Aluminum mold is giving me fits!

[Brother_Love]

Hey,
I am getting back into casting after about 24 years. I am getting new equipment and started with a Lee 2 cavity 44 mold. I followed the instructions with the mold and cast about 150 bullets and maybe 20 were good. I cleaned the mold again, lubed it again and smoked it this time. Still no luck.

Next I washed it in strong detergent, degreased with laquer thinner, re-lubed and re smoked, still no luck. I also have a new Lyman 429421 mold that cast great bullets after the first twenty.

I have been re-reading several copies of Handloader mag about bullet casting and then I noticed that none of the writers use aluminum molds. I do not know if there is a connection or not. I have read a number of threads on this site and know that many, many of you use the aluminum molds with great results.

I just cannot figure out what I am doing wrong. When I cast bullets 24 years ago, I used Lee molds and had great results. What's the chance of just getting a bad mold?

Thanks, Malcolm
PS: I just ordered 2 new RD molds today.

[Springfield]

Might help if you told us what was wrong with the bad bullets. Bad fillout, wrinkled, excessive frosting, finning.........

[FireCop203]

All of my molds are aluminum. I usually have a few bad ones starting out, but when the mold temperature gets to where it's supposed to be everything is fine.

[Brother_Love]

The main problem I have is wrinkling, it is slight but there. I thought that it might be oil in the mold but I have cleaned them really good. They are a little frosted too, but I think I can lower the lead temp a little to stop that.

Thanks for the help, Malcolm

[oneokie]

posted by Brother Love

mold again, lubed it again

degreased with laquer thinner, re-lubed and re smoked,
Are you lubing the mould while it is cold without boolits in the cavities?
What lube are you using?

Just a WAG, but you are contaminating the mould when you lube it. If the boolits are frosted with wrinkles---------------?
Clean the mould again, bring it up to temp by dipping or casting several boolits, then apply your lube sparingly, to the alignment pins and wedges. When lubing the tops of the blocks and bottom of the sprue plate, do so with the boolits still in the cavities, before opening the blocks. Apply the lube and then wipe the surfaces with a clean swab or cloth to remove any excess lube.

[Ben]

A double post.....my comments below.......

[Ben]

Did you mention if you are using bottom pour or a dipper ?

If there is still oil in the mold, you may want to get the mold hot and use a Q - tip dipped in denatured alcohol. Rub out the mold cavity halves well with the Q - tip and alcohol. If there is oil in the cav. , while the mold is hot, using this method should remove it.

Several treatments of this , re-soot with a Bic lighter when dry and it should cast well.

I'd like to know if you're using a dipper or bottom pour ?

Lubing the mold could be the problem, a millionth of a micro gram of lube inside the mold cavity and you've got the very problem that you describe.

Ben

[Junior1942]

Get thyself an old toothbrush and a bottle of rubbing alcohol, and scrub the oil out of that mold. Open the mold over the sink and pour on alcohol. Scrub. Repeat. New Lee molds are coated with what looks and feels like mineral oil. Then run a hot pot and cast a bunch of good bullets.

To lube Lee molds, I use NAPA spray graphite. And I don't get any inside the cavitys.

[Brother_Love]

Well, Cleaned it again. Let me show you what I got. In the phot of 4 bullets the discoloration is not wrinkles, don't know what it is though. THe fourth bullet has a damaged upper band, I think that happened when I dropped it from the mold. In the single bullet photo you can see the dis-coloration better.
Thanks for the help, Malcolm
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q225/revrun4/44_bullets_a.jpg
http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q225/revrun4/44_bullets_b.jpg

[454PB]

Welcome to the forum....

My additional comment is all the above, plus scrub the venting well. I've seen results like you describe when lube from the sprue cutter and alignment ribs slowly migrates to the venting and cooks on.

It's one of the reasons I don't lube my Lee moulds.

[Bass Ackward]

Malcolm,

I ain't ashamed to admit it, that's match quality stuff for me. That can be from your pot or the stuff you fluxed with too. Trial and error to eliminate it. Or you can just wait it out to see if it clears on it's own.

