Post by: Stormrider51 on May 10, 2011, 05:30:32 PM
I was casting balls in what is supposed to be a .600" Lee mould. The actual size is .604". The weight is supposed to be 325 grains according to what is written on the box. The pure lead balls came in at 330 grains average. So why bother to weigh them? Because out of the approximately 100 balls I weighed, 6 of them showed substantially less weight. The ones I culled varied between 327 and a low of 323 grains. So again, what's the big deal? Ask yourself where the missing weight went in a ball that outwardly looks like all the rest? Those light balls have pockets of either air, impurities, or both in them. You can bet that the pockets aren't located dead center of the ball where they would do the least damage. The pockets are off-center and cause an unbalanced ball. Just for grins, I placed a couple of the lightest ones sprue up on a smooth surface and gave them a spin with my thumb and index finger. Both wobbled visibly. How many times have you fired a shot that looked and felt good but was a "flyer" well outside the group? The problem may well have not been you.
Let me stress that you don't need to go out and purchase a grain scale and weigh all your projectiles in order to enjoy shooting black powder firearms. I'm an accuracy nut, or "geek" to use the modern parlance, and I like knowing that my gun is performing to its best ability. Then if I draw bead on something and miss I don't have much excuse. It was me!
Have fun,
John
Post by: biliff on May 10, 2011, 05:50:40 PM
Post by: Loyalist Dave on May 10, 2011, 06:44:12 PM
LD
Post by: Uncle Russ on May 10, 2011, 09:26:31 PM
Quote from: "Loyalist Dave"
If you ever threw or saw thrown one of those "gag" baseballs with the smaller ball inside a hollow cavity, you get some idea of a possible wobble you might get from a round ball with a good air pocket inside. Not good for the hunter, or the target shooter. Not geeky at all, especially for the guys and gals who hand cast.
LD
Good question SR51!
I would like to respond just a bit to this since I have well over fifty years experience casting bullets and playing around with muzzleloaders.
Dave nailed it...a void, or air space, in a round ball can only be detected by weighing it. And, if it is a large enough void you can see some really silly results down range...curve balls, knuckle balls, drop balls, ya just never know what to expect.
At the same time, I love it!
(It provides the greatest excuses you can imagine, when you do something really stupid.)
Have you ever weighed the round balls from the factory?
Pretty common to find a variance of 2 to 3%.
As far as what the mould says it will throw, and what you actually get, is based on many major manufacturers using the most common alloy from Lyman know as 20:1 (twenty parts pure lead to one part Tin.)
The problem with most folks is their not accepting the fact that plain old wheel weights are as close as you can get to 20:1 without actually mixing the alloy yourself. The BHN of 20:1 is roughly 9, while wheel weights can vary from 9 to 11.
Pure lead will have a BHN of about six nowadays. Many of us old timers can remember when that was 5.5 or maybe a little less!
Personally, I don't get too excited about the hardness...hard can be good in many instances, whereas soft and obturation can be good in other cases.
IMHO, the lowly wheel weight shoots just fine in all my muzzleloaders, albeit roughly .0015 or perhaps .0020 undersize from the same round ball cast with pure lead.
By the same token a pure lead round ball will weigh a wee bit more than the same ball cast from wheel weights.
Of course, the larger the round ball, the more pronounced the weight variance.
I used to fret and whine over every little variance in my muzzleloading, but at my age it just it ain't worth it...not until it reaches a point of greater than 5-6%.
There is, in my opinion, other things that I can put that effort toward that could possibly give me a little better score, assuming i do everything right.
Things such as same Patch thickness, same Patch material, same good Lube, and the same consistent, even, seating pressure without damaging the shape of the ball.
This is just my thoughts on the subject, and like all things in life, everyone's mileage may vary just a wee bit.
Uncle Russ...
Post by: greyhunter on May 10, 2011, 10:06:31 PM
Good topic tho, enjoying it!
Post by: pathfinder on May 10, 2011, 11:33:27 PM
All this dicourse is great for disscusion,but in the field and on wood's walks and the fun kind of shootin' we do,2-5% difference in ball weight is more than compensated by the harrasment you get yer "freind's"! On the bench my Bess shoots 1" groups @25yds,off hand I'm lucky to hold 2" @ 25yds. I dont weigh them,but I do "roll" 'em.
