Casting Machines

[Don Purcell]

What messy stuff? I thought all garages looked like that, mine does.

[Tazza]

Looks pretty good for the third owner!

Thanks for the pictures, now if i could only have one in my shed too

[hunter74]

Thanks. It works great when adjusted right but I'm having some trouble adjusting the timing of the pouring and the nockers in the bottom.

These actions take plase 12 and 6 o clock on the wheel and adjusting one affects the other. To me it seems to pour a little to early.

It doesn't seem to affect the boolits to much but I'm adraid that this can degrade the quality of some of the bases. Rounded bases on one side and so on.
I've played with the adjustments of the "thing" that touches the mould carriers but can't get it just right. Can someone please tell me in plain english what the two knobs do?

I have fugured this

This moves the "feeler rods" (I'm calling them that in lack of a better word) in and out. Clockwise in and counter clockwise out i think.


This knob moves the rod sideways left and right and I think that moving it clockwise increases the travel of the wheel before stopping. Right?

What's the deal with the canted and flat sides on the moulds carrier? I see that the rod has a wheel at the end sliding on the adges on the carrier arms and the wheel gets pushed in. Is that the signal to the activation of the pour and the knockers? It seems to have to be adjusted perfect to touch the canted edge and the flat spot at the right time.

Can someone please set this straight? I've red the Magma manual and I did not get any smarter about this.... Maybe it's because I'm slow or that English language is not my native tounge.... I don't know..... What I do know is that you guys have the knowledge 😂

Thanks again!

[hunter74]

Anyone??

[AbluquerqueBullet,LLC]

I believe the 2 knobs adjust the position of the lead flow switch adjsuting the position will adjust when in drops lead. the wheel looks to be under rotated? the position of the wheel is adjusted by adjusting the arm that connects to the motor. the mold carriers have the angle cut into them so they can wedge into the opening cams on the bottom of the rotation.

[hunter74]

I'm sure you are right. Im not sure I understand what you mean about the arm that connects to the motor. Is it on the main chaft or where the shear pin breaka

Thanks

[AbluquerqueBullet,LLC]

if you are flowing lead to soon try turning to knob on the front of the machine the last picture. and read the manual
3rd page
http://www.magmaengineering.com/PDF/...structions.pdf

[AbluquerqueBullet,LLC]

below the sheer pin the long arm that goes all of the way back to the motor. on the side below the sheer pin it can be disconnected with it should be a hitch pin and clevis pin. you can tighten or loosen the clevis on that end of the rod as one way to adjust how much stroke it applies. that is in the manual kind of hidden last thing on second page. in the lateral adjustment paragraph.

Also make sure that the arm the long part that goes back to the motor is straight if it is bent then this is the cause of the sudden difference in stroke. if it is bent make sure it is running the right sheer pin.

[ReloaderFred]

Prior to making adjustments, clean the pour spout, as it appears one hole in the spout may be plugged with debris. I sent you a PM on how to do that, and a picture of the tool I made for clearing the holes in the pour spout (spigot).

In case the picture didn't come through on the PM, here it is again:



Hope this helps.

Fred

[ReloaderFred]

The picture is the one I use on my Master Caster, but I also made one that I use on my Bullet Master. This picture was handy, so I used it.

Hope this helps.

Fred

[hunter74]

It turned out that the previous owner had installed a smaller diameter share pin. This allowed too much play in the joint. Bacause of this the wheel stopped a tad too son and the described problems occurred.

I got some share pins that had the correct diameter and the problem solved! A easy solution to the problem once identified!

[ReloaderFred]

Glad you were able to figure it out. That shear pin is pretty important, and it's also important that it's not too hard. It has to shear when something gets caught in the mechanism. I've gone through dozens of them.......

Fred

[hunter74]

I replaced it with a similar machine screw of the same diameter. The guy at the harware store said it would brake at the same resistance so I hope thats the case. Guess I'll watch the machine closely until I know for sure! My experience is that it's not a good idea to leave it unattended for a long time 😁

I'm having problems with lead sticking to my mould halfs. Any good advice here? My plan for the day is to remove alle the moulds and go over them with a razor blade and smoke them. I casted som 105 swc last evening and ran it about 60% speed without the fans on. The machine ran great but I struggled with stuck boolits.

