Another question for you.

[johnnyjr]

Sorry for all the questions.
I have some old lead pipe. I checked the bhn with my Lee tester. It's around 6..
I also have a large box of super hard commercial cast bullets I guy gave me which I have no use for being they are 44s.
Can I mix these with my soft lead to make rifle bullets of a bhn of around 12 or so. Thanks. Going to harbor freight to get a scale...

 

[Bret4207]

Yes, but "super hard commercial cast bullets" are going to vary in makeup. If I may drag out the dead horse I've beaten here multiple times, (Look up my posts on Bhn/alloys with Burbank Jung), an alloy is more than just a Bhn. My suggestion would be to get whatever you have together, melt the majority of it up into one base alloy and go from there. Even with a 6mm you don't need "HARDCAST" if the bullet fits. Read Ian and FIvers dissertations on what it takes to get a small bore to shoot with cast. It is far, far easier and simpler to juice up a base alloy with antimony/tin bearing enrichment metals than it is to turn a 100 lbs of too soft alloy into a harder/stronger/tougher/more resilient alloy. Note those words I use- stronger/tougher/more resilient. Those words don't even cover the whole spectrum of what makes a suitable alloy, but it's a start. Bhn is just a relative # that means almost nothing in the grand scheme. It simply doesn't convey enough information.

FIT IS KING! Bhn is a small part of FIT. Start with that in mind and you will avoid countless hours chasing the wrong rabbit around a tree.

.

 

[johnnyjr]

Damn man. I love your post. Makes more sense than a lot I have read. Precise and to the point.. thanks, johnny...

 

[Winelover]

Mix them together, I do it all the time. It will definitely add hardness to pure lead. Try them out. If you need harder, you can waterdrop or heat treat. Myself, I prefer heat treating.

 

[Ian]

The thing to remember is antimony takes a few days to a few weeks to fully do its hardening thing. If you mix the lead and commercial bullets and test right after casting they'll test soft, test in a month and they'll test a lot harder. In between they'll be erratic and not shoot as well as they will either right after casting or after they're through aging.

 

[JonB]

This may or may not matter to you, but if you really want more of an idea of the alloy composition...this may help.
.
Not all lead pipe is pure lead. Some manufacturers add antimony (1 to 3%) for the extruding process. If the pipe is extruded and has antimony, and you try to test the hardness of a piece of pipe, the extruding process has work softened the alloy and will read softer, than if you melt some of the pipe and pour a few bullets and test the bullets (wait at least 2 weeks...or a month as Ian mentions).
.
Once you have that info, it'll give you a better idea of what percentage to mix with your Hardcast alloy...which is likely 92-6-2 and if you know the mfg'r you can probably verify that too.
.
OR, depending on the amounts you have? and the size of the schmelter pot you have?
You can just melt it all together as Winelover suggests, so you have one big batch that you know is uniform...and go from there.

 

[358156 hp]

The thing to remember is antimony takes a few days to a few weeks to fully do its hardening thing. If you mix the lead and commercial bullets and test right after casting they'll test soft, test in a month and they'll test a lot harder. In between they'll be erratic and not shoot as well as they will either right after casting or after they're through aging.

I was all set to write something very similar. If the commercial bullets are at 18 bhn hardness right now but turn out to be old linotype for example which is bhn 22. When melted and cooled they won't reach their "normal" hardness for a little while, the "few days to a few weeks" Ian mentions., but the hardness will stabilize to the base alloy contents. So melt the commercial bullets and cast into ingots, or better yet enough samples of bullets that you intend to cast so you can test their hardness in their intended final size and form. Then you can decide what your mix needs to be.

The reason for casting bullet size samples is that ingots cool slower than bullets do and the speed an alloy is cooled directly impacts final hardness. Large ingots will cool slower, so their bhn reading will be lower than if smaller samples are cast and tested. Test a few samples the day after casting, then other samples a week or so later, then more a week or so after that. Since you're having fit issues as well, mike the samples on test day as well to get an idea of how diameter is being affected by the aging process.

