Streamlining Softnose Production

[BruceB]

I'm "tooling up" right now to cast some Lee 405 hollowbase softpoints. "Tooling up" requires some wire and an assortment of pistol cases to make dippers ...not very high tech, in other words.

A .40 S&W case holds about 180 grains of alloy, and a .45 ACP case holds about 280 grains. Being as the Lee hollowbase is a nose pour (of course!) the shank metal has to be poured first, and the .45 ACP case will be the dipper for the WW metal. This will leave a nominal 120 grains of volume to be filled with the pure lead, and I'll then use a different dipper for the pure lead. I may adjust things a bit to give slightly more room for the softer metal, but these will do for a first run, anyway.

Most of my "pure lead" is derived from soft 1/8"-thick lead sheeting. However, I do smelt the stick-ons separately from the normal WW, and save them for muzzle-loaders etc where they seem to work fine.

On the question about hardness of the shank compared to the soft nose, I refer y'all again to the thread last year on "Successful Casting of Softnose Bullets....". Just do a search for "softnose" and you'll find it.

Toward the end of that thread, I described a water-jug impact test. Note that the aircooled boolit expanded RIGHT DOWN TO THE BASEBAND, which seems to imply that the shank is definitely bearing its share of responsibility. Expansion was up into the .80" area from .416". The water-dropped boolit tested retained the gascheck and its original base diameter, but still carried 300-plus grains of metal (out of 365 to start with) all the way to the sixth jug. I elected to hunt with the aircooled model, but didn't get an opportunity to use it.

[BruceB]

I'm "tooling up" right now to cast some Lee 405 hollowbase softpoints. "Tooling up" requires some wire and an assortment of pistol cases to make dippers ...not very high tech, in other words.

A .40 S&W case holds about 180 grains of alloy, and a .45 ACP case holds about 280 grains. Being as the Lee hollowbase is a nose pour (of course!) the shank metal has to be poured first, and the .45 ACP case will be the dipper for the WW metal. This will leave a nominal 120 grains of volume to be filled with the pure lead, and I'll then use a different dipper for the pure lead. I may adjust things a bit to give slightly more room for the softer metal, but these will do for a first run, anyway.

Most of my "pure lead" is derived from soft 1/8"-thick lead sheeting. However, I do smelt the stick-ons separately from the normal WW, and save them for muzzle-loaders etc where they seem to work fine.

On the question about hardness of the shank compared to the soft nose, I refer y'all again to the thread last year on "Successful Casting of Softnose Bullets....". Just do a search for "softnose" and you'll find it.

Toward the end of that thread, I described a water-jug impact test. Note that the aircooled boolit expanded RIGHT DOWN TO THE BASEBAND, which seems to imply that the shank is definitely bearing its share of responsibility. Expansion was up into the .80" area from .416". The aircooled boolit tested lost the gascheck but still carried 300-plus grains of metal (out of 365 to start with) all the way to the sixth jug. I elected to hunt with the aircooled model, but didn't get an opportunity to use it.

[Old Ironsights]

I am so jazzed by this. I'm really looking forward to dropping .350 (65gr) round balls into my .358 molds - especially in the hollow points (though keeping the mold hot enough will be more problematic there).

Solids are nice, but I would really like my little .357s to grow just a bit on impact...

[BruceB]

This episode duplicates what DK17hmr described in his "Softpoints, Success!" thread of a short time ago. I'm glad he was also able to make the system work. The only thing I changed from DK's work is that I poured the pure-lead nose section from an ancient and much-deformed kitchen teaspoon, rather than using a pre-cast donor bullet. The reason for this is that it's essential that the cavity be full, and also that there be enough metal to overflow and form the sprue puddle.

These were both the first aluminum-mold softpoints I've made, and also the first nose-pour softpoints likewise. In DK's word, "success!"

