The weekend is here! The rain is gone...

Beagle333

New member
and so it's time to play in the yard. It's going to be really hot, so why not sit around a pot of lead!:D

First...... the dirty part. And no, I do not cast from this pot. This is an old one that is dedicated to smelting and I don't want/need a bigger one because this one will melt them about as fast as I can test them with the cutters and sort. Besides, my ol' wrist gets tired before a pot finishes anyway. Stick-on weights go on the left, clip-ons on the right, steel and zinkers in the coffee can with the clips.
(I do plan to quit smelting very soon, so I don't need/want to upgrade or change my setup or methods just now.):)

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(That's just water in the red can in the background. The coffee can on the table is for clips.)
 
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Here' my smelting set-up.

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Turkey fryer that is reinforced to handle a full pot of lead. The structure just did not look to be able to hold 100 pounds of lead if the pot was ever full.

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I have 6 of the Lyman ingot molds, a couple saeco and some lee's As well as 2 muffin molds. Cast full to-the-top- the Lyman molds are 5#, makes them easy to stack and gives a broad surface to write on the identify different alloys.
 
I only got the one Saeco mold.... but it's a nice relaxing time in the shade here today, 4 ingots at a time. :)
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I ended up with 46.23# out of that box. Not too bad considering it wasn't sorted before. I usually get sorted WW when I buy em, but these were on sale.
There was a good number of steel ones in there, and mebbe half a dozen zinkers. :cool:


And... while I was mixin and stirrin and making smoke, I mixed up about 50# of premium HP alloy from a bunch of sheet lead and isotope containers I had.:D
 
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I cast a pan of these today. :) This is the NOE 35 XCB bullet. I believe it's 228 grains, but I didn't weigh one as cast yet. They don't have much lube groove at all. 'Not that it matters in my case, since I'm going to powdercoat them, but it doesn't hold much lube if you were to lube it. I think I remember somebody saying the reason for that.... but it escapes me at the moment.:cool:

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and I also cast some more of these NOE 432-265 HPs. I still don't have a .44, but there's supposed to be one on a brown truck now and it may be here tomorrow. :D
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Did ya get that 44 off the brown truck Beagle ?

I just ran into a similar situation and just purchased a 4" S&W 686-3 to match my 6" 686-3 and to give me another excuse to fire more of the MP 359-640's LOL.

Yep, it's my story.....
 
I got the email that UPS delivered it to somebody. But my gunsmith (and FFL) had to go out of town for 2 weeks suddenly on a family emergency thing, so it's locked up in his shop!!! And it's one of the Ruger Bisley .44 specials with the 5.5" barrel. :(
 
That is a major bummer Beagle... sorry to hear that. Nothing like waiting two weeks after Christmas to get your present!

For the time being though I'll give you a peek at my new to me toy....

4" S&W 686-3

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