Hi! First post. BHN and alloy questions.

[Drew P]

So, I've fallen into the rabbit hole of molten lead. This forum is obviously massively loaded with smart fellas and tons of good info! So, thanks for all the quality writing I've been enjoying for some time now.

So far my casting has been shotgun slugs exclusively. I've obtained decent results despite not having a friggin clue what I'm doing, and not even having a lead thermometer.

Well, thermometer is in the mail, and I've had such a good time and good results casting slugs that I've added a 308 mould and a 45acp mold also.

With the slugs, I didn't give much thought to alloy or bhn because being big dumb and slow, and carried by a plastic petalled wad I didn't think it would matter. Now that I'm branching out, I am trying to play catchup on the alloy stuff.

I do not have a hardness tester.

So, today I found a hunk of antimony at my local scrap yard. Paid 4$/lb for it and it was 14 lbs. should be enough for a while?! From my reading it seems a little antimony is great to add a hardness, and a little tin helps fill out the mould. And that if kept equalish in proportions they play well together. Okay, so without getting over-technical, my thought is that my low velocity 308 (300blk) and 45 boolits would benefit from a little hardness over plain lead. So, since I have this nice antimony should I just go ahead and add 1% to the lead? Should I acquire tin and use it also? And does water dropping temper all drops or just antimony alloyed drops? I haven't done any water drops yet. Does water dropping just artificially age the boolits that would otherwise just take time or does it get harder than natural aging would in a few weeks?

Where is a good source for scrap tin?

[Dusty Bannister]

This would be a good time to start your education and the LASC site has a great reference. This URL will be enough to help you find answers to a few of your questions. A good place to look for tin is usually found in the S&S section of this forum. You will find pewter ingots, solder and other necessary sources of tin.

I will urge you to pay particular attention to the safety suggestions in handling antimony as you will be warned that it is toxic and does require special handling to avoid health problems. Consider this the start of a rather lengthy educational process. But it is well worth the effort. Dusty

http://www.lasc.us/CastBulletAlloy.htm

[Drew P]

Thanks yes I was curious about the health issues although reading the wiki on antimony it didn't mention poisoning risks. They did mention flammability, explosivity, and use in medications which I thought was interesting. I'll read up on that link if my GF will let me. This subject has been eating up a little too much of my time in her opinion.

[gray wolf]

May I add:
Antimony in it's raw form takes a little bit of learning as to how to add it to your mix.
I do not believe you just drop it in and stir. If I recall it melts at a rather high Temp. I want to say 1100*F but do a check on it.
Anyhow I would check into the process.

[tazman]

Welcome to the insanity. Lots of good advice here for you. The search engine is your friend.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

Hugh Jasoule, welcome !
you've come to the right place.

So, If your block of antimony is truely pure...You should do some research on how to deal with it. I have a gut feeling, once you learn of it's difficulty, you may consider selling it or trading it for Linotype or other "type" metal that has a high antimony content but is still over 50% lead and blends with pure lead or other alloys much easier.

Here is a little info, see post #6
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?37734-How-to-melt-antimony&p=411980&viewfull=1#post411980

[Drew P]

Hugh Jasoule, welcome !
you've come to the right place.

So, If your block of antimony is truely pure...You should do some research on how to deal with it. I have a gut feeling, once you learn of it's difficulty, you may consider selling it or trading it for Linotype or other "type" metal that has a high antimony content but is still over 50% lead and blends with pure lead or other alloys much easier.

Here is a little info, see post #6
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?37734-How-to-melt-antimony&p=411980&viewfull=1#post411980

yeah I'm reading mixed reviews about alloying the pure form. Seems like its more about dissolving than melting. I guess I'll find out. Might need tin first.

would it be common practice for casters to own a hardness tester?

[Drew P]

One guy uses a propane torch to melt the antimony into a pot of molten lead. This sounds easy enough. Any objections?

Is is it possible to cast bars of antimony easily?

[Yodogsandman]

Welcome to the site!

I think you are overthinking getting the boolit alloys for starting out. Most just start out with melted clip on wheel weights or range scrap lead for general shooting. These have antimony and some tin already in them.

Tin can be easily had in the form of roll solder, bar solder and pewter.

[Dusty Bannister]

Thanks yes I was curious about the health issues although reading the wiki on antimony it didn't mention poisoning risks. They did mention flammability, explosivity, and use in medications which I thought was interesting. I'll read up on that link if my GF will let me. This subject has been eating up a little too much of my time in her opinion.

