Ebay is about the best source, although Amazon has the approximate same price when you figure shipping. Either way, seems you're looking at about $65. It is a chunk of change. Seems they never show up used.
I buy lead from all kinds of sources, so it's been a good thing for me to have. I can now buy cheap "no name" lead offa Ebay, and instantly know what I have when it arrives. Tweak it a bit, if needed.
farmersamm, I suggest that you consider the Cabine Tree tester. Sure its more money but you get a quick accurate reading without playing around with a toy microscope. The bottom line is you get what you pay for so would you rather waste the money on a Lee or step up and buy something that is a heck of a lot easier to use, doesn't require you to carry your reloading press with you and eliminates the guess work associated with the Lee? I used a Lee for a few minutes and went with the Cabine Tree.
Does anyone know if the Cabine Tree can be purchased without the dial indicator? I already have one of those and if it would lower the cost, I might be able to swing buying the Cabine Tree. If I don't get an answer here, I'll try the seller.
Chris
It's VERY accurate. It is very close to how Brinell himself determined hardness. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brinell_scaleOriginally Posted by bangerjim
I made a Cabine style tester, but still use the drill press method.
The Cabine tester doesn't use enough pressure to correctly measure the hardness, in my opinion. Using the 200 lbs of the Brinell method eliminates a lot of guess work, as the pressure isn't all that important. The difference between 190 and 210 lbs is negligible in the calculation. I can measure the Brinell hardness to about +/- 0.5 consistently.
I considered the Cabine when I purchased the Lee. Honestly, it was the price difference that swayed me to the Lee. BUT I FOUND OUT THAT THE LEE IS ALSO GOOD FOR TESTING INGOTS. http://www.farmersamm.com/gun-talk/b...testing-alloy/ This has been a real bonus. I don't have to cast a sample bullet to determine how I'm going to tweak my alloy. I can do it before I ever plug the pot in. Everything I buy is generally already cast into ingots, or I cast it into ingots prior to alloying.
I agree......the little microscope is a PITA, but I've gotten used to it with time (upside down, inside out, way of moving it around to focus on the indentation). And the recommendations from Lee are to be taken with a BIG grain of salt when it comes to hardness/chamber pressure.
Portability is a real plus for the Cabine tester, I definitely agree! I really never buy lead locally (which can be a minimum 100 mile round trip to any good sized town/city) so it hasn't been an issue so far. But I definitely think it's a real plus for guys that are able to find scrounge sources for lead.
In a perfect world, I'd own both of them. I think hardness testers are one of the best tool box stuffers there is for casting.
I remember when I started almost 40yrs ago. Used to buy lead from a local sporting goods dooood. He had two buckets near the front door. One was marked "soft", and one was marked "hard". It was all in small ingots, and you paid by the ingot if I recall. Was back in the day, when Lee made the little pan with lube cutter, and little block of 50/50. Probably 5ish bucks for each caliber back then.
I was young, and stupid, back then. I remember melting my lead in an iron pot on the kitchen stove IN A CLOSED UP HOUSE. Probably why I'm so weird to this day.
About the "young, and stupid"..........I'm definitely not any younger, and probably not any less stupider.
It is very good at telling you that your test alloy is harder, or softer, or the same as a known alloy that was used to establish the chart which provides your results. But the tester does not return a Brinnel number.
Using fantasy numbers to build an alloy, say you add .75 lb. of tin and .75 lb. of antimony to 98.5 lb of lead ... to create an antimonal alloy that happens to be the same hardness as 20-1 lead/tin.
Your Cabine Tree tester will accurately indicate that your alloy is the same hardness as 20-1 alloy.
If you are wondering about a Brinnel Hardness Number, your chart will tell you it is 10 BHN.
If the Cabine Tree could provide a Brinnel readout, it would say the alloy is 7.8 BHN ... which is the actual hardness of 20-1 lead/tin.
The Lee is more complicated to use, but the results are actual Brinnel numbers.
Once you move up in hardness past the simple lead/tin alloys, you get more useful results from the Cabine Tree because the numbers in that area of the chart are from more accurate sources.
Retired...TWICE. Now just raisin' cows and livin' on borrowed time.
I saved up and got the Cabine Tree, I never looked back.
That FPS/BHN chart is just too funny! You can easily shoot up to 1900 FPS with a BHN 12 lead alloy. I've read of some here that can shoot much faster with a 12 BHN alloy, accurately. Fitment of the boolit is so much more important than just the BHN. Alloy composition is also much more important than just the basic BHN hardness.
Regards
John
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