Round ball lead and alloy?

[Turtle Creek]

I've just started casting round balls and see lots of lead available with minor amounts of alloy.
Is that any kind of issue for a patched ball?
What alloys are acceptable.
Thanks
Hope this is in the right section...

 

[cullen1780]

I use wheel weights to cast 10, 12 and 14 ga musket balls and shoot the bare ball in a smoothbore; they shoot about 1" higher than pure lead at 30yds. I only use patched pure lead for rifled barrels.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

There are no issues regarding damage to the barrel. Lead alloys may be sufficiently lighter that they get a bit more muzzle velocity when using the same powder load used for an all lead bullet. Thus they may strike higher on a target at the range.

Being harder, they shrink less when cooling after being cast, so often folks who have a tight ball and patch combination suddenly find it impossible to load an alloy ball made with the same mold used for their all lead bullet.

As an alloy is harder than soft lead as it doesn't deform and readily, some folks with smaller calibers worry about the size of the wound on large game... on the other hand the lack of deformation of the harder, alloy bullet can be an advantage giving deeper penetration on certain types of shots on big game.

LD

 

[wayne terry]

Ditto.
What LD said.

 

[Turtle Creek]

Thank you gents, appreciated and good points.

 

[Rick Boylan]

I just bought a Lee double round ball mold from a guy on ebay and was wondering the same thing. I have a rifled kentucky style rifle and am looking into what lead I need to cast good round balls for my gun. Is a Lee mold a good place to start and should I only buy pure lead?

From the advice I see here that is what I am thinking.

 

[bpd303]

Pure lead is only needed for revolver shooting. Harder (alloy) balls will work for patched ball shooting, especially if you are mostly shooting target's or plinking. For hunting I would lean more to softer lead. I have molds from all the manufactures and Lee's work just as well as any of them with a plus of costing much less.

 

[hanshi]

I've had good luck with WW and alloyed lead in my rifles. I prefer WW ball for my .62 smoothbore. Just adjust your patch for the slight dia. increase and rifles do well with alloys.

 

[Zonie]

I have several Lee molds and haven't had a problem with them. For the money I consider them to be an excellent buy.

Buy the softest lead you can find.

Lead made from salvaged pistol/rifle bullets from a shooting range will be quite hard.
Lead from roofing companies will be quite soft.

As the others have mentioned, if your stuck using a hard lead you may have to reduce the thickness of the patch you've been using.

This is needed because the lead roundball won't deform when it's started into the muzzle.

The catch here is, the patch will still need to be deeper than the rifling grooves on your guns to seal the grooves off.

For most factory made guns, this isn't a big problem but if your shooting a rifle with a barrel made by Rice, Getz, Douglas, Green Mountain or other muzzleloading barrel makers they will have rifling grooves .012 to .016 deep.

 

[Rick Boylan]

Thanks, that's good to know guys. My gun is a factory made one so I'm good there. I just need to get a lead pot to melt it, and find some suitable lead to melt and make balls.

Thanks for the help. :hatsoff:

 

[mooman76]

Not much to add but I concur with everyone else here. I use soft lead now because I have it but even most of it isn't quite pure. I used to use WWs and range lead because that's all I had and it worked fine.

 

[jamesthomas]

I use Lee Molds all time, works as good or better than Lyman for half the cost. I only use pure lead, Not to hard to find around here.

 

[Rick Boylan]

Good information guys. Thanks for the feedback.

Now I just need to get the last two items (melting pot and lead) and then setup in a well ventilated area where I won't poison myself with lead fumes. Then I'll be in business.

I know my loading/gunsmith bench won't work because it's in a small room area in my basement. The only thing I could use in that area would be a fan to move the air. I doubt that would be good enough ventilation for doing this.

But I'm almost there. :grin:

 

[Turtle Creek]

Go out into the garage, leave the door open and still use the fan.
I have a Lee pro pot IV that has a bottom spout on it controlled by a lever.
Nice and quick...no dipping and since the dross floats on top no casting problems.
My Lee .527 mold throws great balls with no sprue at all.

 

[Rick Boylan]

Ahhh, so I didn't need the dipper I bought with the mold? :haha:

That sounds like a heck of a setup. I'm going shopping for that model of melting pot.

 

[Rick Boylan]

Hey, what is a fair price to pay for soft lead?
I see lead sold on eBay and it's all over the map on prices.

 

[jamesthomas]

I would not pay any more than $2.00 a pound myself, its too easy to get it for free to pay much more.

 

[mooman76]

$1 a pound is a fair price if you can get it but can't always find it that cheap.

 

[Turtle Creek]

I bought 10 lbs of 99.9% pure lead from RotoM and there seemed to be a lot of cr@p in the stuff for 99.9.
I'll try another source when I use this up.

 

[doug60]

Last time I picked up roofers lead at the local auto reclaiming center it was .75 a pound