[Tazza]

I find that when my molds are too hot they can stick. Smoking the molds will help release them too. It could also be the tappers not hitting hard enough?

You may want to buy a few shear pins then copy them. I have seen other people that got new bolts and used a lathe to cut a groove into them to weaken them the same amount as the factory bolts. This is only of the setup you have uses weakened bolts that have a groove cut into them to allow them to shear off with less tension.

I wonder if you can even install a circuit breaker on the motor so if it was to stall, it would trip and not require a shear pin?

[ReloaderFred]

I always run the fans when I'm casting, as they cool the sprue faster and keep the molds from overheating. I've never smoked any of my molds on either the Master Caster or Bullet Master, but I do spray the sprue cutters and tops of the molds with the PAM/denatured alcohol mix about every thousand bullets or so. I spray when the sprues start sticking.

You also might try spraying the inside of the molds with the mold release you bought from Magma. You'll just have to remelt the next 500 or so bullets, as they'll be wrinkled from the lube, but enough residue will remain in the mold cavities to help with the bullets falling out.

My Mark 6 Bullet Master already has a circuit breaker on the motor circuit in case the shear pin doesn't break in a timely fashion. The shear pins are simply soft bolts, so there shouldn't be any need to machine grooves in them.

Hope this helps.

[hunter74]

I was trying to get a feel for it when running the small 105 gr 38s. The moulds seems a bit cold when running the fans ans 60% speed but I'll try that next time when my moulds are cleaned up. They sure got too hot without the fans so....... I'll also try to spray with mould release and see if I get better results. I pour a generous sprue so the sprue plates get worm. I have no smeared lead so I guess they are not too hot.



Sent fra min SM-G900F via Tapatalk

[angus6]

My 2400 MK5 doesn't have the pneumatic knockers underneath and it really hasn't been a problem I do use a mold release and sprue lube. I'm finally getting close to needing to fire it back up as I made a enough bullets a couple years back that it's just been sitting.

Was really hoping to see Joshua get his act together and start making molds again as I was wanting a set for 300blk subs

[AbluquerqueBullet,LLC]

What temperatures are you running? running it to hot will make lead smear under the sprue plate which causes the sprues to stick really bad. the sprue basically welds to the under smear forming a rivet. and it will build lead around the profile of the cavity causing the bullet to stick. I clean them with a good new razor and some times 1500gt sandpaper to remove any lead coloration the re-coat with the spray.

I use lyman dry moly spray on my molds and bottom of sprue plates never the top never. as mold release it works really well goes on super fine and lasts a very long time i run 12-22k bullets per run so for me it has to work.

Once you are getting good bullets slowly back the temps down and see when they bullets start to lose fill. then speed the machine up a little to run the molds a little hotter. you want to run it cold and fast while maintaining proper fillout.

[hunter74]

I casted some boolits this evening and I got som stuck as before but the mould release worked great. First I sprayed the top of the sprue plate and into the empty moulds. Then I sprayed the moulds and the underside of the sprue plate after it was knocked over, with the boolits still in the moulds. That seemed like a good idea. I also sprayed into the cavities at one time but I got som wrinkles after that but not too long. After that I sprayed the top of those moulds with the stuck boolit in place. It fell out on the next pass and it took some time before it stuck again. I ran it from 65-90 % of full speed with both fans on all the time. At 90% it seemed to get little too hot. My guess is that it could work at about 75-80% of full throttle.


I run my pot at 760 F and my alloy are 70-30 range scrap - pure +2% tin. I'm thinking about using a bit harder alloy since I get a lot of pinch marks on one side of the boolits. But that gets ironed out during sizing so it does not bother me too much.

I have not tried to run the melt at a lower temp. I get great fill out with my existing setup and these boolits are not the easiest to get to fill out properly.

Thanks for good advices! I'm learning every day and I feel that I know my machine better and better. Today it ran about 3 hours without stopping or breaking a shear pin 😅

[Ausglock]

I use HITEK 500 Plus Mold release/ Sprue Plate lube.
Mix it an a trigger spray bottle and give the sprueplate a squirt every now and then.