Adventures in Boolit casting. Part 1

Nearly 2 years ago, I took a trip down to the local Cabela's (Lehi, UT at the time) and purchased a brand new Colt 1851 Navy reproduction in .44



It was a wonderful experience, walking in and buying a gun without having to have a background check. Ah to have lived in the 30's.

I immediately purchased the required items to fire the weapon, and a holster in which to carry it.

I went out to shoot it within a week or so, and found it very enjoyable to shoot. It would hit the bullseye on my target at 50 yards so long as I did my part. Can't remember the load though.

But something hit me, the price of 100 round ball for the thing was crazy. $20, I couldn't believe it, I could buy 100 loaded rounds for my 9mm for that price.

So I started looking into ways I could shoot this thing for less money. The most immediate answer was found in a round ball mould from Lee Precision.

I purchased this mould for $20 at Cabela's and my Father in law provided me with a small bag of lead shot.

Well, I got together a Coleman Camp stove, some propane, a stainless steel pot, and a ladle made out of a stamped steel measuring cup and a pair of vice grips.

Well, I melted that lead down knowing nothing of lead alloys and hardness, and I was able to create some nice round ball.

Then I went out and shot a few of these. Well, the accuracy was excellent, and I got NO leading. There was just one problem, they were a real bear to load.

Well, I went out and joined in at castboolits.gunloads.com and immediately figured out that what I had was a bag full of magnum shot, which has high antimony and arsenic content, resulting in a hard alloy.

So I bought a few pounds of plumber's lead and cast several more round ball. Loading problem solved.

But I seemed to have to skim off a lot of dross, turns out I needed to flux the pot.

I pilfered a scented candle from my wife(she still doesn't know it's gone) and dropped a small amount of the wax in the melt, sure enough, the dross returned to pure lead.

Well, I went on active duty for quite a while (I'm still on active duty) and was unable to continue until just recently, More on my leap to boolits for smokeless weapons later.