I have been reloading factory bullets for decades but with current events what they are I decided it may be time to start casting my own boolits. When I started researching the process the one concept, I was having a problem with was hardness. Say for example I have a 50lb ball of casting material from a combination of WW, battery post, lead pipe, etc. all melted together. If I test it and it is softer than what is recommended what do I put in it to increase the BH, where is it obtained and not knowing the makeup of the casting material how do I know the amount to add.
I plan on loading .38 special wadcutters at very mild velocities but I also plan on loading .44 Mag, Keith Style boolits to hunting velocities out of my Ruger SBH Hunter and don't want to lead the barrel.
I am sure these are elementary questions to most of the folks here, but we all have to learn somewhere.