SOWW and COWW - Melted Together

[Cast10]

New guy here, so don’t hurt me!

Has anyone melted the two together and used for boolits. It seems the averages are 96 COWW and maybe 98 SOWW. I know I have many different brands and have browsed the data here, but was just wondering. My thought was to melt down WW and add whatever I need for my boolits/hardness. I had planned on melting and keeping separate, but was just wondering. Thanks.

[USSR]

Since SOWW's are essentially pure lead, you are talking about 50/50 COWW/Pure, which is a commonly used alloy when some tin is added to it. However, melt them separately into ingots and create your alloy in your pot when you're ready to cast.

Don

[Stewbaby]

And you mentioned the ‘96’ and ‘98’… Do you lead alloy by weight not quantity or number of items.

[Cast10]

Just studying some stickies on XrF data.......

[P Flados]

Coww is getting more valuable all of the time as there is less and less readily available hard lead on the scrap market.

Unless you have a really large quantity, I recommend you start trying to source more for your lead stash the moment you find your first "happy load" with boolits.

If you find a regular source that is as hard as you need (some range lead is pretty good), smile. More likely you will find sources that are pure or near pure.

If you are loading for mild guns (38 Sp for example) or if you are using powder coat in a typical gun, you can probably blend as low as 10% Coww in with pure and get good resuilts.

[40-82 hiker]

As stated previously, I recommend you separate your COWW and SOWW. Keeping them separate will give you better adaptability to your needs later.

[Winger Ed.]

I'd do them into ingots separately.

Depending on what alloys you want, its easier to measure and add the proportion of the harder clip ones as needed.

[Cast10]

Thanks. I’ll keep them separate.

[lightman]

I keep mine separated but a lot of casters mix it 50-50 and add a little tin. This will stretch out your clip-on weights if they are hard to find in your area.

[farmbif]

you can always add ingot of clip on weights to an ingot of stick ons. but separating them once melted together is like trying to unring a bell.

[GasGuzzler]

Plus SOWW is more likely to have "weird" ingredients. Zn and Fe COWW is easier to cull than some of the creative stuff they put in SOWW now. I keep them separate until time to cast.

[ioon44]

I always melt them together and add mono type to get the bullet weight I want.

[fredj338]

since soww's are essentially pure lead, you are talking about 50/50 coww/pure, which is a commonly used alloy when some tin is added to it. However, melt them separately into ingots and create your alloy in your pot when you're ready to cast.

Don

^^this^^

[Cucumbermonkey]

Last batch I did I cast the SOWW into separate ingots. When I tested them with pencil method compared to COWW ingot I didnt get any difference. Dont know if that has to do with the rate a large ingot cools. Maybe if I cast it into a bullet and it cooled quicker it would be a noticeable difference? Since I use snips testing every WW I do notice that the little painted ones seem a lot harder than the dull grey ones which are super soft. Could there just be a very wide variation in BHN of SOWW and I happened to get a ratio that averaged out to about the same as COWW?