New to casting ball and conical.

[icebones]

Been shooting bp for years now but I just found a new hobby-casting round balls for a flintlock and conical bullets for a cap n ball. I was planning on getting lead wheel weights for my casting. Any tips and pointers? Anything about fluxing, cooling the bullets, heating the mold ect?

 

[denster]

Forget the lead wheelweights. They make fine bullets for modern guns but you need dead soft lead for muzzle loaders.

 

[icebones]

Any cheap (or free) source of soft lead then? I though you could skim off the tin and antimony (and impurities) after the lead was molten.

 

[denster]

Skimming won't remove the tin and antimony to any great degree. Soft lead, cheap is a relative term you have to keep your eyes open for deals. I bought 20 packs of decoy weights from Wal-Mart on clearance at the end of hunting season last year. That was 100lbs of lead for .20 a pound. Some of the guys may chime in here with sources.

 

[higene]

Wheelweights?

I do cast for center fire and BP. I can understand why it is important to cast REAL bullets and conicals with soft lead. The question that I have is why is why is it an issue with PRBs? As I understand it the patch engages the rifling. I have always thought that the main benefit of soft lead is that it easily displaces on impact giving a more dynamic hunting load (like a psuedo HP). Clarification on this point would be greatly appreciated.

Higene

 

[denster]

If you are loading a tight patch/ball combination, and you should be, the soft lead ball will start and load very much easier.

 

[arcticap]

Smoothbore shooters often use a ball that's .020 under bore size and an extra thick patch will compress more easily. So loading harder balls with them shouldn't make as much of a difference.
But rifling can impart some marks on to the soft lead ball right through the patch as it is compressed.

 

[MCgunner]

Only place I see that soft lead is needed is in minie balls. The skirt must expand. I cast conicals for revolvers of range scrap and have done it from wheel weights and I've never had a problem with 'em. They're accurate and load just fine.

I AM going to get me a harness tester one of these days.

 

[Bluehawk]

Same here...I've even used linotype for patched round balls with a good fit in the barrel...never any problems. The ball never engages the rifling so it doesn't matter what you make the round ball from ...haven't tried steel ball bearings...yet!
The problem you could run into is if you ever need to remove a stuck ball...thats where pure lead balls would be easier to remove with a stuck ball remover...other than that... use what ya got!

 

[denster]

Bullets made of wheelweights will shoot out of a revolver and a patched roundball rifle. I know I tried them. Went back to pure lead because the wheelweight bullets were harder to load and accuracy was, well, indifferent. They do have one thing going for them they are cheap. That's my experience YMMV.

 

[Mike OTDP]

Stick with pure lead. Scrap dealers can help, or try Ebay (believe it or not). You can get lead for $1/lb, less if you buy in bulk.

 

[Skinny 1950]

I don't know if they still make flashing for vents on roofs but I know it shows up in scrap yards but it is dirty. Seems to be nearly pure lead.

 

[jimrbto]

If the price of your wheel weight lead is right- use it, just remember to adjust your patch thickness to compensate for the slight difference in ball diameter and to make loading easier. Then range check the loads
Use only pure lead in a C&B revolver

 

[denster]

Skinny1950: That flashing is good stuff if you can get it cleans right up when you melt it and flux it.

 

[wittzo]

I got a nearly full 5-gallon bucket of various wheel weights from a large local tire shop for free nearly a couple of years ago. I did some research on the lead content of wheelweights. The more common clip-on weights are about 95% lead with antimony and tin and other metals making up the rest. They would be good for making roundballs for a smoothbore gun or bullets for reloading cartridges. They might be too hard for a cap and ball revolver, I could tell a difference in loading them up compared to pure lead.

The stick on ribbon weights are about 98% pure lead, they can be used for anything blackpowder related, but they're too soft to use for cartridge reloading.

Out of nearly 100 lbs of free wheel weights, I ended up with 15-20 lbs of iron or zinc wheelweights, both in clip-on or stick-on ribbon variety. Scrap them. If your lead's not too hot to melt the zinc, they'll float on top, but watch out for the zinc melting. If it does, that batch of lead is ruined. I spend some time sorting through the wheel weights before I cast bullets. Lead clip-ons in one bucket, nearly pure ribbon weights in one bucket, and a bucket for the scrap weights. Most of the time, the zinc or iron WW's are marked with Zn or Fe, but a lot aren't. A magnet will help determine the iron ones. The zinc WW's aren't flexible like lead weights.

The last time I had to buy the bucket of wheelweights; $50 for 160 lbs. I've gone through a gallon of them and already scrapped a lot of non-lead weights, but it's still less than a dollar a lb.

I've bought a good chunk of lead on ebay. Some sellers even throw in free shipping and it works out to be anywhere from $1 to $3 a lb, which is about what lead sells for. None of the scrap yards around here sell lead to individuals. Sometimes it's in small pieces, like diving weights and one was in a large 25 lb chunk that used to be some sort of motor bracket or something. It took more than a half hour to turn to putty on my Coleman stove so I could cast it into ingots.

