Home Forums Reloading Bullet Casting Wrinkles

Got a used 6.5 Lee mold, looks new. Cleaned it real good. Was using lino with some lead added, running around 675. I was getting wrinkles at first, understandable getting the mold hot, but even using just that mold and casting fairly fast, I still got wrinkles, just not as bad at the beginning. No frosty bullets. Should I turn the heat up on the lead?

Long skinny bullets as a PIA. If they are not frosting you're too cool. Also add some more tin as it helps fill them out.

Would wheel weights be a better choice? Not planning on setting any speed records here, just accuracy.

it's not the lead temp that's the issue.

you need to get your mould hotter.

several ways to do this.

dip corner in melt get it hot that way.

or cast faster.

don't hold the mould open with no lead in it for very long. it cools quickly that way.

shouldn't take much more heat on the mould to get good bullets.

Modern equipment makes it easy to monitor lead temperature with lead pot settings and displays or bi-metallic thermometers. Also a new to me development is using an infra-red sensor (Harbor Freight or anybody else) to track mold temperature. I see no reason to get into boiling lead and increasing fumes - I'd sooner not bother at all - so I wouldn't go above a measured 650 degrees and would like less for an average temperature so peak temperatures aren't putting more lead in the air I breath.

My own experience is that routines from a bottom pour furnace - heavy flow fairly long drop - that make great bullets in vast numbers with little effort with H&G or Saeco-Redding molds flat don't work very well at all with Lee aluminum molds.

I find alloy is not a major factor for me. That is everything from wheel weights to salvaged linotype (which may have lost alloy and might have needed refreshing for more print shop use) to Rotometal fancy alloys makes good bullets with iron molds and is fussier with Aluminum molds. I think but have done no tests to confirm that time was wheel weights were a better source for including some tin and antimony that has been dropped in recent years.

I suspect folks who start with Lee aluminum and never use anything else learn a different process and have little trouble. I have little or no experience with smoking molds or using mold release so nothing to say good or bad.

This means controlling the process and then making changes is flat necessary to move to the Lee aluminum molds. My own production with Aluminum is nowhere near fast enough and with a very low and inadequate percentage of great bullets. I plan to do more work with an infrared sensor for temperature and temperature variation across the Aluminum mold.

Heat the mold on a hot plate...tented with a coffee can, small cast iron pan or something to hold heat in. It takes roughly the same time to heat to mold to a good temp on MED high as it will take for you to melt and flux your lead. Should be good after two to three pours. Most likely the first two or three fills will be frosted.

smoke it every time you use it with a bic lighter and get hot in the lead pot . if you do that it drop the first cast with keeper bullets

I would keep playing with the heat on the mold.

If you can keep both in their sweet spot it's magic.

I have found that smaller pours do make one look like they know whats what.

But i have learned that when going up in size and weight it can humble one.

Happened to me more than once.

Wrinkles are usually caused by oil or contaminants, too low of alloy temperature and/or too low of a mould block temperature. For the OP, we will start with oils being removed from the mould, since he stated it was washed thoroughly.

A lot depends and what you want out of casting to begin with.

Stating you will cast when the alloy is 650 degrees or 675 degrees (and that's it) leaves a lot of room for lessening success; any 22 caliber, two cavity mould in my experience, will flat not function in any repeatable cadence with an alloy temp that low without a lot of artificial aid; aid being more heat (if we are "set" on our predetermined alloy temp). Even more so if we are heat treating, which is often needed or desired with rifle bullets. The mould and alloy need to stay hot enough for a cadence to be applied. Constant low alloy temp will interrupt this cadence less with larger bullets, more with smaller bullets for a nominal mould size or less with iron or bronze, more with aluminum.

Mould manufacturers seem more worried that their moulds will burn up or fall apart than the end user being able to make piles of good bullets quickly with them. I've tried following their instructions over the years, even to a T. They get ditched in short order, probably because they make a half pot full of wrinkled bullets.

Since the OP is using Lino and lead, heat treating isn't required, unless we want a quicker final hardness time. If it's Lino, it's not the absence of tin causing poor fillout either.

