Rockwell hardness while pouring own round ball

[Plateboater]

All,

Who uses a Lee Rockwell hardness verification tool?  Is majority just pouring lead and shooting.  Specific to hunting what direction does this group suggest?

Be pouring .590    I pour a ton of lead for jigs.   So have setup just looking at options to have quick clean harvest of animal.  I am sure 100 years ago they poured and moved on!

[Pukka Bundook]

Pure lead is best if you can get it, P-Boater.

[45-110]

I was taught by old timers 50 yrs back, if you can gouge a piece of lead with your finger nail, it probably is soft enough. I still use this method when testing some unknown lead. Not scientific for sure, but it will get you close.
kw

[smylee grouch]

I was not getting pass through with a pure lead 610 ball on Bears (3) and thought I would like two holes for a easier blood trail if I needed to go that route so I cast up some harder balls, 5# pure lead with 2 oz. pure tin and it made a dramatic difference. Still had expansion/mushrooming but total pass through on 2 Bears, one a 200 lb. bore and the other a very heavy + or - 400 lbs.  On the 200 pounder it blew a couple of handfulls of pinkish jello out the other side.

[Maven]

Not trying to be a smarta$$, but don't we typically measure cast bullet hardness (conicals, roundtables, grease groove bullets) in Brinell Hardness Units (BHN) rather than Rockwell?  Btw, Lee Precision makes a dandy handheld device which measures alloy and pure Pb hardness in Brinell units and is easy to use and reliable.

[hanshi]

I use the fingernail test then move on from there.

[Daryl]

No one uses a Rockwell Tester for lead.
Brinel is the proper testing, measuring system for lead and it's alloys.
Pure lead is brinel 5. 
Linotype is brinel 21.
Monotype is brinel 24/26.
Dead-soft Copper is brinel 34/35.
Clamp/crimp-on WW are brinel 12 here in Canada. They can be hardened up to brinel 33 if desired, but will age soften over time
to their original brinel hardness. This takes more than a year. Antimony alloys can only be hardened if they contain trace amounts
of arsenic, as in alloy WW and commercial lead shot.

Zinc WW are useless as projectiles for our use in ML's & if introduced into the lead pot, will destroy the entire melt (contents) and sometimes the pot's
ability to cast good balls as well.
Zinc WW are visually easily distinguished from lead WW - as well, they are likely to have a Z on them.

[Plateboater]

Always appreciate the help when I post.   Thank you