I would suggest the book book bt Capt. Ned Roberts,"The muzzleloading Caplock Rifle" to REALLY get the low down about accurate shooting with our beloved muzzleloaders.
Post by: Double Barrel on May 11, 2011, 12:04:42 PM
Good stuff! And it makes a lot of sense. Pretty much all of my shooting is off hand at a woodswalk so I never gave this much consideration.
Post by: R.M. on May 11, 2011, 12:26:58 PM
When asked about loading sprue up, we're told yes load up, so we can see the position, but not to worry about being dead center cause we can't be perfect every time, but get it close. It's said that the sprue, even slightly off-set will still stabilize itself.
Now if you think about it, we're talking the same thing. One has an excess of material, and the other has a deficiency of material.
Gotta go get another cuppa joe and ponder this some more.
Post by: Stormrider51 on May 11, 2011, 01:15:18 PM
Quote from: "R.M."
So this has got me thoroughly confused. I know, nothing new.
When asked about loading sprue up, we're told yes load up, so we can see the position, but not to worry about being dead center cause we can't be perfect every time, but get it close. It's said that the sprue, even slightly off-set will still stabilize itself.
Now if you think about it, we're talking the same thing. One has an excess of material, and the other has a deficiency of material.
Gotta go get another cuppa joe and ponder this some more.
R.M.,
Sorry if I'm being confusing. Now you know why I don't write textbooks for a living. The stuff I'm writing about comes from a lifetime of trying to make a rifle as accurate as possible. As has been point out, it really doesn't make much difference when it comes to casual shooting. Where the attention to detail does make a difference is when you are shooting from a bench for score or when you are hunting. In competition, 1/2" can be the difference between winning and losing. With a rabbit, 1/2" can be the difference between a clean kill and a wounded animal that escapes to die later.
I'm glad you brought up the question of sprues. I use Lee moulds that don't leave a sprue of metal sticking up. If anything, they create a slight flat spot where the metal is sheared off. Back when I had moulds that did leave a protruding sprue I would roll the balls between two panes of glass until the sprues disappeared. But even if the sprue is left unmolested, it will not have much effect on bullet flight provided it is not on the side of the ball. Neither would air voids or pockets of impurities if we could be sure they were somewhere along the vertical axis of the spinning ball but we have no way of knowing where the flaw is. Even then, I accept a ball that is no more than 3 grains underweight. There's a limit for even a nut like me!
Hope this thinned out the mud a little.
John
Post by: Caddo on May 11, 2011, 03:06:05 PM
Post by: R.M. on May 11, 2011, 03:20:41 PM
Post by: Caddo on May 11, 2011, 04:07:15 PM
Post by: Uncle Russ on May 11, 2011, 04:57:50 PM
Quote from: "Caddo"
Ya know, your right RM :lt th
Uncle Russ...
Post by: Stormrider51 on May 11, 2011, 05:32:14 PM
If some of you are thinking that I cheated by using a vernier tang sight or shooting from a bench let me point out that if the load itself and every component in it hadn't been as consistent as I could make it there could have been one or more "flyers" that ruined the group. That's my whole point in this. I am definitely not criticizing anyone who wants to "just go shoot". I'm offering this information for those who find it interesting and perhaps useful.
Take care,
John
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v415/jhansen1951/P5110332.jpg)
Post by: prairie dog on May 11, 2011, 06:47:10 PM
I can also understand that swagged balls from a factory come out of a line of machines and all those may not be the exact same dimensions. Thus slightly larger balls weigh more than the smaller ones.
Of the 600 balls I weighed about 100 weighed exactly 183 grains, 60 or so weighed 183.5 grains, 150 weighed 184 grains. A few were as heavy as 184.4 grains, 50 or so weighed 182.5 grains and one ball with no visible flaws weighed 181 grains.
Which brings up the question; Why won't the factory box up the balls from one swagging machine on the line instead of mixing them up before packaging? Seams to me that would lend to more consistency and uniformity of the balls, better accuracy, and save me a lot of time re-sorting them.
They could even package the balls form one die in a different package and sell those as a "premium" product.
Post by: Uncle Russ on May 11, 2011, 11:57:17 PM
Some swear by casting, some swear by swagging, some swear at both...pick your own poison.
Either way you go, just keep in mind that it's not a perfect science. Keep your melt at an even temperature, keep your casting speed a consistent pace, and make sure you have at least some knowledge of whats to be expected from the alloy your using, along with the finished product......