I don't have any answers, other than what experience I have and what works for me.

In the summer my pot's dial is set to 750. The other seasons, its cranked. If it's little bullets of any kind, its cranked. Why? It eliminates a variable, which is adding more heat. If you've already added it all, you don't need to add more. Furnace casters should use a thermometer or back off when the surface yellows.
With large bullets in 4 cavity configuration or bronze or iron, I usually do not need the pot cranked. Its all based on the sprue cure time and the cadence.

I use a hot plate to cheat; dunking the mould until the lead sluffs off and doesn't stick will also work; just be sure the mould is taken out of the alloy AS SOON as it sluffs off, other wise too long can create a host of other issues. Having the alloy and mould so hot it runs out the bottom is a mess! Yes, it is fixed, but just avoid overheating and remove the mould immediately when the lead sluffs off!

MY hot plate will get hot enough to pre-heat the mould at maximum, but won't melt lead; yours may be able to... So we will point to dunking in this example.
You want the mould dunked (floated in the alloy up to, but not at the handle jaws) until the lead slumps off. The first and definitely the second casting should produce a perfect bullet.
Now, the trick is keeping them that way and keeping a cadence to the point our sprue solidifies around the time we are done filling our other mould.

How quickly the sprue solidifies also is a good indicator to whether or not our mould is hot enough; it's generally not if it hardens within seconds. For my needs, the sprue doesn't fully cure until I've filled my next mould.
Obviously we want a deliberate cure time, but also as obvious is the need not to have so much heat that we are waiting for ages; the sprue curing should be no longer than filling another mould and be ready to cut as the freshly filled mould is swapped, or as you get better, a third mould or three four/five cavity moulds. It especially rings true if you are heat treating and want your bullets to be around a certain hardness. Cadence.

A lot of this is just time and experience with your equipment and how to make it work for you.

A hot plate, even if just set at a warm level while waiting for the sprue to cure, will also help eliminate wrinkles in the nose areas simply because it keeps the bottom of the mould from cooling off; the base of the mould contacts surface areas that can cool it or act as a heat sink in the area of the mould that begins cooling first with base poured bullets. Heat plates can be used also for tiny bullet cavity moulds that displace heat quickly, to maintain cadence and uniformity.
Re-dunking periodically can also be substituted for a hot plate if the mould temp is too cool, just remember it needs enough heat that lead doesn't stick and that's it.
As long as you're casting in a cadence (and experience will tell you), you can incorporate hot plates, re- heating moulds, eyballing your sprues and take a leak without discarding any bullets or starting over.

PS- I have never used mould preps, smoking cavities or any other vudoo oriented tips or tricks. If you need them you've either got oil residue or not enough alloy or mould heat. I've never ran into a "bad" mould over the years, it's more often how the operator makes it run.

good info Hawk1

Shame you are not close to me as I have a five gallon bucket of lynotype for sale

Thanks all for your input. Sounds like I have to heat things up some!

Twenty dollar Amazon hot plate will the best money you can spend. I turn it on at the same time I turn on the lead pot. When the lead is ready so will your mold.

I’d go with this and see if it doesn’t fix the issue.

To all of those that offered suggestions, thanks! Been busy and today was the first time I had to cast. I never changed the pot temp, but put the mold on a hot plate while the pot was heating up, and during the session. The aluminum mold I had trouble with definitely benefited with the hot plate. I had it on and never cast a single bullet with wrinkles. Even after filling, I put it back on the hot plate while casting with the other mold. Still no frosted bullets, worked fine. My other mold is a 4 cavity brass, and that got too hot and I had a few at first that frosted, then I kept it off the hot plate between casting, and that worked out fine. Things worked out fine!!!

Good show, Wayne.

I wonder if I put my face on a hot plate it would help with my wrinkles.

It doesn't look like you have wrinkles at all in your avatar Gary. Be Well, RZ.

I've only used either steel or brass molds until this one. The extra heat from the hot plate made all the difference. The brass mold got too hot, so I had to change that up some.