Casting lead shot into bullets

[bpimwheel]

Hello,
New on this forum. I have been shotgun and rifle reloading for a long time but have recently decided to start casting my own bullets. Finding correct lead alloy seems to be a problem in my area without purchasing it.
My question is can I use lead shot from shotgun shells to recast into rifle bullets?
Is it the correct or near correct alloy?
If this can be done is there anything special I should know about the process?
Thanks in advance for any help that is offered.

[rancher1913]

depends on type of shot. some shot does not melt well.

its far easier to offer shot for sale here and then buy ingots here. several vendor sponsors sell lead for a buck a pound and ship anywhere a flat rate box goes.

you dont give a location so its hard to answer exact.

[avogunner]

The short answer is yes, lead shot can make good bullets. A couple of years ago I was able to scrounge a couple hundred pounds of VERY oxidized reclaimed lead shot. It was mined from a local trap field years ago and left out in the weather in an open barrel so it was heavily crusted with oxidation. Anyway, for alloy purposes, I assumed it was a 50/50 mixture of chilled and "magnum" shot (for hardness) and I added 1lb of 63/37 solder per 25-30lb of shot for "castibility" (is that a real word?). I got a very fine casting alloy of about 12-13bhn (according to my Lee hardness tester). It was a PAIN to smelt though because of the oxidation but worth it for the fine rifle bullets (boolits) I could make from it.
I'm also a trap/skeet shooter and my lead for reloading 12/20/28 gauges is worth far more to me as shot than boolits. I would recommend using the good vendors here on this site who can provide some good, clean COWW or range lead a lot less expensively than using $40+ bags of shot.

Semper Fi!

[Tatume]

Some shot contains arsenic, the fumes of which are toxic.

[Rcmaveric]

Some shot contains arsenic, the fumes of which are toxic.

Clip on wheel weights have the similar amount of arsenic and everyone on this forum is okay and alive. So it can be assumed safe or my self and many others would have gotten sick ages ago.

I would keep the shot as pot sweetener for range scraps and pure. Depending shot type you can have high amounts of Antimony. Plus its the only alloy i know of that has arsenic if you want that for heat treating or making more shot.

[Tatume]

To my knowledge there is very little arsenic in wheel weights (around 0.1%, compared to maybe 3% antimony).

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?304042-Arsenic-percentage

[lightman]

I have not cast with reclaimed shot but I just helped a buddy smelt about 400# that he recently scored. It was oxidized and was about the slowest type of lead that I have melted to date. My pot full of wheel weights takes about 20-25 minutes to go from a cold pot to fluxing. This shot took about 70 minutes.

[trapper9260]

The short answer is yes, lead shot can make good bullets. A couple of years ago I was able to scrounge a couple hundred pounds of VERY oxidized reclaimed lead shot. It was mined from a local trap field years ago and left out in the weather in an open barrel so it was heavily crusted with oxidation. Anyway, for alloy purposes, I assumed it was a 50/50 mixture of chilled and "magnum" shot (for hardness) and I added 1lb of 63/37 solder per 25-30lb of shot for "castibility" (is that a real word?). I got a very fine casting alloy of about 12-13bhn (according to my Lee hardness tester). It was a PAIN to smelt though because of the oxidation but worth it for the fine rifle bullets (boolits) I could make from it.
I'm also a trap/skeet shooter and my lead for reloading 12/20/28 gauges is worth far more to me as shot than boolits. I would recommend using the good vendors here on this site who can provide some good, clean COWW or range lead a lot less expensively than using $40+ bags of shot.

Semper Fi!

I was at Cablas today and seen that the shot is going for $42+ for a bag.That is up about $3 from the last time I was in there earlyer this year.If your shot is good I would save it for shotgun or sell it and do like some stated.

[bpimwheel]

Thanks everyone for the great replies. Although I must admit most of what was said is over my head. I was hoping to use some #9 lead shot I have to make bullets directly without mixing anything in with it as getting the correct mixes of metals seems to be difficult for me to understand. What alloy of lead can be used for making rifle bullets? Im looking to cast some lyman 314299 bullets for my 1891 Argentine Calvary Carbine. How should I go about it?

Thanks for any help.

