Water quenching question

[Newcast]

I'll be using hardball lead (92-2-6) and don't have a hardness tester. Hardball is listed as 16bhn on rotometals so I choose a cheaper option of mixing pure lead with linotype 50/50 to make the hardball. I will mix them in a bottom pour pot, mix, flux, and cast.

When the boolits cast then dropped in water will they instantly go to 16bhn or will they go up to 20 something?

Will water quenched boolits age harden?

About how long will it take a Hardball lead alloy to aircool to 16bhn?

Thanks for taking time to answer a few questions from a new guy. Any help and advice will be greatly appreciated.

[Yodogsandman]

Instantly, quenching will only cool your boolit rapidly and have the same or very close BHN as the alloy was mixed for. It will certainly age harden if it contains antimony. Any small trace amount of arsenic will enhance it even further. I can't answer what it will come out to. It depends on the temperature of the boolit entering the water and the temperature of the water. It will vary depending on mold temp and how long it takes to dump the boolits in the water. Oven heat treating will produce less variation in the final BHN.

The more antimony in the alloy, the faster the boolit will reach hardness after quenching. That hardness will vary slightly for many years but, will be close to it's full BHN potential after just a few days. Be sure to size your boolits ASAP. Within one day at most. After that, they get very hard!

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

[blikseme300]

Newcast,

What mold/caliber are you casting and for what use? Hard cast is typically not needed for proper functioning and can be counter-productive if casting for hunting for example.

[Bigslug]

Three things:

1. Click on the sticky at the top of this sub-forum titled "From Ingot to Target", by Glen Fryxell, and read lots.

2. Get Veral Smith's book "Jacketed Performance with Cast Bullets"

You will learn MUCH from both.

3. Go to the "Lead and Lead Alloys" sub-forum and click on the sticky for "Lead alloy calculators". Dowloading the offerings there will allow you to at least figure out your baseline hardness for various combinations of air-cooling.

My big question in reading your post is "what are you planning to do?" Hardball seems like kind of an inefficient alloy to use straight up. If you mix it 50/50 with straight lead, you end up with something very close to clip-on wheelweight, which starts about 12BHN air cooled, can be water-quenched pretty easily to low-mid 20's for BHN, and even harder for those that oven-treat. There are not a lot of casting problems that mix doesn't solve, though bringing the total amount of tin back up to about 2.5% can help mold fillout dramatically.

[popper]

Hardball is probably good for rifle targets AC. Don't need any harder for pistol either. I oven heat treat for better control but I only use 4% Sb + a tad of As for 308W @2700. Quenched will be pretty close to final hardness in a couple days, size early. I've started using AC isocore for the PB boolits in BO, works good, ~2k fps, ~ hardball/pure 50/50.

[Newcast]

Lee 2 cavity 452230tc mold for 45acp until i get the hang of things, mostly plinking. I must admit this lee mold is different from the ones I've seen from years ago, has two pins at the bottom and looks like some good venting. Does have a few burrs but I'm not complaining.
The lead alloy calculator won't work on my phone, computer crashed so guess I'm outta luck on that one. From ingot to target is a good read and I'll look for the other book bigslug recommended, never read that one.
The reason I choose to use hardball is it was the cheaper option, been looking for ww for 6 months around here and come up with nothing so I just bit the bullet and ordered from rotometals, 35.00 for 10 lbs just to get my feet wet. 5lbs pure and 5lbs lino. Just off the math in my head I didn't want to cut the lino down any more and loose too much tin.
Well, the pot, mold, lead, and everything else I ordered for this project just showed up so I've got some prepping to do then check back shortly, and thanks guys.

[popper]

3:1 pure/lino should give 3% Sb, 1% sn, Pb. about the same I use for 40 which is higher pressure load. Should be fine for 45 ACP.

[Yodogsandman]

Newcast, I agree with popper above. I've read that the 45ACP will eat just about any lead alloy that you feed it. Mine seems to, with no complaints. I'd try for maybe 10 BHN with it. That 230 gr TC mold is a good choice!

Just an idea, go dig up some range berms and get some range scrap for free. Add a little tin, say 3-4 oz to a 20 lb pot, and you're probably "good to go" in your 45ACP.

[ShooterAZ]

3/1 Pure to Lino is also what I use in both pistol & rifle. I actually get mine from Isotope Cores, which are 1/3/96 and super clean metal. This alloy closely approximates WW. If I need a little harder I WD them, but 95% of the time I don't.

[Forrest r]

For what it's worth.
linotype is 4% tin 12% antimony 19bhn
hardball alloy is 2% tin 6% antimony 16bhn
isotope cores is 1% tin 3% antimony 11bhn

Those #'s are from the lead calculator they are telling you to use.

Allot of caster have excellent results with 50/50 coww's and pure lead in their 45acp's. Clip on wheel weights are:
.5% tin 3% antimony .25% arsenic 12bhn

If I put .25% tin 1.5% antimony .125% arsenic in the alloy calculator for a custom alloy (50/50 coww & pure) it comes out 10bhn.

good luck

[fredj338]

3:1 pure/lino should give 3% Sb, 1% sn, Pb. about the same I use for 40 which is higher pressure load. Should be fine for 45 ACP.
Even 4-1 will give a good alloy for 45acp; low pressure, low vel, you could almost shoot pure lead, almost.

