lead purity

[proman1]

Don't know if this is "pure" lead or not... I have about 400 lbs of lead left from the Anchorage Providence Hospital reno/add project in 2010... it came from sheets of drywall lined with the stuff about 1/8" thick and real soft,
Gen. Contractor was gonna dispose of it but I convinced the Gen. Foreman to let me take it all.
almost half of it was cast into 3 and 4 lb trolling /halibut fishing weights, I also gave a local gunsmith 100 lbs for his blackpowder rifles using Minie bullets .

 
I want to make some hard cast .454 and .500 cal bullets...
 
how do I tell or test for purity other than the obvious malleable softness of the metal  before I mix an alloy of lead and tin..

[JaDub]

I think it will work well. I`ve  used it in the past.   Not sure what you mean about `hardcast`..........

[proman1]

no offense but this is a cast bullet section and if you have no clue what a "hardcast" bullet is please don't respond  !:angry::angry:

I've always used wheelweights to make a #2 Lyman alloy for my .44 Mag and .357 mag cast bullets but I have never used pure lead . Just want to make lead/ tin alloy for the proper Brinell hardness (hardcast) bullets for higher muzzle velocities of my .454 Casull and. 500 S&W Mag revolvers,

my question is... how do I determine if its pure lead ?

[proman1]

scratch the question, got my info from somewhere else !

http://www.theantimonyman.com/testingmetals.htm

[JaDub]

Having cast round ball for a muzzel loader out of the very same material that you inquired about  some time ago,  I THOUGHT I was being helpful.  I will respond when I feel I have something to give.  Please be a bit more patient with those of us that are not `experts`.
 
  JaDub

[davidlt89]

no offense but this is a cast bullet section and if you have no clue what a "hardcast" bullet is please don't respond !

theres a lot of "offense" in that response. please be cautious of what you write. God bless.

[gitano]

I was going to tell you how I do it, but since you got such a simple :) explanation of how to do it at the link you provided, you clearly don't need any help from someone that ALSO isn't familiar with your technical term "hardcast".

Good luck with that.

Paul

[drinksgin (deceased)]

Hard cast is a relative term, means different things, I do a LOT of casting and testing, the only way I know to get "real " hard cast is to buy a very antimony rich, over 15% alloy from Rotometals,
The BHN likely will be more than 50, this is a very specialized alloy and I know of no reasonable uses for it other than hardening very soft lead.
I use an alloy with wws that is BHN 12-15 and can make it BHN 28-32 by just water dropping it, find there is no reason to go up to that level.
I am familiar with the material you speak of, likely BHN 5-6,
You COULD spring for a hardness tester.
In reading your post, I suspect you do not know what hardcast is.
Get the Lee second edition manual, it has a very good explanation of the alloy hardness needed to withstand certain pressures.

[RatherBHuntin]

Get the Lee second edition manual, it has a very good explanation of the alloy hardness needed to withstand certain pressures.

Been reading this myself, lots of good info in there about BHN and pressures.