Ball milling lead shot?

[Plane340]

I have a ball mill that I use to make black powder. I cast 60 cal. musket balls to use in this ball mill. I have never been too finiky about the quality of my mill balls because they were not for use in a fire arm. However, I noticed that the imperfections in the lead balls is beat out very quickly. I got to wondering if a person could drop lead shot into the mill and just let it run with the shot only, if imperfections of the shot would be removed. Has anyone tried something like this before? If so, I would love to hear how it went.

[rancher1913]

I use a tumbler to apply graphite to the homemade shot and like you hoped that it would help with some of the imperfections of homemade shot, short answer for me is yes. it does not work as well as the lead balls but i do notice a difference.

[Plane340]

How long do you tumble it with graphite. Also, what is the purpose of the graphite? So that it flows better maybe?

[jsizemore]

I rotary tumble my buckshot to remove the sprue nub and polish. It doesn't help with accuracy. Tumble 2-4 hours. 2 hours gets rid of most of the nub and 4 gets to a high shine.

[beagle]

I'm doing the same thing in an RCBS Sidewinder tumbler. Buckshot and a dash of graphite and let it run as long as you can stand the noise and it removes the sprue and they shine like glass.

Your idea is worth a try./beagle


I rotary tumble my buckshot to remove the sprue nub and polish. It doesn't help with accuracy. Tumble 2-4 hours. 2 hours gets rid of most of the nub and 4 gets to a high shine.