[fredj338]

3/1 Pure to Lino is also what I use in both pistol & rifle. I actually get mine from Isotope Cores, which are 1/3/96 and super clean metal. This alloy closely approximates WW. If I need a little harder I WD them, but 95% of the time I don't.
You get those cores local? I am going to be in Tuscon first of April for the IDPA state match. I would love to bring some home.

[Newcast]

Thanks guys. I made a small batch of 50/50 lino and pure, I'll make another at 3:1 maybe tomorrow. It got dark so I had to stop for the evening. Turned out really good for my first time and they weighed around 226 grains +/- .3gr so I'm very pleased.

[ShooterAZ]

You get those cores local? I am going to be in Tuscon first of April for the IDPA state match. I would love to bring some home.

No, I got them from a guy in Swappin' & Selling named Hammerlane. I bought a BUNCH of them from him over the years, have enough to last a long time. I haven't seen him selling them lately, not sure if the supply dried up or if he may have been affected by the new rules. It's super clean alloy, don't even need to flux it much, and casts great.

[Handgunr]

Newcast,
I've water quenched bullets for many years now. As I have a large supply of WW's, I use them most often. I batch melt them from WW's to ingots, so my alloy ratio remains pretty consistent. Most air cooled WW's range around 9BHN. I have an LBT hardness tester that I've used for years, and bought it when they were first introduced. It has shown that the WW mix has remained fairly consistent as well. What I've found is that when I water quench WW alloy, those air cooled numbers of 9BHN, then climb to around 14BHN. I've had stored bullets that I've tested years later and they've maybe dropped a point or two.....12-13BHN. So, water quenching for a given alloy can, and does, aid well when a bit more hardness can cover different applications. Changing alloys can as well, but often times quenching can expand a regularly used alloy to encompass, or expand it's uses.......

[John Hill]

Newcast,
I've water quenched bullets for many years now. As I have a large supply of WW's, I use them most often. I batch melt them from WW's to ingots, so my alloy ratio remains pretty consistent. Most air cooled WW's range around 9BHN. I have an LBT hardness tester that I've used for years, and bought it when they were first introduced. It has shown that the WW mix has remained fairly consistent as well. What I've found is that when I water quench WW alloy, those air cooled numbers of 9BHN, then climb to around 14BHN. I've had stored bullets that I've tested years later and they've maybe dropped a point or two.....12-13BHN. So, water quenching for a given alloy can, and does, aid well when a bit more hardness can cover different applications. Changing alloys can as well, but often times quenching can expand a regularly used alloy to encompass, or expand it's uses.......


Handgunr
You just answered the question that I was about to ask. My WW mix is mostly clip on WW with "some" pure soft tape on WW. I didn't know whether to water quench or purchase linotype and add it to the mix.
Thanks
John

[Handgunr]

John,
Actually WW's cover a lot of area for what they are. I sort the softer (pure) lead out for shotgun slugs and black powder rounds as I want the WW's to be as straight as I can get them. With an old plumber's furnace I melt down everything in ingots specific as to what they are, then I blend them later if I want. I have a bunch of old linotype bars from a printer, and pure lead sheeting from an old hospital X-ray lab, so I have a bunch of different directions to go if I want.

Forgot to ask John.......do you have a hardness tester ?

[Handgunr]

John,
Just attaching a photo of my LBT hardness tester that I've had for years & years to give you an idea. If I remember correctly, it shows me testing a water quenched round made from straight WW's. i also have a Saeco tester, but I don't use it as often as the LBT.

163352

Bob

[John Hill]

John,
Actually WW's cover a lot of area for what they are. I sort the softer (pure) lead out for shotgun slugs and black powder rounds as I want the WW's to be as straight as I can get them. With an old plumber's furnace I melt down everything in ingots specific as to what they are, then I blend them later if I want. I have a bunch of old linotype bars from a printer, and pure lead sheeting from an old hospital X-ray lab, so I have a bunch of different directions to go if I want.

Forgot to ask John.......do you have a hardness tester ?

Handgunr
I have a modern Lee Hardness Testing Kit. I got it after I mixed my soft WW with my clip on WW. What you say that you do is what I did not do when I got 15 gallons of mixed wheel weights. I sorted out all the steel and zink and simply mixed all the lead together. My mix is about 9 BHN. I want to get this mix up higher. All that I load for is 38 sp. and 45 ACP so I don't need magnum boolits or high power rifle boolits. I would like to be a little harder, that's all.
John

[Handgunr]

John,
By segregating my lead I keep them separate (as to their own groups), so I can control a mix later if I need to. I mark them on the back of the ingots as WW's, Lino, Pure Lead(PL), Babbit, etc. It's just the way I do it.....no right, no wrong. My straight air cooled WW bullets run at 9 BHN on my LBT hardness tester, but if I water quench them straight from the mold, after a day or two they rise to 14-15 BHN.

I cast them at a rate so that there is just a slight frost on them before dropping them in water. I have a 5 gal. pail of water that sits between my legs as I cast about 2/3's full of water. I hang a smaller plastic bucket that's drilled full of holes, inside the big one and I submerge that about 80% so that the bullets catch in it. I cut the handle in half on the small bucket and bent the handles on both sides to catch on the edges of the bigger one. In between pot fills, and until the temp stabilizes, I pull the bullet catch up out of the water and let the water drain out before dumping them on folded towels.............then I start again.

Bob