My first casting session...

[CiDirkona]

My only fear with not sizing them is that I don't trust them all to be consistently the same size otherwise, and running them through a sizer eliminates at least that possibility for error.

What's the importance of the base corner quality? How perfect does it have to be? I have one or two that have slight dents in them from being smacked with the stick to come out of the mold...

[CiDirkona]

I measured some of my boolits last night. Most of the handful I measured were 358 or 359, and a few were 360! I definitely don't think I can shoot these as-cast then... right? That seems WAY too big?

[Edubya]

Cidorkona, none of us can tell you the size that you should make them. Your barrel is the only one that has the answer to that. I have two XD 9mms and they are both individuals, one can take .3565" all day and the other wants .3575" to not lead.
Use some stick on wheel weights and cast up some of those boolits and drive them through the barrel. If it slugs to .354", your .356" sizer should be fine but don't hesitate to ream that sucker out to .357" or even .358" if necessary.

EW

[Flintlockrecord]

Any advice on getting my left furthest mold from releasing it's deathgrip on my boolits??[/QUOTE]

Take 1/4" nut and with the sprue plate open place it over the sticking cavity. Now pour a bullet thru the nut, filling the nut up too.

Open up the mold and remove the bullet and coat it with toothpaste.

Take a socket that fits the nut and a handle to suit the socket and put the bullet back in the mold and spin the socket/nut back and forth a few times. Don't overdo it.

You will be amazed how those boollits jump out of that mold now.

[Dutchman]

I don't know if anybody else suggested this but.....

There's absolutely no good reason to shoot anything but the BEST bullets you cast. That means you do multiple quality control inspections between dropping the bullet and loading the cartridges.

There are at least 3 separate inspection levels before you get to a loaded cartridge. Four or five levels of inspection are better.

Do not shoot mediocre bullets. Why? Your bullets reflect the care you take in this religious experience of molten lead alchemy. The time you take to inspect and cull your castings is directly proportionate to superior accuracy. More so with rifle bullets, I think.

Pin holes in the base of the bullet, failure to fill out the mold, wrinkles, specs of dross, etc. The more careful eye finds the flaws, all the flaws. Do not allow any flaws to be acceptable in your inspection protocol. Set high standards and the result will be much more satisfactory shooting.

Frosting - I never cast with only one mold so frosting usually isn't a factor. Introduce a second or third mold to the rotation or sequence and the frosting will disappear. By itself, frosting isn't terribly important other than to tell you your melt temp is too high or mold temp is too high. Consider it an indicator not a flaw.

Dutch

[CiDirkona]

Awesome advice guys -- thank you!

Looks like I'll be slugging my bore, cooling the mold more often and polishing it a bit.

If my normal bullet is a Dardas that measures out at 356 and I never get any leading with that diameter, is it safe to say that if replicate that diameter and hardness, and get adequate lubrication with 45/45/10 Recluse tumble lube, that I'll most likely not have any leading issues? It sure would be sweet to have it right the first time out!

[CiDirkona]

I tumble lubed these and got them loaded into cases yesterday at my normal load (4.0gr of HP38.) My standard round nose length is 1.125" which leaves about 1/32" of bearing sticking out of the case. This makes identifying Mak and 380 cases easy as there'll be a crapload of bearing exposed rather than a 'fit' looking round. The truncated cone (TC) bullets are about .040" shorter than the round nose (RN,) so at the standard 1.125" OAL, there was MASSIVE bearing sticking out, and too much internal volume. My first attempt at loading was a desire to again leave about 1/32" of exposed bearing just like my standard load, but this left the case at about 1.050", which my glock did not want to feed at all. I did the math for internal volume, and figured out that at 1.085, I'd be shorter of my standard OAL by .040, which would give me the same internal volume as my standard RN load, and there wasn't TOO much bearing exposed, although quite a bit more than I'm used to. Luckily, my glocks have LoneWolf barrels in them that don't start the rifling right at the bore, but rather about 1/2" in from the bore. I doubt this exposed bearing surface would work well in something like a CZ where the rifling goes all the way to the throat -- and no bearing surface extended from the case mouth is acceptable.

Additionally, 1.085" cycled by hand just fine in the glocks, so I'm hoping it will cycle just fine in live fire as well.

1.050": Too short, wouldn't feed.


Loaded at 1.085" OAL:


Tumble lubed, sized at .3565" dia and lubed again. I've since changed my lube forumla to be a bit harder and thinner, this was a bit more messy than is commonly accepted:

[CiDirkona]

Woohoo!

[Mattog22]

Very nice, did it have much leading?

[CiDirkona]

A tiny bit running along one side if each groove, but noting overly concerning. What causes that kind of problem causes that?

The bore was dirtier than I'm used to as well, but a single pass with the snake pulled that out.

[Mattog22]

I think you're probably doing ok. I think 9mm is pretty hard to get right. I'm not the one to ask, I just started and can't get my .45 not to lead lol.

[CiDirkona]

Session 2: 371 rounds.

[Mattog22]

Looks pretty good!

[jsizemore]

CD, you can smoke your mold with a butane lighter/gas grill lighter. Deposits a light coat of soot where its directed.

When your corners are square on boolits, your mold is filling out properly. More consistent weight, and size. You can get your mold up to temp by sticking the corner in the melt. The solutions to getting square corners is to either increase the temp of your alloy or add tin/pewter to your alloy. About 1-2% by weight.

Your off to a great start. Good Luck

[CiDirkona]

Mine is a bevelled base boolit design (Lee 120gr TC) so that's been extra tricky. I also had a friend help me out by picking up and playing with my brand new mold and denting one of the corners in on the bevelled lip part just to make sure I had a good, clean challenge to start casting with. (He's no longer allowed in my garage...)

I yet to have any tin or anything extra to throw in the mix, and have been trying to do what I can out of straight (acquirable/cheap) wheel weights.

I tried smoking the mold this time with a butane lighter, and it seemed to help a little bit, but it also didn't leave much if any soot, so I may try a wooden match next time.

[Doby45]

I have that same mold in a 2 cavity and I think I am going to try to remove the bevel base with a razor blade. Get a good ole plain base boolit out of it.

[.357]

Congrats! that looks great! Looks like the casting bug has bitten you.

[CiDirkona]

Loaded up and ready to shoot:

[CiDirkona]

Smelting session number 2, with seashelly goodness provided by my sister-in-law. Traded some ammo I don't use (121pf FTL!!) for a sea-shell themed cast iron thingy that makes perfect disguised-as-harmless-stinky-soaps ingots.

[Rusty Shackleford]

I'm diggin' the ignot molds, CiDirkona.