Home Forums Reloading Bullet Casting lead melting pots

Guys , I am gunna start casting more bullets . I only have a small pot I used mostly for jigs. It holds about 1 lb and is electric. I dont think it gets the lead hot enough cause I see lines in the bullets like it was layered or something. So, where is a good place to get a lead pot? Is lee a good pot or are they all the same.?

You will hear folks say that the LEE pot leaks like crazy.
I have had 3 of them and after cleaning them have had no leaks.
I also have the RCBS large bottom pour pot and a LYMAN 61 pot.
I have used them all but seem to favor the old LYMAN pot.

For the price if i was looking today,i would get the LEE pot,i thing it holds 11-12 lbs.

Lee makes a furnace with a 20 lb capacity:


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I had leaking problems so I plugged the bottom pour spout and used it as a straight ladle casting furnace. It worked fine as I also used a thermometer to check the lead temperature. I inherited different pots but still have the Lee as a backup.

Never been a fan of electrics and I've had several in almost 50 years of casting.Guess its what you mean by "more bullets".

A good turkey fryer propane burner with cast iron bean pot has been my SOP for many years for casting better than average quality bullets.

The large capacity pots ensure constant alloy rather than mixing small batches,provide better instant temp control and the setup cost is approximately the same or even less in some cases.

Show us your ladle Woody.

The Lee 20lb bottom pour pots are hard to beat for the money. They tend to drip, but it's not a big deal. Put a tuna can under the spout to catch the drips.

More importantly though, you need a thermometer in your lead melt. Without it, you can't know what you're doing, and you've got no way to guess at your melt temp. Could be 600*, could be over 1,000* and putting off lead fumes, you won't know. Buy a thermometer first, then worry about the pot.

Nothing fancy here I use all of these to some degree.

Big ladle at 12 o'clock is an antique #4 blacksmith ladle,a heavy stainless soup ladle,a stainless strainer for slag removal and my pouring ladles.All my BPCR molds are single cavity,the rest mostly custom rifle and pistol double cavities except for a Lee 44 cal four banger.

Thanks Woody. I have the stainless strainer, the #4 blacksmith ladle, and my pouring ladles is like yours. You can certainly make fine bullets with such.

Also, seeing the size of the pot he uses, please note that Woody pours bullets that run about a dozen to the pound...

I blend my alloy in a cut-off propane tank on a turkey cooker burner and use a 20# Lee pot to ladle out of. So far, so good!

Ed

Loved my Lee 20lb pot. Never had a leak problem.

Wife hired a mover for move to the new house. They wrapped most everything. Noticed they didn't wrap the pot before putting it on the truck.

I saw it go on the truck. It never come off.

Strictly rumors Ed.

My philosophy has always been to start out with what I'm going to end up with. It saves a lot of money in the long run. I would suggest searching out a good old Lyman bottom pour furnace, or somesuch (anything's better than a Lee IMO from personal experience), if a bottom pour approach is to your liking. Otherwise any old decent cast iron pot with a constant predictable/repeatable heat source will do. Heck you can do it just fine on the kitchen stove with an old skillet. Do invest in a thermometer too.

I haven't ladled lead into a mold since around 1981, but I can't argue with the success of guys who swear by it!

Most of my casting has been with a (borrowed) Lee production pot IV. I've cast tens of thousands of bullets with it.

Yeah, it leaks sometimes but it's pretty easy to fix. I have an old carpet needle I hold in a pair of pliers and ram it up the spout from below to knock whatever grit is blocking the value open out of the way. I also have an old, burnt (no temper left) screwdriver I twist the valve stem (?) with.

The negative I've found with the Lee is, at least for me, it doesn't work all that well when bullet weight exceeds about 300 grains. Seems like maybe it pours slow enough that the nose cools before the base is filled and I wind up with a high percentage of rejects due to air pockets and wrinkles even with the metal very hot.

I recently returned it to it's rightful owner. I'm shopping for a new pot. I haven't decided between the big RCBS pot and another Lee. While the Lee works, the RCBS might be worth the extra cost to address the problems I've had with very heavy bullets.

I have not had any success ladle-casting. Epic fail.

For mixing alloy, I use a large cast iron pot on a propane camp stove. It will handle 75 pounds or so of wheel weights which I buy about 200 pounds at a time (a 5 gallon bucket of wheel weights is HEAVY) from the local tire store. I'm impatient so rather than wait for the stove to work alone, I also use a pair of propane torches to add heat from the top. The strainer idea suggested above looks good. I've been using a large ladle to skim the steel clips floating off the top. Works but what you're showing might be better yet. Once I have the steel out (and other chunky impurities) I flux with Marvelux and optionally add whatever stuff I want to spike my alloy with ... linotype, tin, etc. My alloy varies from batch to batch but each batch is about 50 pounds of something self-consistent ... good enough for my use. Once I have that pot full, I ladle the mix into a group of lee ingot molds. (I've also used old muffin tins.)

