What is the pro and cons of water quenching cast bullets ? How do you do it ?
To water quench just drop the boolits straight from the mold into a bucket of water(if it is and alloy and not
pure lead as pure will not harden) it makes the surface of the boolit harder. The alloy needs some %age of antimony and tin,
a little arsnic helps too.
Depending on the application(cal. loaded and gun shot in) the hard boolit may work good and then again it may not.
pure lead as pure will not harden) it makes the surface of the boolit harder. The alloy needs some %age of antimony and tin,
a little arsnic helps too.
Depending on the application(cal. loaded and gun shot in) the hard boolit may work good and then again it may not.
Ok , am gettin about an 8 hardness with range lead and rotow metal super hard alloy casted for 30 cal- lyman 311414 die ( .311)
i've quenched just to be quenchin. i'll pick your brain some, "when to quench and when to not quench"?
What are you checking hardness with? What's the ratio range lead to super hard? Look here:http://www.lasc.us/SuperHard.htm for some good info
on using super hard.
How fast do you want to push that 311414?
Quench or no-quench depends on a lot of facters, like caliber, volicity desired, boolit fit to the guns throat.
I've been casting for over 25 years and have never water quenched a boolit straight from the mold. I do oven heat treat
some 22 cal. for my AR and some 30's for my M1, everything else is a mixture of alloys for given cal.
All my hand gun boolits are cast in a mix of 50/50 WW/lead(BHN 11) with the execption of 9MM which is cast in a mix of 75/25 WW/Lino(BHN 15)
The WW/Lino mix is also used for the above 22 and 30 cal oven heat treat(BHN 22).
Am useing a saeco hardness tester, am loading for mild paper punkers for my1917 & 03a3 (14 gr unique) the mix istarted with was 4hard to 6 range thsn add 1 hard And 3 range. As the pot gets low
Your saeco 8 hardness equites to about 13 BHN which is good enough for your plinking loads no need to water quench.
Keep your alloy mix at 1 hard 3 range that will up the hardness a little, try to keep your alloy the same all the time when you refill the pot
also let the cast boolits age for at least two weeks before you size/use them.
Check hardness again after the two week age, they will be a bit harder.
some good info here http://www.lasc.us/CastBulletNotes.htm
