Casting bullet questions

[Bidah]

I started casting a few years ago; Shotgun slugs out of a chicken can melted on a Coleman stove.  I have progressed, now using a cast iron pot on a turkey fryer burner and a ladle.  Last year I cast 15000 9mm and 10000 45acp this way.  I have a couple of tire shops that I get my weights from, and I cast it as is.  You can also buy smelted WW lead off of ebay for just over $1/lb or there about.  There are some places that will sell you ingots for around $3/lb if you want to go that route.

I size in a Lee sizer using White Label Lube.

[PegLeg45]

I started casting a few years ago; Shotgun slugs out of a chicken can melted on a Coleman stove.  I have progressed, now using a cast iron pot on a turkey fryer burner and a ladle.  Last year I cast 15000 9mm and 10000 45acp this way.  I have a couple of tire shops that I get my weights from, and I cast it as is.  You can also buy smelted WW lead off of ebay for just over $1/lb or there about.  There are some places that will sell you ingots for around $3/lb if you want to go that route.

I size in a Lee sizer using White Label Lube.

How do the bullets cast from straight weights shoot with regard to leading/fouling?

[JoeG]

Thanks for the tips guys. I ordered some 9 and 38 from the Bullet Works and the Rim Rock site seems good as well so I will give them a test order this weekend.

I may still get around to casting some day as it seems interesting after reading the Lyman book and the sections in the Lee book.

I have been ordering stuff mostly from Midway and mid South and their shelves have been empty for quite a while.

Do you all have any sources for powder? I won't even mention primers...

Joe

[alfsauve]

http://www.powdervalleyinc.com/

[Bidah]

How do the bullets cast from straight weights shoot with regard to leading/fouling?

PegLeg, they are fine.  I have tested the hardness, and it usually comes in around 12 or so.  My CZ's get very little leading, my son's XDm 5.25 got a bit of leading (at the leade and end of the barrel) until I fired about 500 jacketed through it to smooth it out (only shot lead in it from new).  My Sig 1911, also a lead only shooter, gets a little in the throat.  Mind you I am cleaning at 700 to 1000 rounds.  In other words, I get about the same amount of leading (very little) that I also got from buying commercial cast bullets with a BHN of 18.

I have become better over time with the casting, but overall they still are not pretty (compared to commercial).  I did get a WHOLE lot better with the luber.   I have the boys do their 9mm size/lube, and they still have a ways to go in that department..

[Sponsor]

[PegLeg45]

Thanks for the info, Bidah.... I have thought about using straight weights for a while, just to get started doing my own casting. I have a good friend that runs a tire store and I am in the process of trying to work a deal with him for old weights.

[Tyler Durden]

OK so with the end of ammo as we know it dragging on, I am looking into casting bullets as a way to cope. I have some questions:

1. What melting and casting equipment do folks use and like or dislike?

2. Where do you get your lead and if you salvage it from a range backstop how do you clean it up and get all the junk out of it?

3. do you resize and what lube do you use?

On your mark, get set, start the thread drift

Joe

1.  Propane fired turkey fryer base with a cast iron dutch oven to render all the crap into useable ingots.  Use a Rowell bottom pour ladle to dip the molten lead out of the dutch oven into ingot moulds I made myself.  Before that I stir the melt with a pine stick.  I suppose it acts like flux.  All the crap that then floats spins around and spins to the middle.  That makes it easier for me to grab any wheelweight clips and other dross with a long handled perforated spoon like you'd see at a cafeteria dishing out green beans.  Then the clean ingots go into my 20 pound RCBS pro melt furnace.  I have only 4 of the Lyman steel 4 banger pistol moulds.

2.  I had a friend who was a mechanic at a Toyota dealership.  He and his girlfriend would shoot a lot of trap and skeet.  I made my own birdshot maker from scratch.  He would bring me 100 pounds in wheelweights, and I would bring 50 pounds of birdshot.  So I kept the other lead for myself.  I am also a member of a gunclub which has like a steel backstopped pit area for bowling pin matches.  I'll scoop the bullets and sand from there.

3.   a Star Lube sizer which I never did get timed just right.  I probably got the holes in the sizing dies drilled in the wrong spot.  But that might not matter if I start powder coating boolits

Now for the thread drift, I used to shoot an IDPA style match every Tuesday night at an indoor range.  My blood lead levels were the highest when I shot there.  I stopped shooting there, picked up casting and making shot, and my lead levels continued to drop.

[nosimij]

I have been recovering lead shot form the back of the trap range.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimisod/8844186134/  Recovered lead

These I cast with an attempt at a rocket stove in a tin can.  I then dump that into a cupcake pan.  This gives me ingots.  These work just fine as long as I do not let my Lee bottom pore pot to get so low that the round "muffins" do not reach the molten lead at the bottom.


http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimisod/8844187302/in/photostream/ Stove
Low budget recovery.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimisod/8843564869/ "muffins"

Plus the "muffins" are easy to store.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jimisod/9433253350/  Castings in 9mm and 45

Sorry I cannot get the post pictures to work from Flickr.


I do have to say that the recovery is a lot of work and time, but it keeps me out of trouble.

[Magoo541]

I've been thinking about taking the plunge and start casting my own because I just can't afford the $100 a month it would take to shoot just a 1000 rounds.  The thing that keeps me from pulling the trigger, pun intended  , is I don't have a lead source-locally.  My son used to work at a tire store that catered to farmers but in MT.  I try to coerce them into bringing a bucket down, or two/three/ten, when ever my family comes down but so far it hasn't panned out.  230 LRN are 35 per pound, I can buy 500 for about $50. So to buy lead and make 500 is just over $14 at a buck a pound-not bad but not free either.

If/when I do pull the trigger I'll go the tumble lube way because of the price of a luber, they are awefully proud of their stuff-not as much as the swagers though.