Questions about casting

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Arkansas Paul

Arkansas Paul

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Hey guys. I'm getting a big bore revolver soon to hunt with and am thinking of casting my own bullets. I will be casting for either a .44 mag or a .45 Colt, whichever I find a good deal on. I have a question.

How much $ can you save by casting your own? I can get 500 for about $50 online. Would I save enough to be worth it?

Any tips would be appreciated. Thanks

AP
 
Keep in mind that casting is an art combined with a liberal dose of black magic!!! I have been casting for over 40 years on my own and was introduced to it over 50 years ago. You will not cast perfect boolits with out practice and you will find it frustrating to the "nth" degree. That said; it is very rewarding and once you get all the kinks worked out of your technique and the alloy and your chosen tooling, you will be glad you got into it.
Please do yourself a favor and go over to castboolits.gunloads.com and read and read and read and ask questions and more questions and more questions; before you invest in the equipment.
Good shooting!!!!!!!!!
 
It depends on how much you want to shoot. For 38spl I can cast for 2 cents a round or get them shipped for 5 cents, thats not worth casting to me. Its all in how much your time is worth.
 
I am just getting into casting, and for me... it is like everything else to do with firearms. I do not NEED to do any of it, but I enjoy it.

Like MMCSRET said... go to castboolits.gunloads.com they are GREAT people, very helpful and very nice.
 
How much $ can you save by casting your own? I can get 500 for about $50 online. Would I save enough to be worth it?
Click to expand...

It has everything to do with how you get your lead. If you can find a tire shop that will give up their wheels weights free/cheap, then you can do really well. I found a local tire shop that sold 50lb buckets of wheel weights for $20. I could usually get 1200 240g LSWC for my 44 out of that bucket. Keep your eyes open for cheap lead; that's where you're going to save.
 
It depends on what you have to pay for your lead and what kind of casting setup you get. If you can get a 5 gal bucket of wheel weights from a tire shop for around 25.00 that will come out to about 25.00/100 pounds of usable lead. Get a Lee 4# pot http://www.midwayusa.com/viewProduct/?productNumber=476462 with a Lee ladle http://www.midwayusa.com/viewProduct/?productNumber=161177 get some beeswax for flux and whichever molds you like. I use a turkey fryer and a harbor freight cast iron dutch oven to melt the lead then a steel(not aluminum)cupcake pan to make ingots.
That is the simplistic approach, you can spend more, but unless you plan on casting a large amount of bullets or just need to do it as fast as possible this will do you fine.

Standard warnings apply, absolutely no liquid any where near the melt!!! Do not eat, drink, or smoke while melting lead, this is the easiest way to get lead poisoning. Other than those three things, it is hard to get lead poisoning. Wear welders gloves and a leather apron. Boots would be nice too, you will have splatter and it does hurt. You want to minimize the pain.
 
Casting can be a chore or a joy. It all depends on your personality. Me, I enjoy it, and I find it to be a relaxing hobby. Plus I shoot a lot of rifle ammo so it does save me considerable amount of money. But if I was only shooting 20 rounds a month then I wouldn't bother. One nice thing about it is, if you are just starting out and cast a bunch of lousy looking bullets, you can toss them back in the pot and start over.
And MMCSRET's suggestion is a good one. Read everything you can about it in the various forums and pick up a copy of the Lyman's Cast Bullet Manual and read that as well. You might be able to get a copy at a library.
Then if you are still interested start looking for sources where you can scrounge or buy lead. But don't melt it all down together until you come back and ask about how to tell zinc from lead. That is because if you mix the two you wont be able to cast with bullets with it.
I think if you read enough and take your time you likely will get into the casting, but it's wise to really know what it is all about before you spend a bunch of money. It's cheaper and easier to simply do it right once!
 
Thanks guys. Keep it coming.
I know the more velocity you have, the harder you want to cast to prevent leading the barell. I assume the manuals cover all of that?
 
What the manuals don't cover can be found here with the search as it has been discussed at one time or another here. Another great source of info is the cast bullets site mentioned above. If the search doesn't find it, post a new ? and someone will be along with the answer shortly. Sometimes the search works well for me and sometimes it doesn't.
 
As a "ferinstenss" I stumbled on a batch of alloy that proved out to be exactly as advertised. I stopped in a small gun shop the other day and found 2, 50 cal ammo cans, one with 90 pounds of lino type cast in ingots and 117 pounds of wheel weights cast in ingots, tested with the Lee tester, it proved out. I offered $100.00 and got it. I cast most of my hand gun bullets soft 50/50 pb/ww and have several hundred pounds of very soft lead sheeting so I can make my alloy for years to come. For my 41 mag I can make it hard using the lino. As I said in my first post, there is a little "mad chemist" combined with pure black magic (pbm) in all of us that pray to the Galena God and pay our dues to the tinsel fairy.
Good shooting!!!!!!!!!
 
MMCSRET, I had to laugh at your Mad Scientist remark. It is so true. We find a great mix for an alloy, but we still just have to go looking for a better one. lol
 
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