QC Please - My First Casting

[Razorbak]

So I did my first round of casting tonight. Took awhile to get some good drops.....well I thought I got some good drops until I went through them. Lee 326-124-RN. 50/50 mix SOWW, COWW, pot around 675-700. All feedback welcome. Thanks guys/gals

My QC piles - left side good, right side no-go
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From my good pile. Not sure about the middle one.
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Pulls from my no-go pile. I got a lot of drops with a spot in the lube grooves. Is there a way to improve this?
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[Grmps]

Looks like your mold is not clean. I'd re-clean the molds (dawn dish soap , alcohol , white gas ...) using an old tooth brush or Q-tips. You shouldn't have to smoke a clean mold but sometimes a little smoke helps clean things up. Casing temp looks good for aluminum mold. Are you dipping the corner of the mold in the lead to warm it up until the lead doesn't stick? that can help to. A couple ounces of tin helps but that doesn't seem to be your problem. If this doesn't help post again and someone will help brain storm your problem .

[Yodogsandman]

Not bad...not bad for your first casts. Welcome to the forum!

Your mold is too cold or it has remnants of machining oils in the cavities. If they're for pistol shooting I'd just shoot them up. Sometimes it takes a few cycles with a mold to start dropping good boolits. I clean a new mold with alcohol and paper towels and Q-tips. Heat up the mold by casting in fast cadence for the first 50-60 boolits. Just plan to throw them back in the pot. When they start to frost over, you can slow down. Also, if you wait just a hair more, for the lead to "set" before moving the sprue plate, the bases will cut off cleaner.

Your photos show just what we all experience with a new mold. A few more heat cycles and you'll cast like a pro!

[BNE]

Not bad for a first session!

I think you need to have your mold or pot temperature hotter. That will remove the drip lines.
They will look frosty if you get too hot.

The deep pits in the bottom are because you cut the sprue off too soon. It takes a consistent cadence to get consistent Bullets.

But for a first session, you did fine. They will shoot fine also.

BNE

[Eddie17]

Running to cold, bump up the temperature!

[CASTER OF LEAD]

Welcome to the addiction Razorbak. Those look pretty good for first attempts. +1 on upping the temperature, and re cleaning your mold. This craft/hobby/passion, is more addictive than any drug known to man IMHO. You been warned. Lol - CASTER

[Razorbak]

Thanks everyone, nice to know those are shootable. I stuck it in the pot but never really came out clean. Guess that's the first sign that its not hot enough.

I'll reclean the mold, bump the pot to 750-800, heat mold till it doesn't stick. round 2 tomorrow night

[Razorbak]

addictive is right. buy a pistol, think to self "rounds are $$ I can save some money, I'll reload! oh wait I can save (shoot) more if I cast!" 400 lbs of WW's later......Just 6000 more reloads and I'll break even.....maybe hahaha

[Yodogsandman]

addictive is right. buy a pistol, think to self "rounds are $$ I can save some money, I'll reload! oh wait I can save (shoot) more if I cast!" 400 lbs of WW's later......Just 6000 more reloads and I'll break even.....maybe hahaha

Not quite but, you'll enjoy it all the much more!

A pot temperature of 725*F is hot enough for 50/50 alloy, many might go down to 700*F. The hotter you run the pot the more your tin will oxidize from the alloy. The optimum mold temperature is about 350-400*F +/-. Use the melt and cadence to keep your mold hot.

[wv109323]

I would try 700-725 for temp.
I would clean mold.
I would pre-heat mold on hot plate. Getting the mold to temp. avoids a lot of casting and rejects.
I would get the molten lead in the mold as quick as possible.
If your good bullets came near the end of your session then your mold was getting to proper temp.

[Phlier]

Heya, Razorbak,

I'm a new guy, too. Cast my first bullets about a month ago, using the same mold you're using. In addition to the tips the guys above have mentioned, there's one more thing for you to look at... Measure the diameter of the boolits. It's pretty common with six cavity molds to have concentricity problems. Until I got it figured out, I would often find a boolit that measured .357 at it's narrowest, and .363 at it's widest.

Two tips to prevent this: 1. Make sure you don't hold/touch/look at the sprue handle while casting. Just use the two mold handles to keep the mold closed. 2. Do not loosen your firmly held grip that's keeping the mold closed until you've cut the sprue plate. Relaxing the pressure that's keeping the mold closed (especially when you're casting with a hot mold) while you're waiting for the sprue to cool off can cause concentricity issues.

One other thing that I did when I got my new Lee six cavity mold, was to throw away the instructions. If you follow the good advice the guys above me have given, you'll have much better luck than following Lee's rather bad instructions. Especially regarding mold lubrication.

Oh, speaking of mold lubrication, I don't think that's been touched on yet. Go to the store and get some two-cycle motor oil. Very, Very, *Very* sparingly use it to lube your mold, while you wait for your order of Bullplate sprue lube to arrive from: http://noebulletmolds.com/NV/product_info.php?cPath=85&products_id=726. Make sure you order the sprue plate lube on that page, and not the other type of sprue plate lube that NOE sells. You want the one from the link, and only that one. :) Make sure you don't allow the oil to propagate down to the mold cavities, or it will cause wrinkled boolits.

