Range lead into bullets (boolits)!

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They make long sleeve shirts too nowadays! Cotton would be best! Go to TSC or some farm store and get the cotton welding sleeves. Cheap and they will keep that from happening. Maybe Harbor Frieght has them too.

My work shirts are all cotton and long sleeves.

 

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Well, talk about nice folks!

I just stopped by to tell the people that gave me the last batch thanks and low and behold, they sent me out with another bucket full!

This one even weighs more! 107lbs! WOWSERS!

 

[Wolfe28]

Any idea what the hardness is (as compared to straight wheel weights)? Just curious.

D

 

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Wolfe,
According to the Lee Hardness tester on an ingot, I got .072". That translates to 9.8BHN as is.

I am going to try to drop quench some and see what happens as well as adding a touch of wheel weights or Linotype and see what happens.

Anyway you cut it, these are some real cheap boolits!

 

[xM3RC1L3SS1x]

That's great that you got it for free.

 

[Slow Hand]

An easy way to harden them up is to add plumbers solder. Modern lead free solder is what we call 95/5. it's 95% tin and 5% antimony. I've got a bunch of pure lead from drywall and I alloy it down for the most part into 20:1 alloy, or 20 lbs of lead and 1 roll of solder.

 

[wolfman]

Wolfe,
According to the Lee Hardness tester on an ingot, I got .072". That translates to 9.8BHN as is.

I am going to try to drop quench some and see what happens as well as adding a touch of wheel weights or Linotype and see what happens.

Anyway you cut it, these are some real cheap boolits!

No doubt!! I am buying wheel weights for .15 a lb raw, which after sorting out the steel stick on's, zinc, and skimming the steel clips when I smelt, I end up with a net cost of right at .20 per pound of ingot. I don't sort out the pure lead stick on's and my smelts run between 10 and 15 BHN. I usually have several smelts to work with, and try to end up with an alloy of around 12 BNH. This gives me good results with Lee tumble lube designs in my .357, .40, .45, and when I water drop, gives me about a 25 BHN for my .480.

 

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I have a bunch of wheel weights around here too. Need to get them smelted. For the most part I gave $30 for 480lbs.

There was a Sam's Club Tire Center that was changing suppliers and I happened to walk in right at the right time. It seems one company wouldn't take the left overs from the other company unless they were put in the new company's buckets. Well, these fellas weren't going to take the time to do that so I offered them $30 for the whole shooting match, they helped me load them!

Pretty sure that money didn't get into the cash drawer but that wasn't up to me!

I have a couple of other sources for wheel weights that I have to pay $30/5gal. Still, that is about 120lbs and still cheap enough to make it worth while. 25 cents a pound is still pretty cheap boolits. 7000gr to a pound means 29-240gr boolits per pound for 25 cents. That is less than a penny a piece so..............