommendations?
Most of my casting material is some medical waste lead, that I thought at least would be just pure lead, pretty soft. (This stuff used to be radiation shielding containers for prostate implant seeds) Maybe not though, when I follow the instructions on using my Lee hardness tester, I get imprint dimples ranging from 0.060" to 0.070" diameter, which corresponds to BHN 11-14. This is for air-cooled ingots and boolits that are air-cooled.
I got some wheel weights the other day, finally, and melted/fluxed/cast ingots from them. I guess you'd call these ingots air-cooled, although I tried to speed up the ingot casting process by setting the ingot mould on a wet towel to force-cool the mould faster. Anyway, I was surprised last night when I put a WW ingot of mine into the hardness tester and got the exact same dimple size and Brinell hardness numbers that I did for this air-cooled scrap lead of mine. Ok, so maybe I got lucky and my scrap lead is really an alloy close to WW composition?
Here's the other weird thing: figuring I'd need all the help I could get hardening up my boolits, I water quench them by dropping them into a coffee can with some water in the bottom. I cast at about 650F to 750F (I'm still learning how to adjust the melter rheostat for consistent temperature) and after a few boolits, the mould and the boolits are hot enough to get me that sizzling sound when they hit the water. Ok then. When I hardness tested some of these water-dropped boolits, once again I get dimples about 0.060" to 0.070" corresponding to BHN 10-14.
The only other physical data I have is my first test firing of boolits that I cast and loaded myself this last week. I loaded up some light 45ACP 230LRNs, 9mm 125LRNs, and 357 158LSWCs all lubed with Lee liquid alox, run through a sizer die, and re-lubed again prior to loading. By light I'm talking about in the ballpark of the recommended starting loads, like about 4 grains of W231 under the 230LRN for instance. Ran of box of about 50 each through some of my pistols and had decent accuracy (as good as my store-bought lead hand reloads anyway), and only a little bit of leading (only with the 158LSWCs, in the throat/chamber area of a Ruger SP101 with a 2.5" barrel). So I was pleased with that, heck, if nothing else, this whole casting thing is worth it if I can make ok 45ACP boolits for myself. I'd heard you need hard boolits for 45ACP (shallow rifling grooves) and these made from my scrap material seem to be ok.
Sorry for the rambling, but I'm trying to be accurate in my presentation. So, my questions are:
1) all things considered, is the Lee hardness tester this inconsistent, or is my technique poor/down on the learning curve so that I'm getting inconsistant results?
2) IIRC, doesn't water quenching usually result in an increase of about 5-10 BHN numbers? I'm a little annoyed or concerned that it doesn't seem to be having any effect when I try it, unless I'm messing up the water quenching or the hardness testing.
3) any idea or way to tell what kind of alloy I might have from these old shielding "pigs" that I'm melting? If it matters, the material has a silvery appearance at room temp, and that's not a surface coating, that's just what the bulk metal looks like. It melts by 650F per my lead thermometer. Maybe I got lucky and it's something like wheel weights?
I have some more work to do with my scrap lead melting to keep investigating, but I'm a little concerned about whether or not I'm getting accurate BHN numbers when I use my equipment. Tonight I'll try melting down and casting some of what I think is pure lead from a different source. This other stuff I'm going to hardness test and cast into ingots is a dark gray color, and is very soft (it was once radiation shielding for x-rays and is in the form of heavy bricks, a single brick is >20# and I have to think of a way to melt it w/o overwhelming my Lee magnum melter).
Question 4) The Lee hardness tester guide has some recomendations for max load pressure as a function of BHN number. IIRC, BHN 14 is supposed to go no higher than about 17,000PSI. Do you "buy into" these handload pressure recommendations?