One other thing regarding mold temperature... The Lee six cavity molds (especially the one that you and I are using) like to run hot. I bought a 35 buck infrared thermometer and a 20 buck hot plate. I heat the mold on the hot plate (using medium heat setting... you don't want to warp your mold) until I get a thermal thermometer reading of 415F. My mold starts throwing good bullets at that temp, and starts to turn out frosty bullets at 440F or so. Lead temperature will vary that range a bit, but IMO, 415F is a good starting place for our molds. I run my lead pot at 725 degrees, and those mold temps work well for me.

This mold temperature range will translate to around a six second count from the time the last cavity is filled until the sprue plate frosts over. After the sprue plate frosts over, I'll do a five second count before opening the sprue plate (again, holding the mold firmly closed the entire time!). This ensures a good sprue cut that won't tear the center out of the boolit base. Sometimes I'll have to wait a bit longer if the mold is really toasty.

Wow, this post turned out to be much longer than I intended...

One last thing... promise. ;)

As I'm sure you're aware, your mold is a tumble lube design. I have had great results using 45/45/10 lube with our boolits. Here's the main thread on it: http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?67654Tumble-Lubing-Made-Easy-amp-Mess-Free (http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?67654-Tumble-Lubing-Made-Easy-amp-Mess-Free)

Have fun!

Edit: I realized that I just assumed you're using the six cavity version...

[Grmps]

On This site you will find a lot of good information http://www.lasc.us/. I do most of my casting between 675 and 700. +1 on You get over 725 and the heat starts messing with the alloys in the lead. Pouring to far to the mold can do that also.

"I would pre-heat mold on hot plate. Getting the mold to temp. avoids a lot of casting and rejects." Be careful with hot plates, they are very useful BUT can easily get to hot and damage the mold, I use a 1/4 inch steel plate on my hot plate to protect the hot plate and disperse the heat mot evenly (some of the guys use saw blades). I run mine between low and medium getting a temperature of 385ish.

Fluxing the lead before casting will help incorporate the tin into the melt and improve mold fill out it will also help "clean" the lead.

near the upper right of the page is a search box, you can find answers to many of your questions from this forum (I use it all the time)

[Razorbak]

Thanks for all the tips everyone! Got the pot to a solid 700, cleaned and heated the mold real good. 2nd batch turned out great. 350'ish cast in about 45 min.
90
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Recap - Lee 356-124 - weighted a bunch of them on a FA DS-750 - all around 129.6 to 130.8 (couple of heavy and lite ones) Next came the caliper. I would take one measurement then spin it 90 for a 2nd. Seems that I have a lot of oval shaped rounds. ?????? - The goal is to drop and shoot without sending them through a sizer one at a time.
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[Yodogsandman]

If that's your goal, I'd say to try them out that way with a good tumble lube.

[JeffG]

Like others have noted, 715-725 is plenty hot for the alloy. The mold needs more heat. Keep a consistent cadence and don't stop to inspect, and pour a generous sprue so you help get more heat in the mold. Small bullets generally require a quicker cadence than larger ones. Personally, I start a count in my head, from the time I finish the pour until I see the sprue flash over or set, give it another second or 2 and cut smoothly. Whatever that cound is, say 5 seconds, start running at that cadence. Once you start getting a little frosting when the bullets drop out of the mold, you know you are at a good mold temp. Now keep a good cadence.


Thanks everyone, nice to know those are shootable. I stuck it in the pot but never really came out clean. Guess that's the first sign that its not hot enough.

I'll reclean the mold, bump the pot to 750-800, heat mold till it doesn't stick. round 2 tomorrow night

[scottfire1957]

Do a test, if you have not already melted the culls. Load equal numbers of each, shoot them for groups, tell us which is better! Or worse, your preference.

[odfairfaxsub]

Lee molds are known for being out of round but sizing the helps make more concentric pistol bullets. I love my 6 gang 9mm, 45 acp, yada yada molds even though they're out of round. If you get into powder coat then those lines on your bullets mean almost nothing

[jsn]

Are all cavities producing exactly the same boolits--weights and out of round?

On your out of round boolits--can you tell where the parting line is on the boolit pictured in relation to the marker line you drew? Also, it looks like you might be measuring right on the bottom of the boolit--do you have the same out of round further up the boolit towards the nose?

I would take a magnifying glass and closely inspect the interior surfaces of the mold, looking for burrs, lead splatters or anything else that might be slightly holding the mold open. Being out of round .003" could be indicative of something holding the mold open enough to get oblong boolits without any flash at the parting lines.

[gwpercle]

Casting is part art , science and black magic . You don't just pick up a mould and start producing perfect boolits every cast. There is a lot of stuff to learn. Don't get discourged , don't give up.
Keep doing just what your doing, posting photo's , asking questions and learning.
When I start I set the pot at 750 , as I cast and start seeing slightly frosty boolits I dial it back to 725, after more casting I might go down to 710. I have always had better results casting on the warm side.
For your first casting session , those boolits pretty good . The second session showed even better.
Looks like you getting the hang of this.
Running your boolits through a sizer will round them out.
Gary