I poured the wheelweight shank using a wire-handled .45 ACP case as a dipper. A trial weighing of JUST the shank came in at 270 grains, which allowed the fill-out of pure lead to be around 130 grains to complete the 400-grain boolit. As it turns out, the softpoints average approximately seven grains heavier than the same boolits in straight WW metal.

I found that the aluminum mould can be cycled a good bit faster than my iron moulds when making softpoints. Where the iron jobs really needed a good four or five minutes on the melt to recover back to maximum temperature, about 2.5 minutes seemed OK with the Lee HB mould. Rushing it any more than that gave me incomplete fill-out of the nose (pure-lead) area. Best to err on the side of allowing too much time, rather than not enough.

[BruceB]

- especially in the hollow points (though keeping the mold hot enough will be more problematic there).

Solids are nice, but I would really like my little .357s to grow just a bit on impact...

Yep, I'm trying to visualize just how we might keep things hot enough, long enough, to get the lead into the nose area without creating any voids due to too-fast freezing. It's already a big-enough problem, making hollowpoints when using just one alloy!

In this case, I believe that a flat-nosed softpoint without a hollowpoint might work just fine as-is. A hollowpoint in the pure lead might even make the nose area too fragile, although for handgun varminting etc, such fragility might be very useful.

Now you've got ME jazzed, because I wasn't actually considering doing anything with my handgun bullets re: softpointing. Your 65-grain donor ball sounds just right to me, in a 158 boolit. Incidentally, when I dropped room-temperature .30-180s into the HOT mould, it only took about five to ten seconds before they melted. I'd still recommend letting the freshly-molten lead heat up in the mould for at least a minute or two.

Dammit, I reckon it's time to start stacking up old newspapers again (for boolit testing)....it drives my wife nuts, having them piled all over the place.

[Topper]

Bruce,
What a great post.
I've played with submuging all but the upper portion of cast boolits in water and using a torch to soften the tip, but your technique definitely sounds like the best approach, since it removes the guess work.
Thanks

[BruceB]

Gracias for the kind words, Topper.

If anyone here should actually use one of their cast softpoints to bump-off some pore li'l innocent creature(s), PLEASE let us all know how it worked!

I put the word "streamlining" in the thread title, and looking back over the thread, and AFTER completing the juggling routine for today, something else occurred to me.

I was using the .45ACP case/dipper for the WW alloy, and also the aforementioned teaspoon clamped in a small vice-grip as a dipper for pure lead. What occurred to me, and what would have simplified the whole performance a great deal, is that I could have used the SAME .45 dipper for both alloys!

-the shank comprises about 2/3 of the weight, and

-an overflow of pure lead is needed to form the sprue, and

-using the .45 dipper after knocking any crud off of it on top of the pot would work perfectly, and satisfy all the requirements above!

Of course, for normal base-pour softpoints cast from a bottom pour pot, this is unnecessary, because the donor-boolit method works so well. However, we have a LOT of ladle casters here, and perhaps they should take note, especially if they plan on using nose-pour designs. (I still think the donor-pure-lead-bullet system is more elegant and accurate than using a dipper for both metals, however).

HEAT, Brethren, crank up the HEAT for softpoint success.....

[Old Ironsights]

Now you've got ME jazzed, because I wasn't actually considering doing anything with my handgun bullets re: softpointing. Your 65-grain donor ball sounds just right to me, in a 158 boolit.

RE: Pure Lead Ball Weight Per Caliber

.310 = 45 grains
.315 = 47 grains
.321 = 50 grains
.350 = 65 grains
.360 = 71 grains
.375 = 80 grains
.395 = 92 grains
.400 = 96 grains
.433 = 122 grains
.437 = 127 grains
.440 = 128 grains
.445 = 133 grains
.451 = 138 grains
.454 = 141 grains
.457 = 144 grains
.490 = 177 grains
.498 = 180 grains
.520 = 212 grains
.530 = 224 grains
.535 = 231 grains
.543 = 241 grains
.550 = 251 grains
.560 = 260 grains
.562 = 276 grains
.570 = 279 grains
.575 = 286 grains
.595 = 317 grains
.600 = 325 grains
.610 = 342 grains
.648 = 410 grains
.662 = 437 grains
.678 = 469 grains
.680 = 473 grains
.690 = 495 grains
.715 = 550 grains
.730 = 586 grains
.735 = 598 grains
.760 = 661 grains
.775 = 700 grains
.835 = 875 grains
.919 = 1167 grains
1.052 = 1750 grains

[eka]

Do you water drop or air cool the soft nose bullet?

