ADKWOODSMAN
Member
If I mix pure lead with linotype?
What will my boolet hardness be?
Haven't casted any bullets in 35 years. Need help.
What will my boolet hardness be?
Haven't casted any bullets in 35 years. Need help.
I KRINGE at the thought of all the alloys I wasted chasing the "harder is better" route.
One thing (look on the notes) to remember that matching tin % with Anitmony % will produce harder alloys and in a case where you want to use less of your antimony, by matching tin you can achieve this.
Also water dropping will produce harder bullets and can reduce the amount of antimony needed.
A note on Tin: Tin ads very little hardness by itself and plateaus very quickly. It's best assets are when used in equal amounts with Linotype it increases the value and hardness of the antimony...by itself it does little to nothing with helping to harden lead. Secondly tin helps to insure a good mold fill and reduce poor fill when casting. Nice shiny whole bullets are a welcome sight! Thank tin.
Now I run my own powder coat and have no need to be overly cautious.I KRINGE at the thought of all the alloys I wasted chasing the "harder is better" route.
More to testing them than looks too. Though you can catch many that way. Long process of sorting by hand which I no longer do. However if you wish to be sure get you some diagonal cutting pliers and test each one. You can tell the difference easily this way as steel and zinc won't cut.I saw WWs mentioned. Don't use any of the shiny silver ones. They have zinc which will wreck your whole batch of alloy. Only use the dull grey ones.