thought I'd copy it and post it here too - for anybody that might be interested.
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Items needed for casting:
-safety stuff - heavy gloves, face sheild or saftey goggles, long sleeve shirt, etc.
-Furnace to melt the lead (or some just use a cast iron pot over a burner)
-molds and handles for the molds
-mold tapper - I use a hickory hammer handle - use this to tap your moulds to ensure complete closure and coax the bullets out when they hang up a bit
-ingot molds - or muffin tins - that's what I use (mark them for casting only!)
-dipper (I like bottom pour) - even if you get a bottom pour furnace, you need a dipper
-sizer - this depends on what you're casting - round balls and most ml bullets don't require sizing - I have become fond of the Lee sizing kits and use them exclusively now
-lube for the bullet - again, only for centerfire type bullets or pb cartridge bullets (I use the Lee liquid alox that comes with their sizer kist - excellent stuff!)
-alloy - as you mentioned, wheel weights are great - but try and get them these days! All of the tire stores are on "contract" with their weight suppliers to turn in the old ones for credit.... I'm going to see about paying them for the next batch - a little more than their credit.
-gas checks - if you use gas check designs you'll need these - there are also now gas check tools and dies to make them from beverage cans.
-flux - I use paraffin (candle wax) - you put this in and light the smoke and stir with your dipper - helps bring the dross to the top (dross is impurities and oxidized stuff that needs to be removed)
-lighter - I use this for lighting the smoking flux and also to "smoke" the moulds so that the bullets drop out easily - works great
I just got through casting three different calibers yesterday - Saeco .359"/250 grain for my .356 Winchester, Lyman .309"/210 grain for my 30 caliber bolt actions and Lyman .314"/200 grain for my Lee Enfields.
Here's a picture of a previous casting session - Lee molds used for .44 cal conicals for the .44 cap and balls and .50 cal target minie bullets for the muzzle loaders:
And here's another half-way option - purchase Laser Cast 170 grain .309" bullets and apply you're own gaschecks - that one design that they sell is a gas check design - wish they did that with some other designs, calibers.
Here are some 240 grain .430" semi wad cutters (gas check) loaded into some 44 Specials - the brown stuff is the Lee liquid alox lube - you can whipe it off of the exposed part of the bullet as it does little good there... excellent lube that absolutel prevents anything but very minimal leading.
Hope that helps give you an idea of what's "out there".
For me, I need to get the tools to cut gas checks - that would make me completely self-sufficient as far as making bullets is concerned.
Now, if they'd just come up with primer makeing kits, and brass making kits and smokeless powder making kits