Thanks,

Keith

[BruceB]

eka,

I tried it both ways with my first experimental boolits (.416 Rigby). In testing on water-filled plastic jugs, the water-dropped bullet clearly out-penetrated the aircooled bullet, but this was at muzzle velocity of 2100 fps.

Since longer-range impacts would be at lower velocity, I decided to take the aircooled bullets hunting. I was unable to persuade any critters to pose for the shot, so I still don't know about real-world performance. Both aircooled and waterdropped bullets expanded well and also retained plenty of weight.

I was quite confident in taking these cast softpoints after elk...I just wish I'd come up with one!

[Ricochet]

Everything old is new again! Back in the '70s, and maybe earlier, Lyman sold special order mould kits with a small mould to cast soft lead nose sections which were then inserted in the standard mould for filling up the base with harder alloy.

[44man]

Bruce, I guess I have to try it your way. I think a dipper would be easier then making other boolits to put in the mould. Speed is not important because not many boolits are needed for hunting. I will have to remove the bottom pour stuff so my mould will fit in the pot and figure how to keep it level until I pour the hard lead.

[BruceB]

Yep, the dipper works fine. The only real reason for not using a dipper (i.e.: with pre-cast "donor" boolits of pure lead) is just that there are fewer items to mess with while actually making the softnose bullets, and no need to keep a small pot of lead molten. Just preheat the mould in the melt, drop in the pure-lead donor bullet, keep the mould in the melt a couple more minutes, and fill it with the shank alloy. I had no particular trouble with the dipper, though. Everything stays liquid for so long, if the mould is preheated in the pot, that I don't think keeping it dead-level is too important. More-or-less level should work fine.

Ricochet, the big difference in making the bullets with my current system is that there is nothing to create a junction or weak spot in the finished bullet. When both the pure lead and the shank metal are at pouring temperature, a perfect union is achieved. The fault of the Lyman (and others') two-mould system is that the two parts would sometimes fail to stay together, because there IS a weaker area at the meeting-point between soft and hard.

Lyman was making similar moulds for casting softpoints 'way back in blackpowder days. The nose portions had a longish shank which was bigger at the rear than the front, which probably helped reduce incidents of separation. However, from looking at the designs, I suspect there were a lot of bullets cast with internal voids around that shank.

[versifier]

I had a very successful session of experimenting yesterday. The mould I was working with is the Lee C309-180. I have been experimenting the last few weeks with that mould and also the Lee 150FP, but I was using the 180 when everything came together and worked perfectly.

Background: Last week: First, I made a dipper of approximate volume using a .223 case. (I decapped, cut the case down, chamfered, deburred, then d&t'd it through the primer pocket for an 8-32 screw, & trimmed the screw to length. Then I mounted it on a piece of old hacksaw blade that I had ground the teeth off of, and fitted it with a wooden handle.)

I had a bunch of tape WW's that I melted down in the old Lee Precision Melter that I started out ladle casting with back when Moby Dick was a minnow. Then I filled my equally ancient Lyman Mould Master with WW's and got everything hot.
The .223 case was too thin to fill and pour conveniently. I cast up a few hundred 150gr boolits from the WW alloy and called it a night.

Back to the workbench: There is actually a use for AMERC brass! Dipper #2 was made the same way from a 45ACP case. I found it to still be difficult to pour with and clumsy. So I stopped experimenting and cast up a few hundred 180gr boolits out of the WW alloy and called it a night.