When casting day comes, I have a mountain of alloy ready to go straight to bullets, no mixing or anything like that to monkey with. When I cast, it's usually a full day operation starting early and going 'til I can't hardly remember my name.

Tom

Lee pots benefit from drilling out the spout a little larger. You don't want to go too far, just a 32nd or so over the current size. Maybe a step larger if you're going for really heavy bullets, but mine did great with 400-420gr molds. They are cursed with a too-small spout as shipped from Lee, a larger hole makes them cast better for all but the tiniest bullets.

I thought that was common knowledge, but it probably doesn't get mentioned as often as it should. I wouldn't even bother plugging a Lee pot in until the spout is drilled out.

My first lead pot was a RCBS bottom pour unit that would never cast a decent bullet bottom pouring. Being a novice caster at the time probably had something to do with it, but switching to ladle pouring gave good results. A friend decided he wanted the RCBS pot, and I had switched to 20 lb cast iron pots on a propane burner, so he now has the RCBS pot. Anymore, I ladle pour from cast iron pots for rifle and heavier handgun bullets. I recently added a Lee 20 lb bottom pour pot for smaller handgun bullets and have been getting good results.

I feel 20 lb pots are smaller than ideal for most of what I do. It seems once I'm warmed up and have a good rhythm going, the pot is down enough that I need to add more lead. I'm thinking a 50 lb pot should get me through a casting session without having to stop and fill the pot.

Sir,

I tried that with bad results so I am wondering what I did wrong. What is the diameter of your pot? Do you have a chimney to control the heat? I have a 65,000 btu single burner propane element. Is that enough heat?

Thanks

Tracy "Ranger" Green

Not sure what you mean by chimney for heat control unless you're referring to mold vent chimneys. I use an exhaust fan for fumes.Your single burner is your heat control and should be OK but be prepared for more time should you use a big pot of course.

My pot is 10" in dia. 4" deep..not sure how many lbs of alloy it holds at full capacity actually never weighed it but it makes a ton of bullets even the Heavies for BPCR like 500+ grs at 30:1

Your negative results can be attributed to many factors,without knowing your experience level I'll list several basic SOP's for success and welcome the other guys to chime in.

..Season your mold cavities well give em a good carbon bath for easy release.

..I usually preheat mine but not in direct flame as they will warp.

..Good heat control and a constant casting temp via a thermometer is essential I wouldn't think about casting without one.

..Fluxing the pot is also a priority and should be done again if you add more alloy.

..In my experience each mold has its own sweet spot so rarely do I mix aluminum,brass or cast iron construction in the same casting session do to different heat requirements.Not that it can't be done but I choose not to and concentrate on molds of similar construction.

..Probably the #1 reason for failure barring all others IMO is casting technique which needs to be a repetitious procedure without deviation for quality bullets.Bottom pouring pots do eliminate this to a certain degree.

I always was taught that the U.S. was a melting pot, but now it seems that it is supposed to allow every element to maintain its own identity and we are never supposed to flux and skim off the dross.

"In my experience each mold has its own sweet spot so rarely do I mix aluminum, brass or cast iron construction in the same casting session do to different heat requirements. Not that it can't be done but I choose not to and concentrate on molds of similar construction"

-can't agree more with this and would also throw in size of the mould and caliber to be close as well.

22 moulds are oft to be cast alone, not even with other 22's. Just about anything else matches well.


LEE pots are accursed PsO'S. Anyone accustomed to using one must have a PhD in patience and/or time.

The Lyman and RCBS pots work decent and plumber's furnaces and ladles can also work well. With the Lyman and RCBS, the flow needs adjusted as the pot empties.
Adding metal as the pot empties will lead to bad behavior and bad bullets; the temp of the melt needs be constant.

Always curious to the quality of a Magma bottom pour, but the RCBS pot works just fine for me.

I have used the RCBS 20 pound pot for the past 20 years or so. I return all of the still hot sprues back into the pot and preheat one pound ingots on top of the pot. i try to keep the pot nearly full and adding a pre-heated ingot doesn't seem to affect the bullets. I also use a SAECO pot but noticed that adding pre-heated ingots shows more affect than with the 20 pound RCBS. Not much good to say about Lee pots.

I preheat my moulds on an electric hot plate with a 1/2 inch thick steel plate between the mounds and the calrod. This allows you to pause the casting session and resume w/o any bad bullets.