Cadence used?

[63 Shiloh]

I am running two molds in my casting session, both 2 cav RCBS.

Mold 1: RCBS 38-140-WC

Mold 2: RCBS 38-148-WC this is actually a BNWC

I am running my alloy at 720 degrees F.

My alloy is WW+2% Tin, there is a trace of Super Hard Shot in the melt too.

So, how do you all cast with two molds and at what cadence?

For example, I am currently pouring into mold 1 and setting it down, I them grab mold 2, fill and set it down. Then I open the sprue plate on mold 1, drop the boolits into water and refill, grab mold 2, open sprue and drop the boolits then refill. so it goes until pot is empty.

Timing myself yesterday, I am doing a cycle as described in the above paragraph about every 30 seconds.

I am experiencing slight incomplete base fill out with the 148gn mold in the cavity nearest to the mold handle. This improves after about 20 mins.

My sprues are too hard to be opened with my gloved hand, I do need to crack them open with a piece of hardwood.

So, how are you blokes doing it with running two molds?

Appreciate any advice.


Mike

[Bret4207]

Eliminate 1 of the moulds and work on producing as close to perfect boolits as you can. I've tried the 2 moulds thing numerous times. IMO it's wasted effort- for me. I cast as fast as the mould wants so that it makes the best boolits possible. I've had the 2 moulds thing almost work right a few times, but it's just not worth the effort for me. Too much frogging around trying to get one mould back for a fill a little faster and one a little slower. If you could find 2 moulds that had nearly identical needs and could meet that need with your tempo then you'd be fine.

It depends on the mould and some other things, but I'm filling the mould roughly every 8-10 seconds with a single or double cavity iron mould. It's more like 15-20 seconds with a 6 banger aluminum. You say you are taking about 30 seconds. What are you gaining?

[Calamity Jake]

Bret has trouble running 2 molds, I run 2 (up to 4 cav. each)all the time, have been for 30 years, I ran a combination if 3 different molds yesterday, always 2 at a time. My fill/dump rate is about 4 per minute.

You didn't say anything about preheating your molds before casting, preheating helps a lot.
Get you a cheap electric hot plate, on top of the burner place a flat steel plate to set your molds on, and old skillsaw blade works good.

I don't worry about cutting the spru with a gloved hand as it's hard to do with 2+ cavities and running 2 molds.

[MT Gianni]

I use one mold and keep temps so my sprue freezes between 4-7 seconds.

[1Shirt]

I will run two molds with single and double cavs without any problem. I cast as hot as possible and as fast as possible. In general, the one I have set down has the overflow solidified, and ready to cut. Never actually timed anything, but would gusstimate probably 5-7 seconds between blts.
1Shirt!:coffee:

[prs]

I always run two molds, usually 6 cavity Lee in 45 Colt. There are variables you can use to control the heat and techniques you can use to alter quality of fill.

You say you fill a mold, lay it aside as you fill the other, then........ and so on. But, what do you lay it on? If your molds tend to run too cool, lay them on wood. If they build-up too much heat, lay them upon a section of angle iron or aluminum. A wet cloth can be used to quickly cool a mold too - put the less stuff you have to do to break your pace, the better. Getting the mold up to temp is prolly the better part of success and try not to use an overly hot pot temp. When a mold is up to temp for me, the spru waste reamains liquid for some time -- it is important to keep some modest hand clasp pressure on the handles as you lay the mold down and don't remove that pressure until the spru waste has frozen - its just a second or two at the right temp.

