I know I'll probably get a lot of different opinions on this, but I figured it couldn't hurt to ask.
According to Lee's reloading book, one should cast their bullets to a certain hardness, for a given load and the pressure it produces. So that the bullet is soft enough to obturate and grab the rifeling for accuracy and seal off the gasses, but that it's also not too soft so that the gasses cut the bullet and/or the bullet skips the rifleing, leading the barrel and reducing accuracy both ways.
Using wheel weights, I get about 12bhn air cooled, and 21 bhn water quenched, measured using lees hardness tester.
So according to their pressure/bhn chart, 21bhn is technically not hard enough for most .357mag, 9mm, .40S&W loads.
Yet I also hear this advice quite often: "air cooled wheel weights for most pistol loads, and water quenched wheel weights for rifle loads"
Which advice do I follow? I haven't done enough testing either way to be able to conclude for myself.