There's also RotoMetals, where you can get pure lead ingots for as little as $1.99 a lb. If you order enough, you get free shipping. http://www.rotometals.com/product-p/leadingotpure.htm

 

[Hellgate]

Hard lead balls in the revolver may lead to bending the rammer if forced too hard. Also the ball hits the forcing cone harder. could be a problem with brass framed Colts where the arbor could get pulled loose from the frame.

 

[icebones]

Thanks, I got my molds in today and I scraped togeather some old sinkers i wasnt planning on using, and got a decent fire going outside with some charcoal. I got about 25 .490 balls for my old flintlock, they aint prurdy, but its a smoothbore and i dont think it will care one bit. I got another mold for my 1858 remmington that casts conical bullets, and I was planning on getting a bit more expirence with casting before I try to tackle those. Would one of those portable plug in stoves get hot enough to melt lead? Im talking about the kind that look like a regular electric stove top, but the plug in portable kind, my wifes 7 months pregnant and I dont want to be anywhere near her while casting. After I finished with the last batch I washed down like I had got sprayed with VX. Clothes in a trash bag, washed my hands, you name it. Any tips for portable stoves?

 

[Chasing Crow]

Pure soft lead for round balls without a doubt

 

[arcticap]

Would one of those portable plug in stoves get hot enough to melt lead? Im talking about the kind that look like a regular electric stove top, but the plug in portable kind,

I bought one of those at a yard sale because some folks said that they use them for casting. I checked to make sure that it puts out a lot of watts (1650) hoping to insure that it will work because they may not all have the same output. But I haven't cast with it yet.
Folks use a variety of gas camp stoves, propane burners. cooking units and Lee electric pots.

 

[OYE]

Getting the metal hot enough seems to be one of the main issues for quality bullets.
You'll figure it out soon enough.

 

[MCgunner]

Any tips for portable stoves?

For 50 bucks (not real sure what they go for now, bought mine 30 years ago) get a Lee bottom pour lead pot. Once you get the rheostat set, always the perfect temp. Just set it up and plug it in and come back to it in 20 or 30 minutes. Put the mold on top of the pot so it'll warm, too. It's no hassle compared to trying to regulate lead temp on a stove.

I get my wheel weights free from my SIL who's a tech at the local Ford place. I also dig scrap out of the backstop at the range on occasion when it's not too hot out and the skeeters aren't swarming. I can dig a big coffee can full out of that backstop in about 30 minutes, especially after a rain. It's just laying on top of the dirt. I have no problems loading the conicals and I have a press for that, anyway. Might be a little rougher on the brass framed Navy, but I shoot loads that are well under what Cabelas recommends for their brassers, so I doubt that's a concern for me. The ROA, it's absolutely of no concern.

BUT, I don't have any pure lead at this time and minie balls do not work unless pure lead because the skirt has to be pliable so as to expand with the pressure and engage the rifling. So, right now, I'm shooting 385 grain Hornady great plains bullets. I need to find some pure lead for Minies. I don't shoot that many seeing as the reloading routine at the range is rather slow, scrub the bore with a wet brush, dry the bore with a dry patch, at least every other shot. I have 100 Great Plains bullets at the present time and those will last me a while. Still, I need to buy some pure lead, I reckon.

I had a 67 lbs lead weight out of a scrapped drum scale at work, I think it was a calibration weight, not sure, was in a junk pile. I thought it might be pure lead. Don't have a hardness tester. But, I cast a few 360 grainers from my Lee mold to test and they didn't shoot for squat, so I guess that lead is not pure. That mold shoots better than the Hornadys from my Hawken with proper alloy.

 

[robhof]

robhof

I scavange range lead too, separate cast from jacketed. Most jacketed cores are pure or near pure lead with a trace of tin to increase adhesion to the jacket. Had a friend that his job was changeing out the berm dirt at a USAF range. He ended up with a side business of making fishing sinkers with the recovered bullets, mostly 223 ball. The sinkers were very soft and the split shot he made could be easily squeezed.

 

[Bluehawk]

Getting the metal hot enough seems to be one of the main issues for quality bullets.

Temperatures between 725F and 775F is correct for lead, WW's and linotype. Purchasing a casting thermometer is a good investment!

 

[MCgunner]

Most jacketed cores are pure or near pure lead with a trace of tin to increase adhesion to the jacket.

Now,, that right there is some DANGED good info. Now, I have a new project.

 

[wittzo]

When I said a zinc WW would "ruin" the lead, all I meant was it will change the alloy's density and hardness. You can't get zinc (or tin or antimony) out of lead once it's mixed in, it would be like trying to take the salt out of sugar cookie dough.