Back again to the workbench: I rummaged through my bag of odd brass and came up with a .30WSM case. I prepped it as before, except that I cut it off at an angle to make a pouring lip. I fired up both pots again and set the dipper and the aluminum 180gr mould in the pure lead (the temp on the pot was cranked up all the way). The first two attempts I was not patient enough and I was not heating the mould enough - you could see an obvious join line between the two different metals. BTW, they don't intermingle because they are of differing densities, the pure lead in the nose being more dense than the alloy of the base. It ended up taking about two minutes for the mould to come up to temperture, and three or four minutes before it had cooled enough to properly solidify the sprue. I let it air cool and cranked out some .358 wadcutters while I waited. By the time I had a few hundred wadcutters, I also had a few dozen soft nose boolits. I haven't tested them yet, but will probably have time to do it next week in water filled milk jugs and will report back with results then.

The two boolits on the left were cast with too cool a mould, the others had the mould at the proper temperture. The other shot is my WSM lead scoop. If I had been unsuccessful, next session I was going to try using some .36cal rb's, but this worked well so I don't think I'll bother.

Thank you BruceB!

[Nrut]

Bruce...I casted up a bunch of pure lead Lee soup cans and Lee 158gr/.357 bullets this weekend and tried your method...worked slick....

44man....
You have plenty of time to pour the base metal in after the pure lead is melted.....I used 400gr/.459 mold and a 213gr/.358 yesterday....one was floating on the pot melt with pure lead in the cav. while the other was cooling...mean while I was casting RDog 350gr./.460bullets...got tricky some times but worked once I got things good'n hot......
One thing I learned is in the larger dia. molds you should adjust your stream down some and pour between the cav. so as to help keep the pure lead and base metals from mixing as much.......

[eka]

I was thinking of using my RCBS dipper after getting it good and hot, drop a donor ball into it and float it on top of the melt in my bottom pour pot. When the donor ball is melted and good and hot, pour it into the mould and then top it off with the WW from the bottom pour. That seems easier than making small dippers and melting a second pot of pure lead. And like 44man said, you don't need very many of them. I'm thinking of using them in my 1894 .44 Mag. and my Model 94 .38-55 lever with the .38-55 group buy mould for whitetails this fall. Only thing, I'm still kicking around whether to air cool or water drop. Probably follow Bruce's lead and try the air cooled. Thanks Bruce for this neat thread and all the good info. that has followed.

Keith

[Nrut]

Well eka...I can testify you can use Lee 6 bangers to make softnose bullets.....Using my Lee 20# pot and the 38-55 GB mold I just made up 34 softnose bullets using pure lead Lee soup can bullets for the softnose part....At first I just used the end two cav., but soon found that you can use all six cav.........It'll be interesting to see how they perform on game.......

[waksupi]

Everything old is new again! Back in the '70s, and maybe earlier, Lyman sold special order mould kits with a small mould to cast soft lead nose sections which were then inserted in the standard mould for filling up the base with harder alloy.

And, if you look in Ned Robert's, The Muzzloading Caplock Rifle, you will see they were being made pre-1900!

[eka]

Good to hear you can use all six cavities. I was thinking about just using the end cavity, but now that you found all six to work, one can make short order of this task. No real need to throw out a whole bunch of these speciality bullets anyway.

[44man]

A few problems. I made a dipper and used two pots, one with pure and one hard. I would dip for the nose and put the mould into the pot until the nose just melted. Then I would pour the base. No parting line but the sprue took forever to cool. First thing I noticed was lead ran out of the vent lines and appeared on the side of the mold. Then, even if I tipped up the ladle and held it on the mould, the base did not fill out right. I also had speckles of lead on the nose and in the nose section of the mould. The back was frosted too far up the nose and not smooth and even. A hardness test showed the nose was the same hardness as the base. It looks to me that the alloys are mixing too much. The whole boolit is softer then my usual alloy. If I ran a little cooler, the parting line would come back but the nose would be shiny. I messed around for three hours with the same results.