I KEEP SEEING THE USE OF THE TERM "HARD CAST" BULLET ALL OVER THE PLACE, BUT WHAT IS A "HARD CAST" BULLET? I NEVER HAVE EVER FELT A SOFT CAST BULLET, THEY ALL FEEL HARD TO THE TOUCH. AT WHAT BRINNELL HARDNESS IS A BULLET "HARD CAST"? DOES THE ALLOY MATTER? AND WHY "HARD CAST"? TO CUT DOWN LEADING? THE HARDER THEY ARE THE MORE BRITTLE THEY MAY BE. "HARD CAST" BULLET IS NOT A UNIFORM UNIT OF MEASURE SO TO ME IT IS A FAIRLY MEANINGLESS TERM. WHAT DO YOU CONSIDER TO BE A "HARD CAST" BULLET (ALLOY, BRINNELL HARDNESS, AND OTHER) AND WHY? AND WHAT IS YOUR PURPOSE FOR USING A "HARD CAST" BULLET? LEADING? BULLET INTEGRITY? OR WHAT?

Interesting question. I'm curious now too as I've always lumped them all into 'cast' bullets. Never knew there was a distinguishing factor that separated hard cast from soft cast.

You've already had a lot of coffee this morning...

Cast pure lead, such as that commonly used for roundball, has a hardness of 5 BHN. To me, "hard cast" is an ambiguous term that I generally use to differentiate between swaged, cast pure lead and a lead alloy bullet generally around 12-BHN or harder. Most commercial cast bullets are hard.

I don't know where the delineation officially lies, but I would imagine somewhere north of 16 BHN.

Where's Dick? He needs to weigh in here.

I had once said that hard cast was 12-15 BHN or greater
I have seen some as high as 22 and those seemed to be the ones that were too brittle.
But in regards to the question I just always went by BHN. Alloys did not weigh in.

Yep Dick should be able to shed some light here.

Charles

Lyman #2 alloy is 90% lead, 5% tin, and 5% antimony. Brinell hardness is 16. For whitetail deer I prefer to cast my bullets from wheel weights. Brinell is around 12 and they expand very well.

Cast lead bullets can be hardened by heat treating in an oven or water quenching the bullet as it?s being dropped from the mold. Brinell Harness increases to 22 but bullets will soften over time to around 18.

Casting bullets from pure Linotype is great for small caliber stuff like a 22 hornet but the Brinell is around 22 and very brittle. I cast for my 222 Remington.

Linotype allot consists of 84% lead, 12% antimony and 4% tin.

Anything harder than air cooled wheelweight just will not upset but penetration is great so I think Hardcast starts there. Lung shot deer go a long way with caliber size hole. As discussed in other thread, I will now shoot the .358 180gr WFN air cooled Saaco or LBT thru the shoulders to hopefully break them down. Plenty for deer and smaller hogs. Just my .02