Casting mistakes

My last biggest mistake was put damp lead in molten lead. I know to not immerse water into molten lead. But, I had cleaned range lead the day or two before and layed it out on a tarp. The top was dry but the bottom was damp. I already filled the pot once with this lead, watching the steam rise, and pouring one ingot. I have control not using a glove and proceeded to pour the dry and damp lead into the molten lead blew out of the top. My palm stunk but the skin wasn't damaged. So now. if the same situation arises, I pour all of the molten lead from the pot and fill the pot with damp/dry range lead and watch the steam come out of the pot. I use a folded paper to pour the lead pieces in too.
 
I try to make mistakes only once......

Just this weekend I put about a dozen old 2 lb cannon ball sinkers in my smelting pan and set back waiting on them to melt down. Heck, they'd been on ebay a good while before I ordered them, and it took over a week's worth of shipping to get them here, and when they got here I let em sit for at least a month before I decided to do anything with 'em.

About 5 minutes into the heat up I started hearing a good steady hissing sound. Chit, there's trapped water in those sinkers. I went inside and told my son not to go out in the carport for a while.

Went back out and peeked to make sure they were done melting and all was fine with no evidence of a visit from the sparkle fairy....but dang ya just gotta be situation aware at all times.
 
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Mistake:
Casting in shorts with rubber knee boots.

That occasional sprue which makes a run for freedom doesn't always make it all the way to the cold concrete floor.

Song lyrics which came immediately to mind that day:

"Hmm, now wait a minute, of course I can dance
Of course I can dance, I'm sure I can dance
I'm sure I can dance, I can dance
I can dance, I really hit the floor, ah, it feels good
Look at me dancin'!"

Leo Sayer, 1974(?)
 
Jeff H said:
Mistake:
Casting in shorts with rubber knee boots.

That occasional sprue which makes a run for freedom doesn't always make it all the way to the cold concrete floor.

Song lyrics which came immediately to mind that day:

"Hmm, now wait a minute, of course I can dance
Of course I can dance, I'm sure I can dance
I'm sure I can dance, I can dance
I can dance, I really hit the floor, ah, it feels good
Look at me dancin'!"

Leo Sayer, 1974(?)
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Welding for a living you just get used to hot stuff going down your boots, and, well, other places......
 
I love Marvelux!
When I was forced to live in a apartment, bullet casting was in stealth mode. Marvelux made it possible to cast without being thrown out.
Marvelux and the residue are both very water soluble (sodium carbonate). After a casting session everything got washed and sprayed with WD-40 (the WD is Water Displacing) and allowed to dry. Nothing rusted, everything worked fine.

Do I use it now? No, it is too much trouble. But it has a soft place in my heart.
 
pretty good for killing ants, and soldering too.
if you use it just so you can even get antimony ore into a wetted alloy.
 
fiver said:
pretty good for killing ants, and soldering too.
if you use it just so you can even get antimony ore into a wetted alloy.
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For antimony chunks I just grab the box of 20 mule team borax and shake a bunch into the pine sawdust flux.
 
Interesting read, thanks all. I've had an errant sprue go into my workbook top. I flipped it out quickly with my finger.

Thankfully I've never had a tinsel visit. I have had some bubbles in the pot from a cold ingot though that got my attention.

My biggest mistake was trying to scrub a stubborn mould with a nylon toothbrush while hot. I give the brush a shot of brake cleaner, opened the hot mould, and commenced to scrub the offending cavities. After a minute I looked and darned if those bristles weren't about 1/8" shorter.

I tried every solvent I had access to, including Hoppes, lacquer thinner, and acetone to no avail. I finally was able to gently scratch the offending nylon out with a wooden skewer. Every inch of the cavity was scoured. It took about half an hour more of casting before I didn't have any more contamination wrinkles.
 
Do not, may I repeat do not, dump a 50 year old tuna can full of some old guy's cast bullets into your molten pot. Yup, all the old bullet lube etc. would have burned off. That is if the ancient round of .25 auto with the stamped W primer hadn't instantly, and I do mean instantly, detonated ejecting several pounds of silver hell all over the old milk house I was casting in. The tiny 1/8x1/4" scar on my left hand is completely insignificant compared to what could have been.
 
RBHarter said:
9mm . Poor storage of carefully hand sorted range metal. View attachment 45499
90+ lbs on the floor.
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I bet that sucked !!!

I hit my plumbers pot, which was full, with the wheel of a hand cart while moving buckets full of ww to the pot. Splashed about ten pounds of molten lead into ( yes into ) the gravel under the pot! Recovered the lead, and an assortment of gravel too, mostly in one piece. The re-melt really had me cautiously adding chunks back into an empty pot, worried some trapped moisture in the mess wound again deposit it into the gravel and me!
 
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I know to warm the ingot mold before pouring....after NOT doing it last summer.
Yep cast iron can hold moisture if laying out side..The Tinsel fairy is fast:embarrassed:
still have a bit stuck in my suspenders.
 
RBHarter said:
9mm . Poor storage of carefully hand sorted range metal. View attachment 45499
90+ lbs on the floor.
Click to expand...
I had a similar scene long ago, but mine was caused by using a heavy aluminum pot to melt in. It worked fine the first time I used it, then a good sized piece burned out of the bottom and poured about 50 lbs of alloy on the driveway. I salvaged all of it of course, and bought a chineseium iron pot to replace it. The iron pot is still in use today.
 
I have had a few in my time. One was a reload I made for my wife's 38 special, I didn't put enough crimp on one round and the bullet traveled forward enough in the cylinder that it wouldn't rotate and I had to do some creative reworking to get the cylinder to swing out at home. I have also seated a couple primers backward and had to pull the rounds down. I did have one squib in a 380 round I loaded, but it may have been shooter error, the friend doing the shooting wasn't using a firm grip at all, I shut him down very quickly. Not bragging mind you, just thanking God.
 
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