 

[bruce381]

I aslo size right away then if when they harden the hard part is over

 

[Jeff H]

As an alternative, and not to dismiss the knowledge and experience of others, I'd take the commercial bullets and mix them with some pure lead and see what I got. I can fairly easily adapt sizing, lube/PC, charge, powder-type to suit my mongrel alloys.

I've done this three times in the past using Magnus and Leadheads commercial bullets with "pure" lead (pipe, roof flashing, etc.) at about 75/25 and each time they came out the same hardness as my 70s - 90s wheel weights, if the SAECO hardness tester wasn't lying to me. I only tested them out of curiosity.

This will depend heavily on what kind of shooting you intend to do though. I don't shoot matches and I don't shoot anything over 2kfps - yet. I usually use somewhat fast pistol powders (mostly Unique) too. If your end goal is to gain "tenths" in your groups, or aspire to flatten trajectory through velocity, or hunting more than varmints/vermin at relatively close ranges, then my way probably won't suit you.

 

[fiver]

pure lead is 8 BHN.

 

[Ian]

I think it's closer to 5 bhn on whatever the Brinell scale is we use for stuff as soft as bullets. 99.99% is something like 5.5. Sticky WW are somewhere around 7-10, usually on the upper end. Roofing boots I melted down into a 250lb batch make bullets that I have to step up to a larger ball bearing size and do number stuff with to get a useful reading since the Lee tool won't measure down past about 8 or so.

 

[Bret4207]

Honestly, if I had a mess of pure lead I'd be saving it for roundballs and hammer heads. I haven't run across pure in a long, long time, just not something you see up here in the sticks. But I still run across buckets of old COWW once in a while!

 

[johnnyjr]

There are 5 tire shop in my neck of the woods. BUT NO wheel weights available. Go figure..

 

[Winelover]

Because most have contracts with their supplies, covering used weights. Also, spoken for, by their long standing customers. Fifty+ years of casting, never did pursue wheel weights.

 

[Bret4207]

There are 5 tire shop in my neck of the woods. BUT NO wheel weights available. Go figure..

Some places, like here, they've run up against environmental regs that say they can't be used. I guess when a WW falls off Bambi and Thumper immediately start gnawing on it or something like that. I'm fortunate enough to have a few hundred lbs of old COWW on hand, and I'm scared to death to shoot too much anymore with the primer shortage. But if I had to find lead alloy these days, I'd bite the bullet (pun intended!) and order from some place like Rotometals. I'd also be building a snail type bullet trap!!!

 

[johnnyjr]

Yes sir. My thoughts exactly..

 

[JonB]

Some places, like here, they've run up against environmental regs that say they can't be used. I guess when a WW falls off Bambi and Thumper immediately start gnawing on it or something like that. I'm fortunate enough to have a few hundred lbs of old COWW on hand, and I'm scared to death to shoot too much anymore with the primer shortage. But if I had to find lead alloy these days, I'd bite the bullet (pun intended!) and order from some place like Rotometals. I'd also be building a snail type bullet trap!!!

I haven't searched for any alloy in my area for quite some time, in fact I often ponder selling some of my stash...it just seems too large. The range scrap (bullet trap idea) is another one I've pondered. The last couple times I've acquired any alloy (maybe 4 or 5 yrs ago?) was from the pistol pit at my range (hand picked), and also a purchase of three 50 lb flat rate boxes of WW stickies from TheCaptain.

 

[Missionary]

Try truck tire stores. They deal with big heavy truck and Machine tires.

 

[Bret4207]

I haven't searched for any alloy in my area for quite some time, in fact I often ponder selling some of my stash...it just seems too large. The range scrap (bullet trap idea) is another one I've pondered. The last couple times I've acquired any alloy (maybe 4 or 5 yrs ago?) was from the pistol pit at my range (hand picked), and also a purchase of three 50 lb flat rate boxes of WW stickies from TheCaptain.

There is simply no such thing as "too much" of many things, cash and COWW being 2 of those things!

 

[Brad]

I bet I have not used 150# of wheel weights in my life. Lots of pure mixed with Lino or mono.

Now range scrap, I have enough that I don’t even collect it any more. The berms will hold onto it for me.