New alloy

[45 2.1]

View attachment 389 " and may even be good for HV cast bullet shooting."

I'm sure it would be. Edd prefers the big flat nose bullets with that alloy. It depends on what you shoot and what you want the bullet to do.... if anything. A lot depends on what you want... hunting or target and the intended purpose.

 

[Warren4570]

Hunting (moose elk bear both grizzlies and black ) and target shooting off the bench, off-hand, and various other positions to hone and improve skills
my plinking loads for my 454 are 300 and 335gr cast at 1200fps the loads for the 4570 300gr @1600 and 390gr@1700. At the range usually 50+ rounds for the 454 and 40+ rounds for the 4570 is an average outing.

The bullet mould I am lookin at 1st one is the 300gr lee mould for the 454 dual crimp groove massive metplat
Looking at going to accurate moulds and getting a 360gr and 420gr both with .360 metplat. The lee bullet for the 454 is the same as as the avatar picture.

Lubing right now I use the felix lube recipe with a bit added beeswax and carnuba wax to make it a little bit stiffer. I get no leading so far with it. The lube that came on the bullets as shipped is a hard red lube and after filling the groove of the 4570 for the last 6 inches of the barrel I removed the lube and made the felix lube as mentioned above as the components were easy to get ... problem solved... Learned real quick how much scrubbing the leading out sux.
If I decide to alox them as well I have a blend of alox and softened felix lube that the bullets are tumble lubed in. They seem to dry fast and are not sticcky you can feel the lube on the noses but thats it.
My current supply of 1000 bullets though are 2Sn6Sb92Pb advertised @25 BHN and I am shooting them up pretty quickly.
Having shot jacketed type and now switching to cast (after spending 100s of hours reading in these forums) I am learning a lot.

At first I got caught up in the "hardcast / super hard cast" thing with alot of the adds n articles and after reading a lot in the forums I started to learn the difference from folks such as yourself and the others here that Hard and TOUGH are two very different yet related properties in the art of casting bullets.
The properties of a Cu enriched alloy and the notable increase in toughness lead me here and into this discussion.

My most important goals ... minimal to no leading ... good accuracy ... be able to hold together if I hit heavy bone @ 15ft or 150yds...and the satisfaction of casting them myself. Expansion is also another goal but that I believe could be tailored by HT.

I only get to hunt 12days a year (annually with my son in law in Utah) with my 454 as we are only allowed to hunt paper here in Canada with handguns.
My loads bullets and skills all need to be in sync to be successful and ethical.

 

[fiver]

I'm gonna disagree with the tin being higher.
I worked with EDD a lot when he first become interested in using the copper alloy and at that time the information I had showed the tin was needed to keep the copper in the alloy at higher amounts.
however at the amounts we use to actually cast with does much better with the Sn/Cu amount equal to the Sb amount.
the Sb and Cu form a much stronger bond that tin and copper does.

when I referenced sulpher removing tin from the alloy I was referring to the fact that it would come out with the zinc when the sulpher removed it.

tin is a complicated animal in lead alloys it isn't a great hardening agent it is actually great at allowing the lead to flow better [wetting agent] when melted and then it kinda does it's own thing.

if you look at the pictures above you can see how antimony sits within the lead alloy and how when it is put under pressure the antimony can break down and allow the lead to glide and flow over it.

too many people get wrapped up in how the alloy appears to behave as a liquid and as a set up solid when we need to be looking at how it behaves under pressure and duress on target.

 

[45 2.1]

At first I got caught up in the "hardcast / super hard cast" thing with alot of the adds n articles and after reading a lot in the forums I started to learn the difference from folks such as yourself and the others here that Hard and TOUGH are two very different yet related properties in the art of casting bullets.
The properties of a Cu enriched alloy and the notable increase in toughness lead me here and into this discussion.

My most important goals ... minimal to no leading ... good accuracy ... be able to hold together if I hit heavy bone @ 15ft or 150yds...and the satisfaction of casting them myself. Expansion is also another goal but that I believe could be tailored by HT.