Sprue up, sprue down, has been the subject of many honest, well meaning, debates.
Lube makes for another great discussion. There are possibly as many 'great recipes' for home-brewed lube as there are shooters, and they all have merit for the person using them at the time.
Patch thickness, material, and 'weave' by thread count can also be interesting.
Ball hardness, softness, diameter, plus speed or the lack thereof, all has its place in this wonderful game of muzzleloading.
The one single thing that all these factors have in common is the opportunity it gives each of us in getting to know our old rifleguns just a little bit better, and that is the one sure-fire thing that is going bring home the bacon.
Just my thoughts.
Uncle Russ...
Post by: Stormrider51 on May 12, 2011, 10:44:29 AM
Russ - You hinted at something else that is a big factor in shooting, confidence. It can't be weighed or measured but it sure does show up on the target. Every time you step up to the line, draw bead, and see a hole appear right where you were aiming, your confidence increases. Knowing that you have done everything you could to make your gun accurate increases the probability of that hole appearing where you aimed.
I do all this stuff because I find it interesting and fun. There are those in our association who can tell you the exact dates that certain events in history happened. Some can look at someone in period clothing and point out anything that doesn't fit the the time period the person is re-creating. They find those things interesting where I have at best a general knowledge. One of the great things about muzzleloading is that there's room for everybody to pursue something that interests them.
John
Post by: Caddo on May 12, 2011, 11:58:50 AM
Post by: Hanshi on May 12, 2011, 05:29:55 PM
. I've never seen any advantage to weighing balls but I'm not a precision match competitor. The accuracy I get with as-cast ball is better than I can shoot. No way could I be precise enough to tell a difference unless it was a real-bad-ball way under weight. And then, just maybe.
Post by: prairie dog on October 30, 2015, 01:32:26 AM
After they cooled down I weighed every one of those balls on my RCBS scales and I learned something interesting.
91 balls weighed exactly 227.0 grains.
16 balls weighed one to two tenths of a grain lighter. (226.8 - 226.9 grains)
5 balls weighed one to three tenths of a grain heavier. (227.1 -227.3 grains)
That is a spread of five tenths of a grain. or half a grain. That is a heck of a lot better than any of the balls I have purchased, either cast or swagged.
However, I also had 4 balls which weighed 231.2 grains. 4.2 grains heavier than the majority (227.0 grains)
Now I understand how an air pocket inside a cast ball will make that ball lighter than the others. But it wasn't making sense to me what caused those 4 balls to be that much heavier. Were those heavy balls the only ones that didn't have an air pocket? What in the heck was I doing wrong to get that many light balls? I worried over this for a couple of hours then walked away from it.
Latter, I came back and took a closer look at those heavy balls. I noticed that the mold line (or seam) appeared to be more pronounced on them. When I ran my fingernail over them I could feel those lines. On the other balls I could see a faint line but I could not feel it with my fingernail.
Thinking on that, I concluded that some of the hot lead must have gotten between the mold half's. But that tiny bit of extra lead could not amount to 4.2 grains.
What the heck???
Then the little light bulb came on. In order for lead to leak between the mold half's I must not have had the mold completely closed. If that were the case, wouldn't the ball be just a bit larger than the rest?
So, out came the dial caliper. Those four heavy balls measured .538 and the others measured exactly .532
I think I found it out!
So, what I learned today;
1. The balls I'm casting are much more consistent in size and weight than any I can buy.
2. Be sure to close the mold tightly in the future.
Some of my friends think I take this stuff way too seriously. (They may be right about that, but they aren't beating me in the shooting matches.)
Those four heavy balls went back into the lead pot. 91 of them went into a box marked "matched 227.0 grains" these will be used for load development and match shooting. The others went into a leather bag for off-hand shooting at gongs.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/Sells/Rendezvous/011%202.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/Sells/Rendezvous/010%202.jpg)
Post by: Fletcher on October 30, 2015, 08:26:23 AM
Post by: RobD on November 01, 2015, 07:43:37 AM
yes, without a question of doubt the amount of pressure on the mould handles can vary the cast objects weight and size. i use locking mould handles and that really helps prevent 500+ grain bpcr bullets from dropping at grains of diff'rent weights to tenths of grains at best. part of the art of casting consistent projectiles is also in casting technique ... and practice.