Naphtali, sir;
I haven't tried it with a nose-pour mould as yet. There is a Hoch 430-grain .459" nose-pour mould here, so it'll get done at some point.
The only difference, as far as I can see, is that instead of a dipper to measure pure lead for a nose, you'd need a dipper to measure the harder alloy for the shanko f the bullet. Then the mould gets topped-up with the softer material. Should work out just fine.
Please let us know how it works out for you, if you try it.
Regards from BruceB in Nevada
"The .30'06 is never a mistake." - Colonel Townsend Whelen
I cast twenty softnose 452424's yesterday, you are right about it taking time. I used a .375 swaged round ball for the nose portion. With a weight of approximately 81 grains, the soft nose comes to just above the SWC shoulder.
One word of advice, when using a precast bullet or ball for the nose make sure they are clean; you can't flux in the mold. The first 14 that I cast I used speer balls from a plastic box, the nose come out mostly dark, with a few shiny streaks.
Then I cast four Hornady's from an open box, not good, the nose looked tan almost like sand in color, and there were visible flaws in the joint. As I was waiting for the last two noses to melt I popped the nose off of all four with hand pressure.
None of the balls I utilized looked dirty or corroded, just a very dark gray color. As close as I can remember the Hornady's are probably 7 years old and the Speers six or so.
The next time I cast softnoses I will use two pots so I can flux both types of metal.
All in all, I am impressed by how easy it is to make these softnoses. Thanks Bruce.
Robert
Last edited by Mk42gunner; 11-26-2007 at 08:34 PM. Reason: to correct non-operational keys.
Hi, I'm a new guy here but you folks have really got my interest here...... Has anyone killed game with this type of bullet... If so what was the wound like and did you find the bullet? I use a Siamese mauser in a 45-70 to hunt with at times but when I took a white tail with it the cast bullet left an exit hole just about the same size of the bullet... I was still a large hole but not what I expected.... I'm going to have to try this soft nose style... MM
Mauserman,
I have taken deer with softpointed boolits out of a .348 winchester and they work extremely well, almost too well as the amount of tissue damage is impressive. I have gone back to using plain air cooled wheel weight for hunting boolits. Both deer I shot with soft pointed bullets were shot facing me, impact at the base of the neck, left a fist sized hole where the soft point blew up and then the bases continued on and were found in the back of the hindquarters. Pictures of the recovered boolits are posted in the cast boolit hunting page, under ".348 get another one"
Jerry
This may be a dumb question, but how well would it work to drop a .32 call ball into a round nose 45 cal mould and casting the harder shank over it ?
TexRebel
"A nation which can prefer disgrace to danger is prepared for a master, and deserves one."
Alexander Hamilton
Bruceb,
Yer a genius. Thanks.
Cat
Cogito, ergo armatum sum.
(I think, therefore I'm armed.)
I'm a little late getting in here with these comments but I am with robertbank.
Many years ago I cast 500 gr. Lyman round nose for .45-70 in my Siamese Mauser with the Ross Seyfried method of 2 dippers - soft lead for the nose in one pot and wheelweights for the body in the other pot. I found it worked very well and if there was any mixing it was minimal - and the joints were good. I haven't used any for hunting but did shoot some into end grain fir and sand. They mushroomed impressively and didn't come apart. These were loaded to Hornady 500 gr. "J" bullet loads for the Siamese Mauser.
Having said that the .45 cal 500 gr. boolit is substantial and may be easier to cast like this than say a .30 cal.
Have been reading with great interest. I use an '06 almost exclusively for whitetails and have been asking questions about this very subject. Thanks for all the info, wc
I’m not sure about how possible some of the things you mention would be, but there is one setting that may interest you, if you haven’t seen it already
Well, this popped up again and I thought I had reposted.
As previously mentioned, I had good success with the two dipper method for large boolits but decided to try it this time with .30 cal. ~ not so good! The joints were very obvious and fusion was poor no matter how hot I cast.
I have to assume that the larger boolits just have enough more lead mass and heat that the two parts fuse together but it wasn't going to happen for me with the .30 cal. mould.
So, the BruceB method is the way to go to be sure of what you get.
Longbow
Lloyd hit it dead center, just like the Nosler Partition, the work is done once that nose shears off. I've used them on many game animals & they flat work (sixguns)
Dick
A while back I undertook a project where I designed a "Special Soft-Pointing Tool."
For a while I was using the method's described on this thread and I was really pleased with the results.
The only down side for me was that It took me such a long time to make up a batch of soft-points. What made it worth while to do was the fact that they really work very well for their intended use and when I did take the time to make up a batch of soft-points I made it a point to make alot of them.
This way it only had to be done once in a while.
Anyway, I piddled around with my "Soft-Point-Tool" idea until I came up with a working model and I haven't looked back. I can now make Soft-Points at about the same rate as I do when I cast plain lead bullets.
I'm presently waiting for my new CAD software to arrive but, when it does I'll try to post some images.
In the mean time, here's the link to this entire process I posted in the Special Projects section.
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=65379
HollowPoint
Bruce,
I am very interested in trying your technique for softpoints, but I have a possible adaptation to your technique that I was wondering if you've ever tried:
Instead of placing the mold in the melt to remelt the lead, have you ever tried setting it on a hotplate or gas burner until it melts? It would seems that this would allow the boolit to stay upright while cooling ensuring that all of the soft material stays level and on the bottom of the cavity (correct me if I'm wrong, but to dip the mold in the melt, it must be tipped into the pot)?
Are there any potential issues that you could anticipate with this method?
Last edited by wtfooptimax200; 01-07-2012 at 10:30 PM.
what about casting a hard boolit then drilling it strait through then put it back in the mold and fill with pure lead add a gas check and shoot
I make 12 ga lyman slugs then drill strait through and fill with hot glue. expansion is awesome
drilling strait is no problem. a jig of angle iron locked down to a small drill press works great. the only problems I encountered was it takes many slugs to find the center. and if drilling too fast the bit will become clogged.
the good part is that the slug being lighter flies faster and flatter recoil is much less punishing
I've read about this type of thing before. I thought I would try it but instead of trying to pour two alloys at a time I would pour a bunch of boolits of pure lead. Then cut the noses off. place the noses back in the molds, then pour the harder alloy on top. trying to keep a good puddle on the sprue plate.
Then set the mold on a hot plate to remelt the boolit, watching the puddle to see it melt, then let it cool.
Leo
BP | Bronze Point | IMR | Improved Military Rifle | PTD | Pointed |
BR | Bench Rest | M | Magnum | RN | Round Nose |
BT | Boat Tail | PL | Power-Lokt | SP | Soft Point |
C | Compressed Charge | PR | Primer | SPCL | Soft Point "Core-Lokt" |
HP | Hollow Point | PSPCL | Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" | C.O.L. | Cartridge Overall Length |
PSP | Pointed Soft Point | Spz | Spitzer Point | SBT | Spitzer Boat Tail |
LRN | Lead Round Nose | LWC | Lead Wad Cutter | LSWC | Lead Semi Wad Cutter |
GC | Gas Check |