There are several schools of thought here. Hard and tough (copper alloy) wide meplat bullets don't need to expand to kill... true, but can you find it after it's dead. Hollow pointing one with copper alloy probably will not expand enough to do any good also. Unless you shoot bone to immobilize it, you may not have a blood trail to follow (experienced that twice and no longer shoot solids). Another is hollow points, A softer alloy (less than 2% antimony and 1/4% tin) heat treated blows off the nose to the base of the hollow point and usually drops the animal or it doesn't go farther than a stones throw away. Mine act like a Nosler partition and blow thru the animal killing it fast and exiting (on deer with some lengthwise shots also). Some folks want an umbrella type mushroom with all the bullet weight left (and it to go thru).... that's a hard balancing act to get. With what you hunt, I would not use a deeper hollow point, just a cup point with the softer heat treated alloy (it will expand with something like 50% WW / 50% pure water dropped) and see what the results are.

 

[Warren4570]

Called the supplier of the alloy yesterday after spending a few hours at the range.
I had originally emailed and asked if they had an alloy in stock that contained low Sb and Se along with
As, Cu, and possibly Ag and / or Sn.
The response back was positive asking that I call them to get more infomation.
Spent about 45 min on the phone with their metallurgist discussing the alloy

One thing to note. It just so happens that these folks produce the alloy for one of the commercial bullet companies in the western US so it was a productive discussion to say the least as the folks I had the pleasure of speaking with understood the goals discussed. LOL he did say he couldn't sell me this proprietory alloy while we were talking as well.

The Composition of the alloy we were discussing ( 2.75 Sb ) is as follows
Lead 96.8%
Antimony 2.75%
Tin .25 -.35%
Arsenic .07-.10%
Copper .03-.06%
Selenium .012% (was hoping for up to 0.03)
Silver .003-.004%
Nickel .001%
Above levels may change slightly within the specified limit
The alloy will come with an lab analysis certificate to validate values once shipped.
Cost $120 Canadian or $100 US for a 60lb ingot. $2/lb because I bought in small quantities
I have had quotes of $4.10 to $6 per pound for 92 6 2 alloy. Equivalent of Rotometals Hardball mix. So this price could be considered good by comparison.

Ironically the 2.75 is fairly close to wheel weight with the amounts of Pb Sb Sn in it however it may be a bit shy on the As levels. Yet that is hard to say as it seems that many sources differ slightly on the actual blend used in wheel weights.

As such though this does seem like a good place to start. Cu and Sn can be added as can As.

During our telephone discussion a few suggestions were made for both the addition of Cu and Se to the alloy and blending in general.

1st base metal temp of about 950deg F if possible. (for the blending process)

2nd to add Cu, it could be done either with Edds or others findings (copper sulphate or copper wire) but it was also suggested that copper foil used in radiator fin fabrication could be usedas it is really thin. It was discussed that the foil would dissolve into the mix at the temp mentioned above quite readily. The method such as how Brad did it with Babbit obviously works as well.
The advantage to adding Cu by itself is that the other alloying elements only change in small percentanges as the alloy is created.

3rd Se could also be added at or around the same temperature (950*F) and alloyed into the mix as well. Smallish quantities may not be easy to find working on that one

4th The tough one. It was mentioned that during the alloying process they (the manufacturer) stir the alloy until a vortex is present while blending the added elements. The comparison to a blender in a bowl of thin batter was made. That one could be hard to safely pull off in a molten pot of 950* alloy. However it would lend itself to homogenous blending for sure.

5th Temperatures about 1000F+ will cook the Sn out of the mix.

As the above info may be of added use to all here it is shared both for knowledge and discussion.

This week I am going to order 120# of this alloy to work with as a base alloy and from this should be able to come up with some good data as it will take a lot of the guesswork out of it.