[RogerDat]

Swapping and selling forum here you can buy good casting lead for $1 a pound. Shot runs around $1.80 a pound. So melting the shot to cast with makes little sense. $42 for a 25# bag of shot picked up at Cabela's more if shipped or $63 for a 50# box of COWW lead delivered. Prices are +/- a bit but generally about that price. Throw in a little solder or pewter for tin and you can make 1,300 255 grain 45 cast bullets. Or 2,200 158 grain 38/357 cast bullets. Taking apart shot shells or using shot is just throwing money away.

Shot has a hard shell so it melts like a pot of M&M's. All melted on the inside but unless you crush them open the shell keeps it from becoming a pot of molten material for casting. Even white corroded shot can be brought back by washing in a bucket with stiff dose of Lime Away. Then re-coating dried shot with some powdered graphite. I have a plastic bin with 12# of shot in the back of the car rolling around to smooth it and coat it with graphite. Pretty much going to be good as new, might have lost a tiny amount of weight in dissolving the oxides and washing them off. The shot sliding around in the bin sounds like ice in a cooler sloshing.

[bpimwheel]

Swapping and selling forum here you can buy good casting lead for $1 a pound. Shot runs around $1.80 a pound. So melting the shot to cast with makes little sense. $42 for a 25# bag of shot picked up at Cabela's more if shipped or $63 for a 50# box of COWW lead delivered. Prices are +/- a bit but generally about that price. Throw in a little solder or pewter for tin and you can make 1,300 255 grain 45 cast bullets. Or 2,200 158 grain 38/357 cast bullets. Taking apart shot shells or using shot is just throwing money away.

Shot has a hard shell so it melts like a pot of M&M's. All melted on the inside but unless you crush them open the shell keeps it from becoming a pot of molten material for casting. Even white corroded shot can be brought back by washing in a bucket with stiff dose of Lime Away. Then re-coating dried shot with some powdered graphite. I have a plastic bin with 12# of shot in the back of the car rolling around to smooth it and coat it with graphite. Pretty much going to be good as new, might have lost a tiny amount of weight in dissolving the oxides and washing them off. The shot sliding around in the bin sounds like ice in a cooler sloshing.

Now THIS I can understand. So as you are saying, I just purchase a bunch of COWW throw in a little solder and start making bullets? What are COWW's? How much solder and what kind?
Nope - still having a hard time understanding this alloy mixing thing. Doesnt anyone sell (economically) pre-made lead for bullet casting? I dont want to become a metallurgist just to cast bullet to go and shoot. My real interest is shooting my old and antique rifles and getting the best accuracy out of them that is possible.

Again all help is appreciated

[RogerDat]

Rotometals, link at the top of the page, they are a site sponsor and the link takes you right to their bullet making alloys. Foundry pure costs more but you can know exactly what the alloy is. What you need for an alloy very much depends on what you are going to make bullets for. Muzzle loaders need soft pure lead. Revolvers can range from soft lead with 5% tin (20:1 alloy is what it is sold as) to something a bit harder for higher velocities or bullets for 357 magnum or 44 mag. On to some pretty tough alloy for 30-06 or other 30 caliber and similar rifles.

So you have to start with what you are loading for and how hard you plan to push the velocity. The two main ingredients typically added to lead are Antimony (Sb) which makes lead harder even at small percentages, and Tin (Sn) which helps lead flow into the mold and adds a small bit of hardness. Lead Clip on Wheel Weights (COWW's) are lead with ~2% - 3% Sb so moderately hard lead that can be used for most common cartridges if the bullet has good fit and proper lube for the situation. Also COWW's can be purchased fairly cheap used from tire stores or scrap yards in states that still allow lead WW's. High availability, high versatility in uses means lots of recipes for COWW's. Adding between 1% and 2% Sn makes the lead flow well and form crisp edges in the mold. You can cast something that will work for most uses with COWW's and some tin solder. Not the best for everything but can be made to work for most calibers.

So your real question is "What are some good lead alloy recipes to cast ___________ caliber bullets that weigh _______ grains, I want to push them at ___________ feet per sec."

The answers will tell you what you need to purchase for lead alloy. The whole reason for different recipes is too soft will leave lead in the rifling, pretty soon you are shooting a smooth bore and have a lot of work to clean the lead out. Too hard and the pressure of the powder charge won't be able to swell the bullet so you won't get a snug fit (obturation). A bullet like a marshmallow being hit on one end will bulge outward and grip the rifling, a golf ball being harder not so much. Feet per second can be expressed as "plinking loads" "hot loads" "150 yard deer load" "50 yard or less pig load" You get the idea, your loading manual probably provides a fps for a load but the use intended works almost as well for getting lead alloy recipes suggested by people that make bullets in your caliber. Some calibers and bullets are a lot easier to cast and load successfully, some require pushing the envelope a bit. Generally better to start with what folks suggest as an easy caliber/mold. The revolvers, especially 38/357 or 45 colt are my suggestion as good first bullets. Round ball for muzzle loading or C&B revolver is also very easy and those have gotten pricey so another good candidate.