Glad you aren't grading me. :grin:

[shotman]

you said you have a 2 cav that needs to be run very fast to keep temp up on a AL mold the reason many cast with a steel mold is you dont have to hurry i have 2 singles in Lee and both are a pain to use the 6 cav is a brezze to use after you get it to temp. Try to run at max temp on lead shotman

[cuzinbruce]

About the discoloration, I think that might be the metal you are casting with. Everything I cast comes out silvery, filled out or not, wrinkles or not, frosted or not.
Did you flux and skim before casting? Has that metal mix worked better with other molds?
Only place it could come from is the mold or the metal and if you have the mold scrubbed good, I don't know what else it could be.

[Cloudpeak]

I think the discoloration is dirt. Do you render WW's in a different pot from the one you cast from? If not, you should.

Dirt/sand/crud will stick on the bottom and sides of both your smelting pot and casting pot. Every so often, I use a wire brush on my cordless drill to clean up my pots. My cast iron smelting pot collects quite a bit of crud. My Lee bottom pour, much less so.

When rendering WW's, be sure to scrape the sides and bottom to remove loose grit. I use my steel clip strainer and a wood paint mixing stick as I stir in my flux (candle wax).

Cloudpeak

[docone31]

I once melted my wheel weights in my Lee Pot. It worked well, but, I had to scrape the sides of the pot, the spout from the inside while the wheel weight was melted. A lot of crap came out and poped onto the top of the melt.
It looks like the discolour is a need to stir the mix. The frosting is ok, lube sticks to it pretty well, and the velocity of lead is not so high frosting really matters.
I would cast a bunch, throw them back in, cast more, untill the batch evens out. Sometimes I do that.
My castings do shine. It looks like you have some zinc in the melt and it is blended in. No biggee unless the casting comes out small. It is a pistol round.
You might try a melt, and turn down the temp untill you get a clump floating in the top.
Mostly, it looks like a good stirring in needed. I use a thin, large screwdriver to stir with. The lead doesn't stick to the blade much and comes right off. Scrape the corners inside the mold, the inner spout and valve. You might be suprised at what floats up. I got lots of large dark chunks of dross even from ingoting outside the pot.

[leftiye]

Shoot 'em! Them's purty enuf!

That stuff on the one booit is oxides it looks like to me. Like B.A. said - look into your fluxing. Research it some, there's a lot of good threads here about fluxing. Are you using a bottom pour pot? If so try leaving a layer of crushed charcoal on top of your melt to keep oxygen off of the metal, and alwaYs stir with a stick (hardwood dowel works fine).

[runfiverun]

that is dirt and the black dust from ww's
it reminds me of brake dust, you gotta clean your melt better.

other than that that is exactly how i like my boolits to look.
grey with a bit-o'-shine underneath.

but that is just plain old dirty lead.

[HeavyMetal]

I'ver gotten that discoloration by using Marvlux but it could also be dirty metal.

If your using Marvlux stop and try boolit lube or beeswax as a flux, I prefer beeswax. Check the pot and make sure you don't have any Marvlux still stuck to the sides or floating on top.

Flux the alloy real good and use a wooden dowel to stir then try casting!

[GP100man]

Brother love
hello & welcome to the madness!!!!
i use parafin wax or wax from the left over smelly candles & stir stir stir , dirty WW i mite even flux 2-4 times & still wind up with dirt in the bottom of the smelter
on another note i`d try a different batch of alloy & see if it still shows up .
maybe a bit of tin will help ????
i`d change batches first though.

GP100man:cbpour:

[gon2shoot]

Looks ta me like you got a litttle trash in your mix, course I'm old and blind so I'd shootem.
You get out what you put in, you'll learn as you go along.

[GP100man]

brother love
i tried to email you about pics of the sc 358156 but message was undeliverable ????

GP100man:cbpour:

[MtGun44]

Nothing wrong with frosty boolits.

Looks like a bit of dirt, stir with a wooden stick (outside!) to help clean
the metal.

Unless you are trying to win the Olympics, shoot a bunch and see if the
'no dirt' ones shoot any different than the 'dirty' ones. My bet is no
diff, but I have not run the experiment cause I don't care that much. :-D

Bill

[Cherokee]

Welcome !! You got lots of good comments so: That bullet looks good except for some dirt that got thru the smelting process. I'ed shoot the boolet and flux/clean the melt better next time.