id29ohmj@gmail.com wrote:HI All I'am new to reloading and have been reading up on casting lead bullets. Most articles seem to be for rifle rounds and very little for hand guns. AS I can get wheel weights a plenty is there any reason not to cast this lead or do I need to add to the lead. This has confused me a little as I can't find articles that refer to hand gun casting.
If you seriously want to cast your own my suggestion is...
1) Buy the proper lead...Northern Smelters "hardball" 92-6-2 (lead, antimony. tin) It will make your process much easier than re-cooking range junk or wheel weights.
2) Buy a bottom dropping lead melting setup like the RCBS
3) Buy moulds with the correct shape and weight bullets you want to cast. You can usually buy 2 cavity,3, 4 or even more. Don't go too many cavities as you will find it difficult to hold by hand when dropping molten lead.
4) You have to decide whether you want to use lubed bullets, Hi Tek coated or Powder Coated. I prefer the Hi Tek coating.
5) You will need a bullet sizing setup to do final sizing after casting. Moulds are designed to drop bullets with about .002-.003" larger in diameter than your gun needs so sizing is required. The sizer can often be bought with lubing capability through the sizing die if that's what you decide to do. Bullet sizing is really a swaging process which stretches the bullet very slightly to final size and perfect roundness and concentricity. Important for accuracy. This depends mostly on the quality of the dies used.
Are you still sure you want to do your own? It's quite an investment in money and in time as well as learning the process. Commercially manufactured bullets are readily sold with Hi Tek coating, sized and ready to go. The typical 9mm 124gr bullet is about $65.00 to $70.00 per 500 which is only 14 cents per bullet.
Think about it carefully before jumping into it. I sell lots of bullets to other shooters at my 2 clubs for this very reason. Many tried the casting process and found that ultimately the time taken actually detracted from their free time to go shooting. My process however is pretty close to some of the commercial manufacturers since I use automated casting and sizing machinery which means high volume and very high quality.
If you want to have a go anyway look here...
https://www.castbulletengineering.com.au/https://www.northernsmelters.com.au/bullet-castinghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jybdckmHDbQhttps://www.rcbs.com/bullet-casting/