If I were you I would purchase either S&S forum (about 1/2 the cost) or commercial foundry so you don't have to tackle getting known "good" lead in addition to working out how to do the casting part. I haunt tire stores and scrap yards and over time have learned something about what is "good" and what isn't. But it is an additional learning curve.

A lot of COWW's these days are zinc or steel, waste of money can't use them. Being able to look at a couple handfuls from a bucket and decide good or bad deal takes a bit of practice. Then turning them into usable ingots is its own process. People in S&S or vendor forum do it better than I do and are almost as cheap as DIY when you factor in running around looking, and propane to smelt and time. Some lead items are high in tin (solders) or antimony or both, some are known to be almost pure soft lead (x-ray shielding is one). Just getting started I would avoid the whole make scrap into good ingots to cast with and just get a bullet casing lead recipe for what you want to load and buy the ingredients. Come back to making clean ingots from scrap later if you want. Some people only buy foundry, some like me never do. Some buy foundry alloys to "sweeten" scrap lead for special uses.

PS. You can also post a WTB (Wanted to Buy) in the Swapping & Selling forum (S&S) to get some cast lead bullets of a style you might want to make, ask the mold and alloy, are they sized and to what. Then give them a try. Like them, then buy the mold and use the same recipe for lead alloy and sizing. Don't like them or firearm no likes then you just saved the cost of mold. I found the right size and style of bullet for an old 303 Enfield thanks to some bullets from members.

[Mr_Sheesh]

Clip on wheel wights contain Antimony, not Arsenic.

[RogerDat]

A tiny fraction of a percent of Arsenic is in COWW's I believe it acts as a flow agent or helps them harden. In shot tower arsenic helps dropped molten lead maintain round shape as it falls through the air and solidifies. In both cases I think it is a small amount but I think it is an ingredient that even in small amounts has an impact on the alloy. Arsenic is a key factor in water dropping cast bullets to harden them. Arsenic has an outsized impact on the grain/crystal structure of the lead when quenched. I recall reading that without it the water dropping wouldn't work or worked poorly in some manner.

Yes COWW's contain Antimony. A few percent to make them hard, possibly so they can have the curved shape to fit the wheel. Stick on WW's are soft lead and they don't have the narrow curved shape. So maybe.... just speculating but they added it for a reason. It costs money so it serves a purpose or they wouldn't do it.

[toallmy]

You can keep it simple if you like by starting a post asking if a member would sell you a small box of clean C.O.W.W . To get you started , this will give you around 25 pounds of clean usable alloy to get started . You don't need to over complicate it to get started . Let us know how your coming along .

[lightman]

According to BNE's XFR test clip on weights do contain arsenic. Less than 1% but its there.

Clip on weights usually make pretty good bullets as is. Cast a few and see how they shoot. Some casters add 1 or 2% tin to help with fill out. Mixing alloy is not really difficult. Shot will probably need some tin added also.

[Wag]

While it's true you don't have to be a metallurgist to do this well, it's like anything else: The more you know the better results you're going to get. As always, you have to know what your usage is which gives you a starting point. You say you want to cast for a rifle which is a good starting line but you need to post up more details. What rifle are you talking about? Once you know that and the forum knows that, you can get a lot more help.

I do like the idea of buying the alloys you want from someone who knows how to create it. The idea of buying from RotoMetals is a great idea, too. They have a great reputation and you likely will not go wrong, once you know what you're looking for. This will really simplify the process for you.

Keep learning, though. Again, the more you know, the better your cast boolits will be.

--Wag--

[TaylorS]

I’ve used shot to harden my alloy and it worked well enough that was before I had tin to make it pour easily. I don’t think I’d try it as a stand alone alloy because of the lack of tin


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[bpimwheel]

Thanks everyone for the great information. Especially ROGERDAT. You are a real wealth of knowledge.
I think to begin with Ill take your advice and go the purchase lead to make bullets route.

