Bigger Ladle + Better Boolits

[parson48]

I've been casting for a couple of years, using the infamous Lee Ladle. Never was satisfied with it, but as little as I cast I thought that I'd just live with it.

But while shopping with the wife this past week (good husband that I am), I spied a small stainless ladle in the housewares dept. of the local Target store.

Brought it home, bent it a little bit in the vise, just enough to form a spout of sorts; and this morning I melted a little lead to try it out.

After getting everything good and hot, I poured 20 boolits in my Lee .358 mold, and did not have a single reject!

I would guess that the higher volume of lead gives better fill-out, but whatever the cause for the improvement, I am happy with the results.

By the way, the ladle was less than 5 bucks.
parson48

[longbow]

I have used an open plumber's ladle for almost 40 years and would take it over anything else on the market. I have tried Lee and Lyman ladles, bottom pour pots and whatever else people recommended. I never found anything that worked as well as the ladle for me.

Longbow

[GLynn41]

+++me too ladle all the way

[mooman76]

I still use the Lee ladle and do fine with it for the most part. It could be a little bigger though or they could even make a second size ladle. I have noticed though if you lave a good size puddle of lead on the sprue as apposed to trying to leave a small one you get better fill out at the base and fewer rejects.

[HORNET]

The capacity of the Lee ladle is marginal at best for many of the larger boolits. I believe that it even cools off between the lead pot and the mold.It does work well for stirring and skimming though.. With a bigger ladle, you can let the sprue overflow a bit after the cavity is full to maintain a hot puddle of melt for the alloy in the cavity to draw from as it shrinks. Helps avoid shrinkage voids on those BIG slugs.

[anachronism]

The LEE ladle is the worlds greatest pot scraper. It is perfect for that. I feel it fails miserably as a ladle, though.

[no34570]

The LEE ladle is the worlds greatest pot scraper. It is perfect for that. I feel it fails miserably as a ladle, though.

Yep,thats all it's good for,I have used bottom pours and Lymans ladle,but I use a plumbers ladle too and very few rejects.

no34570

[gon2shoot]

I used an ice cream scoop for a long time, till someone told me it wouldnt work.

[Rockydog]

For you guys that use a big ladle or plumbers ladle. Can you describe your technique? Do you hold the mold cavity verticle and bring the ladle to it or do you place both at an angle toughing the ladle lip to the sprue hole and rotate thme to verticle together? Or???? RD

[SciFiJim]

Like the OP, I use a soup ladle with a pour spout bent into the lip. I don't fill the ladle, I dip enough lead to fill the mold and a little extra. I rest the mold handles on the lip of the pot with the mold over the melt. The distance of the pour from ladle to mold is an inch or less. I can hold the mold at a slight angle with the far cavity slightly higher than the nearest cavity. I start pouring the far cavity, as it fills the run off starts running toward the next cavity. I then shift the pour to that cavity and continue this until all cavities are filled and a generous sprue is poured. It take much longer to tell about it than do. A four cavity mold is filled in about five or six seconds. Also, if you barely tilt it to the side the extra will run back into the pot. I tend to gets the molds too hot though, and have to let them cool some between pours.

[longbow]

When I cast, I rend to tilt the mould a little towards the ladle when I start to pour and I pour tangentially into the sprue cutter so the lead swirls its way into the mould. Never really had any problems this way.

Also, I use a large ladle and I leep it full so sit it on the molten lead in the pot between pours. Works well for large cavity moulds like shotgun slugs but I use it to cast .30 cal and .44 too.

Longbow

[Wayne Smith]

For you guys that use a big ladle or plumbers ladle. Can you describe your technique? Do you hold the mold cavity verticle and bring the ladle to it or do you place both at an angle toughing the ladle lip to the sprue hole and rotate thme to verticle together? Or???? RD

Both. If the boolits are running fine I'll just pour, if I'm getting poor base fill out I'll pressure pour - hold the mold horizontally and tip ladle and mold together. The bigger the boolit the more likely I'll be pressure pouring. I'm not sure but I think everything over about 500gr I pressure pour.

[Leadforbrains]

I use an RCBS ladle with good results.

[woodsie57]

Been using an old anteek silver gravy ladle, bent to form [sorta] a spout. Like it. Hope it doesn't melt

[anachronism]

I just use a Lyman ladle, modified for left-hand use.

[DLCTEX]

On the rare occasions I use a ladle I use a RCBS and dip it almost full, place the spout of the mold just touching the sprue plate and quickly tip the ladle so that the surface of the melt rises above the spout hole in an effort to keep any oxides or trash floating on the melt from entering the spout. I believe I get better quality boolits this way.

[Wayne Smith]

The Rowell, Lyman, and RCBS all draw from the bottom of the ladle, not off the top. This minimizes the junk in the boolit.

[Beau Cassidy]

I have gone to exclusively ladle casting after using bottom pour for years. I went to the ladel after trying for an hour of more to cast some large Saeco bullets. Worked great from the word go and gave better filled out bullets.

[dolang1]

I've never had this before, but I think it's called ladle envy. Later Don

[parson48]

Some of those ice cream scoops look pretty good. I almost bought one of those, but opted for the small stainless gravy ladle.

parson48

[putteral]

On my 6 cavity molds I use a soup ladle with a 3/16" hole drilled in the side near the top. Gives me a nice stream. On my 1&2 cavity molds I still use the Lee ladle. Both work for me.
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