Author Topic: Lead Hardness tester worth buying ??  (Read 594 times)

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Offline pistolfan

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Lead Hardness tester worth buying ??
« on: April 20, 2004, 10:54:19 AM »
Have a question for you all. Is it worth buying a lead hardness tester?? I was thinking of getting the LBT one but I'm just not sure. I've cast my own bullets for 25+ years for several different calibers, three of which I shoot the Postal Matches in the CBA. I used mostly lino for all of it but recently I started using wheel weights also. I melt about 40lbs down at once and label these ingots so I make all bullets from the same melt. I want to try and make the best bullet I can for the Postal Matches and was wondering if an hardness tester would help me get the correct mix for that caliber and weight of bullet. Any help you all can send my way will be appreciated. Peter

Offline AnthonyB

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Lead Hardness tester worth buying ??
« Reply #1 on: April 20, 2004, 12:48:19 PM »
I think you answered the question when you said you had been casting for 25 years without one... Tony

Offline Lloyd Smale

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Lead Hardness tester worth buying ??
« Reply #2 on: April 20, 2004, 01:00:29 PM »
I wouldnt be without one my recomendation is the one gussy sells at castingstuff.com. its accurate inexpensive and well built.
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Offline calvon

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Hardness Tester?
« Reply #3 on: April 20, 2004, 06:17:52 PM »
Veral Smith suggests in his book that a hardness tester should be the last gadget you buy. If you will water drop your bullets from the mold, and if you use straight wheel weights, the hardness will be somewhere around 20 BHN which is plenty hard enough for most purposes.

For water dropping I've found that a big cheap kitchen sponge works great. Fill a five gallon bucket three fourths full of water. hold the sponge under the surface of the water and squeeze most or all of the air out of it. Then allow the sponge to come back to its normal size while holding it under water. This assures the sponge will be completely waterlogged. It will barely float. Now when you drop bullets onto it it will do a slow roll and drop the bullets onto the bottom of the bucket, but only after they have hardened enough by the sudden cooling so that they won't be deformed. It also hardens wheelweight lead to 18-20 BHN range.

Offline Lloyd Smale

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Lead Hardness tester worth buying ??
« Reply #4 on: April 20, 2004, 11:18:42 PM »
if you shoot a lot of water dropped bullets it can be handy for testing them. I used to water drop bullets but found ( using a tester) that the hardness varied quite a bit do to the inconsistancys in the temp of the bullets when they hit the water. I dont bother with it anymore and alloy my lead to get the hardness i want. Mine has payed for itself many times over by taking it along to the salvage yards when i have purchased lead. Ive found it many times in ingot form and the tester is about the only way you can truely find out what your buying. Ive bough lynotpye that the guy was selling as ww for 10cents a lb. I picked up 500 lbs of it and the tester was payed for three times over right there. If your just going to cast ww its not worth buying but if your going to alloy lead at all its a real handy tool. I have a few buddys that borrow casting stuff all the time and the two hardness testers i have are the most borrowed things on the shelf.
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