I live in Concord, CA and see that Rotometals is about a 1/2 hrs drive from me (San Leandro, CA). Their price does seem rather high though, $3 per lb for lead. But I guess you get what you pay for if the knowledge is lacking to make it. May see what I can find here on Castboolits S&S. May or may not be as good an alloy as Rotometals but appears to be about 1/3 the price.

I see Rotometals has many different alloys of lead. In my reading from Lyman's Cast Bullet book it appears that Lyman #2 alloy is the blend of choice for what I want to shoot. That being my 1891 Argentine Carbine Mauser, 7.65x53mm, shooting paper targets at 50 and 100 yards.

Is there a better choice of alloy or is that the one to get? What about straight COWWs to make these bullets. I see some of that being sold here for about $1 per lb plus shipping. Any ideas on which is the better to purchase?

Slugged the barrel of my 1891 Arg Loewe Carbine last night and if Im reading my dial calipers correctly it measures out to .313 to .3135. Hard to be exact as I dont have a micrometer to measure with. Anyway the Lyman 314299 is supposed to make a bullet with diameter of .314.

Again thank you all for the great information and getting me started in the right direction.

[toallmy]

If I lived a half hour from Rotometals I would already be back home with a chunk of Lyman # 2 in the pot heating up .:happy dance: either will work fine .

[RogerDat]

COWW at $1 a pound will do most anything you want. The small amount of tin just makes the alloy a bit better and easier to work with. Roll of lead free solder pull off a foot and add to the pot. Maybe two foot. Some will be good, a bit more will be better. Any greater percentage of tin than the 2 or 3 percent antimony is just wasted.

I make home mixed Lyman #2 for use in 8mm Mauser or 303 British as alloys go it is nice to cast with and makes a good rifle bullet for those uses. Not required to use that rich of an alloy but it will certainly give good results. Another option is buy some COWW at $1 a pound in S&S forum then pick up some Lyman #2 at Rotometals. Mix the two in equal amounts to make a small 50/50 batch. Cast with it and if it works ok then you have the option to save money by using the inexpensive COWW's to cut the expense of the Lyman #2 in half. Pretty sure you can run a good load for punching paper at 50 to 100 yards using that 50/50 or plain COWW's + 2% tin from solder. Equally sure you will be good with straight Lyman #2 alloy from Rotometals.

Main thing is to start so you can make specific mistakes. Then you can post question about why is this specific thing happening. Get some suggestions, then re-melt the mistakes and try the suggestions. Can't make progress until you begin. Like learning to ski, just plan on doing some face plants and start down the hill.

[WRideout]

Roger is correct. COWW will generally always work. Any more, I like my boolits to be a little softer than COWW, so I generally use 50/50 COWW and reclaimed range lead from the backstop. I generally add a little tin for good fillout, but that is optional. If I were you, I would buy or trade for some COWW ingots from members here, and use that to start. You could also trade for some boolits that are already done, and see how they work in your carbine.

I used to have an Argentine Mod 91 sporter that was fun to shoot, but traded it for a Savage 99. The mod. 91 did well with bullets that were relatively heavy for diameter.

Wayne

[rsrocket1]

I've been using almost exclusively reclaimed shot for my handgun and rifle bullet casting. I get the shot for $25/bag which is $1/#. Better than just about any price I can find locally unless someone is demolishing a doctor's office and removing lead sheets from the walls of the X-ray room. No, I haven't run across that gold mine either.

I melt the shot in my Lee 4-20 casting pot immediately before casting. The only downside is having to stir and scoop the graphite off the surface of the melted lead.

The handgun bullet work fine for my target shooting at 10 yards and can get me ~1" at 100 yards with my 788 in 0.308

I tend to cast at 675-700F which gives me good fill out and keeps the bottom pour spout from freezing.

https://images.imgbox.com/e1/d2/5TnbsTme_o.jpg

https://images2.imgbox.com/0d/85/KdJt9bwS_o.jpg

https://images2.imgbox.com/40/e5/TyLEf93W_o.jpg

top targets are 0.308. Bottom are .223 and 22LR

https://images3.imgbox.com/5f/28/5JdbJtEz_o.jpg

[bpimwheel]

Again thank you all very much for all of the information.
For now I believe I will go the purchase of COWW ingots or Lyman#2 alloy and start casting.
Want to get some experience doing this. Im sure actual working experience will bring more questions of which I will need answers to.
Again Thank you all very much.