bullet casting

[rickdavis81]

I'm thinking about getting into casting my own bullets. What all do I need to start out? I'm thinking a melting pot, bullet mold, and sizing die. Anything else? I have mainly Lee reloading equip so was going to go with Lee casting stuff. There sizing die looks like its a pretty slick set up where it pushes the bullet into the holding container. I also need to buy a manual, I here lymans are a good one. Are the copper gas checks just for high velocity rifle bullets? And what is and what puts the goop in the gas seal rings? Any info at all is appreciated.

[copdills]

try to get a separte pot to melt your wheel weights in to clean and flux , try to get a cast iron pot for this , you can flux with wax, or saw dust and many more things as you will learn, a turkey fryer is a great heat source for melting lead so you can make ingots for your melter that you are going to cast from, keeping these two things separte will let your melter last longer and if you have a bottom pour it will not have the trash from melting wheel weights cloging up the spout and your cast bullets will come out nice and shiny without trash in them , you will also need something to pull the steel clips out of the melt I use a large spoon , you will also need some ingot molds to pure your lead in and a ladel to do that with, and this is just to get ready to start casting , now along with what you mentioned and alot I left out you can cast and you will be hooked by the silver stream ( a brotherhood of the silver stream) it will also help to have a hot plate to heat your mold up to temp before casting , doing this you will make good bullets right off the bat , and YES you will need a casting Book , I never had one but it would have been alot of help, I learned everthing to start from the guys at cast boolits.com they are a great bunch of people just like the guys here , try them out they love to help some one get started

[KD5NRH]

Watch flea markets and garage sales for those cast-iron cornbread molds. They make great ingot molds, though they do take a while to cool down once they overheat. If that's an issue, just get several and rotate through them.

Gas checks are for any high velocity cast round; you'll want them for basically anything hotter than .45ACP, so you might want to look on eBay for the guy who sells gas check making punches at about $30 per caliber, and you can punch your own from aluminum cans.

As for the lube, I'd just go with the Lee sizers, which all come with a free bottle of Liquid Alox. By the time you get three or four calibers of sizers bought, you'll have enough Liquid Alox to tumble lube at least a couple thousand bullets. It works fine on all the bullets I've used it on, but I've been ordering most of my molds in the "TL" designs, which are specifically made for tumble lubing with it. (several narrow grooves to hold it better, instead of the 2-3 large grooves in standard bullet designs)

[crowbeaner]

For the best advice and tech info on casting, try www.castboolits/gunloads.com. I post there as well as many knowledgeable casters.

[rickdavis81]

After I melt the wheel weights do I have to add any thing to make the lead harder?

[Linear Thinker]

Before you start casting, or start buying equipment, get the Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook. It will have all the answers, including the alloy hardness.

To answer your specific question - WWs are excellent for handgun bullets - nothing needs to be added. With 5% or so tin, they cast beautifully and have the correct BNH hardness for handguns.

Watch out for zinc WWs, they are marked Zn. Sort them out, zinc is not good for bullet alloys.
LT