"In addition, antimony is extremely toxic, when handling it in a powdered form proper breathing protection and proper clean-up techniques of surrounding surfaces should be used."

This is taken right out of the text referred to on the LASC site.

[mongoose33]

"In addition, antimony is extremely toxic, when handling it in a powdered form proper breathing protection and proper clean-up techniques of surrounding surfaces should be used."

This is taken right out of the text referred to on the LASC site.

I'm not usually a "me, too" poster but this motion is one that's well worth a second.

*****************

IMO, new reloaders or casters should start with proven mixes and methods, and then experiment out from there. Get, or make, some Lyman #2 alloy (get is easier), and work with that. Then, once you can cast good boolits, and have learned how to lube them, and size them, and load and shoot them, and you get acceptable results, then branch out in other areas of learning.

When you have multiple variables all changing, it's much more difficult to pin down what's causing problems or producing sub-optimal results. The more variables, the more frustrating it can be. Suppose you can't drop acceptable boolits--is it the alloy, the temperature of the alloy, has the mold been properly cleaned, has it been smoked, is it the temperature of the mold, is your cadence acceptable, are you filling the mold in the wrong direction (explained below), what the heck is going on? And I haven't even hit on sizing and lubing.

In the OP's case, get some known Lyman #2, and work with that variable resolved. If you don't have a hardness tester, then you're guesstimating especially if you can't vet the actual composition of your alloy and its constituent parts.

So--if you can get a known alloy that you know is good, you've eliminated an explanation for what's wrong if things aren't going well. Then, once you've figured out how to cast good boolits you branch out into making your own alloy, experimenting with it, and so on. And if as you experiment with alloy things suddenly don't work, guess why? It's a lot easier to isolate variables if you do it this way.

****************

(filling mold in wrong direction) I was having trouble w/ a 6-cavity Lee mold. I'd start at the end, filling toward the handles. The boolits on the handle end of the mold weren't very good, and I couldn't figure out why. Some kind soul here (what a great site this is) noted that if I started at the handle end and moved toward outwards my problem would probably disappear.

And, it did. The explanation of "why" was that the handles draw off heat and the handle-end of the mold was cooling more before I filled it than the other end. Filling from the handles outward solved that problem.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

yeah I'm reading mixed reviews about alloying the pure form. Seems like its more about dissolving than melting. I guess I'll find out. Might need tin first.

would it be common practice for casters to own a hardness tester?
This is just a generalization of mine... While it is NOT common practice for casters to own a hardness tester, It surely is common practice for Casters who blend their own alloy to have a hardness tester...Or casters who plan on heat treating there alloy (that is why I bought a tester).


One guy uses a propane torch to melt the antimony into a pot of molten lead. This sounds easy enough. Any objections?

Is is it possible to cast bars of antimony easily?
I have never worked with pure antimony, the only knowledge I have is from reading about others dealing with it...Again, I'd recommend either selling/trading it...or stashing it away for the future, after you have more experience melting metal. Now if you have some experience in that, that you haven't mentioned, don't let me stop you from digging in and experimenting with it. If so, you'd surely want access to a hardness tester, the Lee kit is cheap and accurate, but a bit of a pain to use...looking through the tiny microscope. A holder or stand for that helps alot
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?169268-Lee-hardness-tester-stand&highlight=Hardness

[Drew P]

Nice idea with the kids microscope. Yeah lee tester looks to be 50$ so I guess I'll shell out for it soon. As far as melting metal, I'm a lifelong welder of lots of metals so I'm no stranger to it although that experience isn't as applicable to this arena as other but still, I like a challenge. As far as toxicity I've read quite a bit on it now and my conclusion is that handled like lead there isn't any need for concern about toxicity. Breathing dust seems like a bad idea, but that goes for most dusts doesn't it? Heck, I've probably ingested more of it as fire retardants than I will alloying. I need a method for alloying that does not produce dust.
Given the nature of powder coating the bullets I probably don't even need antimony, but it was an impulse purchase I suppose LOl

[Drew P]

Alright well I did successfully alloy the lead with pewter and some pure antimony. I simply melted the lead and added a pewter artifact from a garage sale, and this made approximately 2% tin solution. Then I placed the antimony in a clear plastic bag, and then in another bag, and used a chisel to knock off a chunk. The chunk and crumbles were collected in the bag and I simply added them to the melt. Took about 15 min of bobbing and stirring and it was all dissolved. Quite easy really. And no mess or powders or fume released, no torches or high temps either. In fact I don't think it ever got above 600°. Anyway I'll wait a few weeks and hardness test it now I suppose. Just need to devise a way to do that!