rethinking my fluxing

[Lloyd Smale]

YOu guys that know me know i do alot of casting. Ive noticed lately that ive had more and more trouble making good bullets. I about know the problem. Its zinc wws. Those evil little sobs that the liberals are shoving down our throats. I smelt way to much ww to have the time to pick out individual weights or to smelt at a low enough temp to have them float out. Now i can add 5 percent tin (2 percent isnt enough with zinc contamination) and it helps or cut them with lynotype (which is getting about impossible for me to find anymore. I did some testing the last couple weeks and came up with something i think might help. Ive never really have been a big fan of fluxing. I flux when i clean wws and flux when i alloy but rarely flux the pot. Maybe once or twice in a 4 hour session. What i did this time was cast a pile of 300 grain lyman swc 44s and 340 bc lfngc 44s. I first casted with lead i fluxed when smelting and then fluxed again alloying it into both 5050 ww/lynotype and ww/5percent tin. I then casted as i usually do fluxing occasionaly but not alot. I then switched to the same batch of wws and alloyed them the same with the exception that instead of fluxing i just skimmed off the top. I did both alloys again and casted with them but again did not flux at all and just skimmed and scaped the pot about evey half an hour. With the 5050 it cut my variations in bullet weights in half and by over 3/4s in the ww 2 percent alloy. I went from an avearage of about 9 grains to 4 with the ww 2 alloy and from 5 to 1.5 with the 5050 alloy. Now this isnt a controled test as it was only one batch of wws but it was about typical in casting character and bullet weights. I guess the conclusion i came to is that fluxing for the most part is going to be a thing of the past for me as its not making any sense to flux in the zinc as i cast. To be honest i did a simular test years ago and found that overfluxing hurt more then not fluxing at all but i never got the dramatic effects i got this time and havent had the problem with bullet fillout that ive had lately either. Where i really notice it is between the cavitys of 2 cavity large molds. The hot spots seem to be much more prevelent with contaminated alloy. I also noticed in testing that my best bullet were comming when i ran my pot as cool as i could for the alloy. My thoughts on that are that the cooler the alloy the more of the zinc that seperated. Any thoughts?

[Woodbutcher]

 Dear Lloyd:
 Just thanks. Stuff on this site is better than any mag article I've ever read.
                                                                         Woodbutcher

[Dusty Miller]

The guy I buy my lead from tells me he already has fluxed the stuff till the chickens come home so I'm going to try a casting session w/out fluxing and see what happens.  I guess the worst outcome would be a bunch of bullets get thrown back into the pot. 

[dubber123]

I used to flux very often, but have gone to just skimming the pot the last 3 times I cast, probably out of laziness.  I thought I noticed the bullets cast and looked better.  Maybe it wasn't my imagination.  Hey, at least flux is one less thing to have to buy.  Thanks Lloyd.

[Cheesehead]

What do you guys use for flux?

Cheese

[Lloyd Smale]

Remelted the batch of #2 that i was having problems with and cooled and skimmed it a few times. It seems to have helped alot with that batch. I also made a batch of ww + 3% tin this morning and skimmed the crap out of it too and it seems to be casting ok. Guess a guys just got to learn to do alot more skimming then fluxing!! Ive never been a fan of fluxing much as its been proven that once your lead is alloyed it will not seperate and the only good fluxing is doing is cleaning your alloy and if you flux it well when you smelt your wws its should be clean enough as is and about all your doing fluxing is driving the zinc back in the melt. For now on ill flux when doing up wws and skim the rest of the time. As far as flux goes most anything works. Ive used bees wax. paraphin wax. bullet lube, motor oil, sawdust,  cat litter. Most of the time i just use paraphin canning wax.

[Cheesehead]

I have been using junk crayons and left over wax from burned out candles, still kinda new to bullet casting and was wondering.

Cheese

[dubber123]

I always used Marvelux casting flux, but it looks like I may have a lifetime supply now that I probably won't use it during casting anymore.

[Lloyd Smale]

crayons and candle wax work fine. I used mavelflux a long time ago and didnt care for it. It fluxes fine but i leaves a hard crusty deposit in the pot thats darned near impossible to get out.

[masek77]

You dont need any flux whatsoever with the lead I sell.

With that said if you have dirty range lead or wheel weight lead one of the best and cheapest fluxes is 20 Mule Team Borax. Youll find it in the same aisle where they sell detergents and bleach. Add the borax slowly. It will react with the lead at first and foam up a lot at first.

Dont overheat the lead as it will give off strong fumes that if you breathe in will put a lot of lead in your system.

[gutshot_again]

I use a scrap piece of wood about 1 inch square and 12 o 16 inches long to flux.  I only flux when casting when I fill the pot.  Take the stick and put it right in the melt and stir and scrap the sides and bottom.  I find it works better than wax, crayons, wood shavings, and Marvelux and I've tried them all.

One word of caution.  First time you put the wood in the melt each day, make sure you hold your gloved hand up by the pot in line with your face/body.  It will sputter and spit for a few seconds burning the water out, but then it works just fine.

[Lloyd Smale]

one more thing i did that helped today. I got the alloy straightened around and was casting with 3 differnt molds. Two of them were casting perfectly and my 44 320 lyman swcgc mold was still not filling out in the lube grove perfectly. I took a brass wire brush and scrubbed the mold gently and it casted perfectly after that. Im guessing the zinc contamination was holding on in the mold cavity where the hot spots were. Once removed the mold worked fine.