Sorting.

[Rollis]

Last time I, was home, I, started sorting some of my recover lead. My MBC 18 brn, and my 12 brn. I, also separated my slugs from the rest of my burm findings. My jacketed, and .22's. Would the slugs, .22's, and jacketed be of the same hardness, that can be used together?

[craig110]

The cores of jacketed bullets are, I believe, almost always pure lead while slugs and lead boolits (which includes .22s) tend to be an alloy so they have the needed strength. Separating out the jacketed bullets before smelting, therefore, is worthwhile since smelting already-alloyed boolits with pure might end up giving you a hardness that is too soft.

[myg30]

I've taken all the mined bullets that were given to me and melted them all in one pot. The FMJ's were smashed with a hammer to crack em so the lead come out. I marked it as "RL", and into the crate along with PB,WW. When the time comes I'll check the hardness and into the pot along with what it takes to get the BNH im looking for.
I dont cast hard,8-10 bnh. Anything fast is getting gas checks.

Just me .02 cents worth,

Mike

[cohutt]

I make berm porridge out of everything and it come out similar to my standard softer casting formula of 50/50 ww/pure.

And note:

No need to smash fmj bullets; this is an unnecessary step. They have been hurled into a backstop @ speeds in excess of 600MPH and brought to a sudden stop and are most certainly damaged to some degree when you dig them out.

In my experience I have never come across a FMJ that wasn't a hollow shell when skimming my berm smelts. I shake them over the post a couple times like the french fry operator at McDonalds does and any remnants of leads returns to the pot.

Likewise, I have never heard any sort of "pop" supporting the idea that these "explode" when the jackets break. Given the fact that there very well may be moisture in dirt on some of the mined bullets I always started from a cold pot, ie never dumped fresh bullets into a hot DO of lead.

Cold pot of bullets ready to melt:
http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m284/cohutt/bermining%202/misc004.jpg

Skimming and shaking out the jackets (note the splatters below):

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m284/cohutt/bermining%202/misc012.jpg

[Rollis]

With the bullets trap I, use I, have been able to keep the 158 SWC's, and the 200 gn swc from everything else because I, know their hardness. Also I, want to do the .22's, separate just in case there is contamination.

[Tag]

May I ask what bullet trap you have? I need to build one but can't decide whether to use a sand filled type or a metal one.

[Rollis]

Card board boxes filled with rubber tire much. We had a detailed thread a couple of months back. I, would link it, but I'm, not sure how to do it on the phone. I, have found that three bankers box's filled with the rubber will stop up to a .44 mag.

[blueline541]

I had photos of my rubber mulch trap posted here...somewhere....sometime....once....

[craig110]

Pulling down the search box and entering "rubber mulch" pulls up a pretty narrow set of hits.

[fredj338]

Like cohutt & mig, I smelt my range lead in one pot w/o sorting, pour it in Glockpost ingots & treat it as 50/50 lead/ww alloy. It seems to run about 10BHN. I use three diff ingot molds for range, pure & ww alloy, then mix in the casting pot.