 

[Warren4570]

Running the alloy through the calc and adding Aim Aquasol solder to the mix 60#alloy mentioned above and 1# solder the blend comes up with
1.86Sn 2.72Sb 0.08As 0.10Cu 0.03Ag 95.2Pb
This is getting close and fairly easily.
The Aquasol contains 1Sb 3Cu .25Ag balSn
Silversol contains 4Cu .5Ag balSn
B1 pic is Aquasol+Alloy B2 pic is Silversol+Alloy

The only thing the calculator does not factor into the mix is the Se.
I am going to have to add columns for selenium and sulphur

Anybody have any thoughts ?

 

[Warren4570]

Brad have you had the chance to shoot any of your alloyed bullets yet ?

 

[Brad]

I have not shot any yet. I was busy getting the 44 mag to shoot the way I wanted. I may try some next week.

 

[Warren4570]

Cool be interested in seeing how they shoot for sure

 

[Warren4570]

2 60# ingots of the alloy I ordered should arrive in the next day or so. The gear to build the PID for the 4-20 LEE pot is slowly coming in. Tom @ accurate molds has shipped my 360 and 420 grain molds for the 45-70s. I can see a busy week coming up.
Have to melt one of the 60 lb ingots and blend in 1.5lbs of the Cu bearing solder to get the numbers about right, and pour smaller ingots to cast with. Build the PID, prep the molds from Tom and the Lee 300gr for the 454, lap out one of the sizing dies and cast some. Pretty stoked about the molds from Accurate 360 meplat with dual crimp grooves and GC'd
I am seeing a busy week comin up hopefully will be able to cast size load and shoot some too

Brad have you had a chance to shoot some of your enriched bullets yet?

 

[Warren4570]

There are several schools of thought here. Hard and tough (copper alloy) wide meplat bullets don't need to expand to kill... true, but can you find it after it's dead. Hollow pointing one with copper alloy probably will not expand enough to do any good also. Unless you shoot bone to immobilize it, you may not have a blood trail to follow (experienced that twice and no longer shoot solids). Another is hollow points, A softer alloy (less than 2% antimony and 1/4% tin) heat treated blows off the nose to the base of the hollow point and usually drops the animal or it doesn't go farther than a stones throw away. Mine act like a Nosler partition and blow thru the animal killing it fast and exiting (on deer with some lengthwise shots also). Some folks want an umbrella type mushroom with all the bullet weight left (and it to go thru).... that's a hard balancing act to get. With what you hunt, I would not use a deeper hollow point, just a cup point with the softer heat treated alloy (it will expand with something like 50% WW / 50% pure water dropped) and see what the results are.

45 2.1 by cup point ar you refering to a hollow point with a very shallow HP like say .125" deep or slightly deeper ? NOE has some HP with a small cup in it but also have pins that can allow you cast the bullet as a FP as well

 

[45 2.1]

45 2.1 by cup point ar you refering to a hollow point with a very shallow HP like say .125" deep or slightly deeper ? NOE has some HP with a small cup in it but also have pins that can allow you cast the bullet as a FP as well

A cup type hollow point should be spherical, not conical. That cup can be very shallow or up to half the diameter of the hollow deep at the meplat (more depth would cause it to stick on the pin). Normal conical hollow points benefit from a radius at the bottom of the pin. I much prefer the MP pin system that I do on these myself.

 

[Warren4570]

the theory then that the cup would remove the risk of stress risers and allow for expansion and reduce tendency to frag and blowoff upon impact correct?

 

[45 2.1]

the theory then that the cup would remove the risk of stress risers in the hollow and allow for expansion and reduce tendency to frag and blowoff upon impact correct?

What you're wanting to know is entirely dependent on the impact velocity, hollow point shape/depth, alloy ductility, and resistance of the material/animal hit. Trying for a classic umbrella type mushroom usually only fits a very small range of alloy/velocities. All hollow point types are stress risers and cause the nose material to move outward. If you're shooting something, do you want to recover it without having to track it for a long ways or ruin a quarter of the meat? A solid usually requires a big meplat and shooting a big bone somewhere to keep it in sight (unless you over power it). You should have some idea of what range of animal types you want to eliminate so you can pick the right alloy and point style to do so. Pick a good example so a more complete litany can be done.

