Well, OK. Not really thousands.
But hundreds, anyway!
The planets aligned today, and for the first time in The Year Of Our Lord 2012 I was able to drag the casting gear outside and set up shop! I set up a picnic bench under the pines in the back yard, nicely shaded and smelling of, well, pine, and with the sun high in the sky and gentle breezes cooling me and carrying off the fumes at the same time, got busy.
My little Lee Melter had two pounds of lead shimmering in the sunlight in about 3 minutes and after fluxing with a bit of candle wax I keep handy for just such purposes and skimming the dross, the lead was ready to roll.
I lit a second candle that I keep for such purposes as well, and quickly "smoked" the mould cavities for quick, clean release, and began pouring, The lead dried as fast as I poured, and the hunk of scrap deck rail I keep quickly cut the sprues, allowing the freshly-cast balls to drop free onto the folded towel I had laid out.
I ran maybe 250-300 .375 round balls through my Lee mould; setting aside a hundred for my buddy Steve as a late birthday gift (he doesn't know it yet) as he is getting prepared to make his "maiden voyage" on the Good Ship BP Revolver this spring. (Now, I ask you....what guy buys 15 revolvers in less than a year and has never fired one yet? That would be Steve.. Well, we're gonna fix THAT!)
The Lee mould heated up quickly, but the quality of the finished product was less than perfect. But I'm a lead slinger and a gong-ringer, so unless they're REALLY bad they don't go back in the pot. What was it the late, great Marc Bolan of T-Rex fame said? "Get it on...bang a gong!" Well put, Marc!
After burning a large number of .375's, I turned my attention to the .454's. Now, my .454 mould is a Lyman, therefore steel, and of course it takes a while for that bad boy to heat up. But once it did (the first 10 or so went straight back into the pot!) the round balls coming out of that mould were clearly superior. Plus, if you gotta refill the pot, the mould retained enough heat that you don't have to warm it up again!
I ran a couple hun of those, and by that time my back was killing me and I decided 3 hours was enough lead-snorting for one day. There will be more. I still would like to flow another couple hundred .454 balls, and a hundred or better of the .490 rb's for my Trade rifle, plus I could do a goodly number of Lee conical 200 grainer's. So, more casting is in order, yessiree! But progress was made and I feel good about it.
The next best thing to a day of shooting is a day of getting ready to go shooting!
