TexasCHLforum.com

Ahhhhhhhh...A fine cool weather tradition, casting bullets..!!!!

Mee Too....It's that time again.
But I still haven't pulled the trigger on coated lead bullets yet, just dragging my feet, no real reason.
I am tired of lube sizers and the Alox mess, so it will happen soon as I get set up.
Shake & Bake seems to be the easiest and cheapest way ??

Just finished rebuilding an OLD heavy duty floor drill press, rewire,lube bearings,clean,paint , new Baldor motor etc....
Like new now, but better than most the new stuff out there, it is about 35 years old. Heavy cast iron and NO PLASTIC or Aluminum or other cheap materials used these dayZ. ( ie. my Horrible Freight bench top drill press )
Plastic and aluminum DO have their places....

D2

Fired up the press for .45 practice.

I ordered 500 fully cleaned and processed 223 cases for $47 delivered.

AndyC wrote:

Don2 wrote:But I still haven't pulled the trigger on coated lead bullets yet, just dragging my feet, no real reason.

Me either, Don - but my reason is I'm not yet convinced I can churn them out in any significant quantity/time; the whole baking part makes me shake my head.

That is one reason, but check out Jmorris items he made to speed it all up on the 1911 forum.
Actually it MAY be faster than a lube/sizer and not sure about the Alox route?

I am going to go for it soon, need to find a larger oven to use instead of my little toaster oven.
He showed me one of them too on his latest post. B&D large oven....

Heck, the Horrible Freight PC paint is suppose to work OK, and its cheap and available.

D2

cleaned, 90mins in SS wet tumbler little of Armor Car clean and ultra shine and 1 little spoon of lemishine.

I got lucky with today. When I got hurt my wife broke down all my reloading equipment and supplies. I was going thru a few trunks today and found .45 brass, 45 SWC and a coffee can full of bullseye....I'm good for a bit.

AndyC wrote:Sure, but he's a mechanical genius - I don't have the expertise or time to make something like that

NOT TO MENTION, he has a complete metal working/machine shop..!!

We can dream right???

Oh well.....I cleaned up another bench yesterday and today.
Took apart a few guns and cleaned/oiled them while watching an old 1950's Jerry Lewis movie "Jumping Jacks" in between.
No reloading...just other stuff that goes with it.

D2

I finally started cranking out 45 ACP this past weekend. I was down to less than 100 rounds in inventory. Had the Dillon set up for small primer and 223 for sub-sonic rounds and have been too lazy to spend 10 minutes to reconfigure until my 45 stockpile got too low. Swapped over to large primer, changed toolheads, and rechecked all the die and powder settings.

Ran off 100 185 gr. LSWC from Bayou Bullets and my last 150 of the 200 gr non coated LSWC I still had on hand from Friendswood Bullet Co. that went defunct a while back. Have 1000 more 200 gr Bayou LSWC to do in the next week or so and I will be set for a bit. I have and continue to be a big fan of Donnie's coated lead rounds from Bayou Bullets!

I checked the first bunch and sporadically throughout the runs and all passed the plunk test in my 1911 with zero issues.

While I am happy with the Lee single stage for rifle rounds, I definitely enjoy the blue koolaid for handgun (and 223)!

Plunk Test

Unloaded 60 rds of 9mm in 5 stages match at DPC and since I run a clean match, I ranked 16/32 with top 40% of the fastest times.
Went back home with 90 cases of 9mm and dozen of 45 ACP.

Living vicariously reading through reloading forums for a few months. After bypass no more pulling on the handle for a while. Keep up the posts, enjoying the read!

Plan to do some casting for .38/.44 Mag/.45 ACP while off from work next week. Hopefully, the weather will cool down a bit in Houston. I hope to cast about 1000 in each caliber to carry me thru 2016...

I'm planning on chopping up a perfectly fine work desk and turning it into a perfectly awesome reloading bench and guitar workbench. It will have a rock chucker on one side and a neck rest on the other. No more loading in the garage for me!!!

Get the Hornady L&L setup for 233 with Hornady Case feeder and the new LEE Auto Drum.
Advice if you think a Turret Classic is tough to get it running, then when you switch to AP do not It is just a learning curve.