 

[Warren4570]

a screen shot off my tablet with the alloy I had shipped and 1.5# of Aim solder alloyed together.
ironically it is close to Brads alloy numbers in post #39 but with a bit of selenium and silver in the mix as well.

 

[Warren4570]

What you're wanting to know is entirely dependent on the impact velocity, hollow point shape/depth, alloy ductility, and resistance of the material/animal hit. Trying for a classic umbrella type mushroom usually only fits a very small range of alloy/velocities. All hollow point types are stress risers and cause the nose material to move outward. If you're shooting something, do you want to recover it without having to track it for a long ways or ruin a quarter of the meat? A solid usually requires a big meplat and shooting a big bone somewhere to keep it in sight (unless you over power it). You should have some idea of what range of animal types you want to eliminate so you can pick the right alloy and point style to do so. Pick a good example so a more complete litany can be done.

I was curious if the cup point had a tendency to expand or rivet with less tendency to fragment than a say a traditional hollowpoint would thats all.

 

[45 2.1]

View attachment 532
a screen shot off my tablet with the alloy I had shipped and 1.5# of Aim solder alloyed together.
ironically it is close to Brads alloy numbers in post #39 but with a bit of selenium and silver in the mix as well.

Cut that with an equal amount of pure lead and you will have something that can be worked with. I'm a fan of heat treating, not a fan of having a lot of things in an alloy.

 

[45 2.1]

I was curious if the cup point had a tendency to expand or rivet with less tendency to fragment than a say a traditional hollowpoint would thats all.

And that depends on what I previously posted. One size usually doesn't fit all things.

 

[carpetman]

When I was going to take up reloading--about 50 years ago, I bought a Lyman Manual to read up on it. Their section on cast bullets perked my interest. When I got to the making Lyman#2 etc I got confused. How do you take 90-95% unknown wheelweights and add 5-10% exacts and come up with an exact? What if the ww's already had some of this stuff? I was just going to be plinking with them and if it took more than one shot to kill a beer can, no big deal, they weren't shooting back. Now I have had beer cans kick my butt, but that's another post.
I'll admit that I don't plink with such precision that I can detect a difference in BHN as obviously some of you can do. I also can't shoot well enough to detect a few grains difference (very small percentage wise) in bullet weight. I'm not going to be shooting matches against you anyways, so I don't worry about my deficiency. How could I possibly consider shooting against such precision? I didn't plan on landing any of my shots on the moon so rocket science wasn't in the equation. I did try to do it once, but in my unscientific methods, I overshot it.
With this mindset, I just used plain wheelweights and I think they work well. Many, many years later when I started casting .22 cal for use in rifles, I was told by lots of folks I needed to add tin to get good fillout. I bought some tin which was the only alloy I have ever bought and ONLY difference I could tell was in my wallet.
But how could I join in on a forum such as this and have anything to add if I was so plain? So I developed a formula. Didn't want to be left out of the conversation. Here it is. You take 50% free wheel weight and carefully weigh them. Then you take that exact amount of wheelweights you didn't have to pay for. Blend the two. I heard that if this is done when there is a quarter moon it works better, but to me results really seem the same if a full moon, harvest moon, half moon, blue moon, or done during the day. BTW except for that tin I've never bought alloy. I can still get free wheelweights at a few places. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

 

[Rick]

I've got pretty much the same story. I cast almost everything out of clip-on weights air cooled with 2% added Sn at 12 BHN including rifle to 2000 fps. For low pressure stuff and HP's in things like the 45 ACP I use stick-on weights +2% Sn at about 8 BHN. Several years ago I blended together 800 pounds of several different lots of clip-on weights for one uniform batch, still using it and still have about 500 pounds of it. I bought the tin but have never had to buy the weights. I stocked up on bar tin back when it was about $6 a pound and still have about 30 pounds of it.

So why the 2% Sn? Because I like it, they cast very well and they shoot very well. No scientific testing, I just like it & been doing it that way for 25-30 years now.