And I AM Picky

[gunsonwheels]

Well the grankids and family arrive at 11:39 pm tonight in Cody, Wyoming.
 
Yesterday the postal carrier delivered an HMR Cannons Heavy Golf Ball Coehern/Coehorn Mortar and mold.  I cannot begin to express my pleasure and gratitude for both the timing of the arrival and the comparitvely massive quality of the product (I have always liked scaling the exterior larger than the bore).  What a great way to finally get a shooter back up and running.  No matter how much time and care I would have taken in doing this myself (I have an extremely well tooled South Bend Lathe 13" x 54") there is NO WAY it would have been any better than what Ed Hart has completed and delivered.
 
As they have available on the Practical Machinist Board... a great big THUMBS UP Ed!  And thank you more than I can adequately express for your dedication to a CW representative QUALITY product (He can't be getting rich by doing this so I invite any with the slightest interest to "hop on board").
 
Guns On (Beds-N) Wheels/George
 
PS:  headed out the door to lay in some stores from the big city so I will post pictures later.  I'll grin all the way there and back...                  ... ad on infinitum   

[Cat Whisperer]

Pictures, pictures, pictures!!!

[Double D]

I think George is acting a bit Grandfatherish....yeah that's It!  Go for it GoW!!! 

I tell my kids that If knew how much fun Grandkids were, I would have had them first.  Annoys my son to hear that...

[armorer77]

Thank you , thank you , no applause , just throw money . 

[gunsonwheels]

A couple of quick pics...  Also picked up about 150# of old wheel weights in Billings today for a couple of "coffee fund tickles".  We'll get a couple pics of HMR's GB mold in action over the next few days.
 

 
 

[Double D]

GoW
Be sure and sort those wheel weights.  There are least four different kinds.

1. Zinc
2. iron
3. pure lead
4.  wheel weight

The stick on types will be pure lead.  You will want to set those aside for special use in making alloys..

The iron weights will just float out of you mix.  Pick them out and take them to the salvage yard.

If you keep your temperature low when you  smelt, the zinc will also float and can be picked out.  If you get the temperature to high the zinc will melt and your mixtures will be like  oatmeal and won't work well for casting.  You are better off sorting the zinc out.

If you shoot steel and zinc balls out of your mortar you notice increase recoil.  If you are going to cast wheelweight balls reduce the loads substantially and work up in small increments.  Pressures and recoil will be higher.  This is a place where you will want to use  Fg  and not FFg.

Of course if you already  know this just ignore it.  There are others here who will find it useful.

[gunsonwheels]

DD
 
I appreciate the information... last time I was smelting wheel weights, almost all were wheelweight metal (mostly lead but with too much antimony to upset well) and lead stick-ons.  The lead simply increased the Pb content of the mix and was stired in.  I don't think they were even using zinc for them last time I processed a batch so I will bring up the heat slowly and carefully as well as tossing aside the ones that are obviously not mostly lead.
 
And yeah I know about slowing down the powder (increasing the grain size) when pushing dense materals but again it's been so long since I was ordnance shooting the reminder is good info for me as well as other board members just getting into it.   I will be sure to use 4Fa or Fg when I push wheelweight balls instead of golf balls and also start light and work up.  Good reminders for all.

[keith44]

Thanks for the indepth detail on the various projectiles and powder recommendations.  I would not have thought about it before hand.  When I do get a GB mortar the plan is to only shoot golf balls, but the boom and arc of the metal projectiles has to be a ... blast
 

[gunsonwheels]

Test results to date:
 
Controlling the range on GB's appears easiest when using a fairly fine grain powder (3Fg) and very precisely controlling the relatively small charges.  It appears more difficult to get the control with the coarser stuff.  We've run 4Fa (very equvalent to Fg), 2Fg and 3Fg.  I think I will send off and get a set of ML powder measures for the puppy but if I were competing I would scale/weigh all the charges.  If I remember correctly, Jim B. said that's the drill everyone at Grayling uses.
 
I think I will short-crop mow the field out back and put a hula hope out there to try and drop balls into it...        
 
I find it interesting that the challenges to accuracy in mortars are very comparable to shooting rifled cannon.  And it is all just as much fun.  Be safe and keep your powder dry...       

[Double D]

keep practicing and you will be ready for hole in one contest and book shoot a CBCCII. 

The hole in  one contest will have an opening pot of $100.

[gunsonwheels]

Sounds like a blast (no pun intended).  I have to admit I never thought the smooth-bore, small stuff could be as addictive as the larger, rifled stuff... but it really, really is... 

[smokemjoe]

Yes, Melt the lead slow, I been doing that for51 years, last batch I used a turkey burning and ran it to hot, lost 130 lbs. of lead,