To get a better fill (given you have an appropropriate alloy and given some alloy/mold combinatins are more difficult than others) try different bottom pour angles. Again, you are just whistling Dixie if the mold is not up to temp yet. Instead of straight down the center, tilt the mold to the side or fore or aft a bit and maybe at a slight tangent to get the alloy to swirl in. The casting should remain liquid for some perceptible time. If your mold is on a rest as you pour, shake it a little as if you suffer with Parkinson's a bit so that the mold sort of rattles against the rest, seems to help get the air out.

prs

[geargnasher]

Those are relatively small cavities and large iron blocks, you aren't able to run them fast enough to keep them both hot. Your method is fine, that's the way I do it on the rare occasions where I can cast with two moulds, but I have the best luck running two moulds with ones that tend to overheat easily and require a slower casting pace to allow the heat to dissipate. As a general rule, I don't have any moulds that will stay hot enough to fill out well at only two pours a minute. Three pours a minute per mould is about the minimum.

I'd say up the pot temp a bit, but you're already running near the upper end for your alloy composition, you might try going up another 20 degrees and cast just as fast as you can, but in the long run you might have better boolits and fewer rejects if you just back off the temp to 650-675 and cast with one mould at a time. Using cooler pot temps allows you to cast faster with one mould anyway, since it imparts less heat to the blocks each pour. A 650 degree wheel-weight melt will keep me hopping with most two-cavity iron moulds, so in effect I cast the same amount of boolits as I would with two moulds, since I don't have to wait but 3-5 seconds for the sprue to freeze enough to cut with a gloved thumb.

Gear

[plainsman456]

I always thought that 2 at a time made sense.
I usually pick one that is similar to the one I really want.
I have poured 3 at a time but after a while it does get confusing.

[btroj]

I Cast with one at a time. I prefer it that way.
Have tried 2 at a time and didn't care for it. Just a personal preference.

Gear had some great advice.

Brad

[casterofboolits]

I had my own boolit casting busines for awhile and I still cast the same way, just not as often. I always use three moulds at a time. Three four cavity Lymans, three eight cavity H&G, also eight cavity Saeco's.

Just what I'm used to. But, I'll make a years supply of boolits in a few days.

[63 Shiloh]

Thanks for the replies fellers.

Bret's comment on 'what are you gaining?' made me have a look at my production rate, it is less than using one mold at a time for me anyway.

Gear's comments have also made solid sense.

Did some casting early this morning, using one mold at a time, with the second one being held at temp on a hotplate.

Did a 100 pours on the first mold, time from pour to drop is 9 seconds, them seamlessly started with the second mold. Due to preheating it only took 3 casts to get good boolits, then proceeded to do another 100 casts. The 148gn mold added an extra 1 second from pour to drop.

So, in summary, I am now getting 5-6 casts per minute, as opposed to 2 using two molds. That's 10-12 boolits a minute using the double cavity RCBS mold.

I did have a wet sponge on the bench, I really only needed it to harden the sprue to keep cadence.

I also experimented with pour angle into the mold and giving it a little shake, reject rate was very low. In fact the only rejects I had was due to operator error, mostly due to stuffing up my pour into the cavity.

Now I have a nice pile of boolits, tonight will be lubing, sizing and loading them up.

[bobthenailer]

although ive made alot of bullets, I dont really like useing 2 moulds in sequence , it seems like you in constant movement with some overlap of motion , I just use a fan to cool the sprues faster.

[cajun shooter]

I for the most part always agree with Bret on most that he post; this is not one of them. Calamity Jake is dead on. I put my two 3 cavity molds onto my hotplate that has been preheated and the control set at midway. I put my RCBS PRO-MELT on 750 and when it is ready I start casting. The correct setting of the hot plate is trial and error until you find that honey spot. I then proceed as you described by filling one mould then sitting it back on the hotplate. I fill the second mould and put it on the plate. I then drop mould 1 and refill it before it returns to the plate and pick up mould 2. This has made it much easier to cast a lot of bullets without over working my moulds and warping the blocks. Since I started this style of casting my cull rate has been cut to almost zero. By using the hot plate to both preheat and maintain that temp after pouring has made the huge difference. My alloy is in the range of 10 BHN or 20-1 alloy. I cast mostly 44-40 in custom brass moulds for the SASS match sports. Before the plate if any little thing like a bath room break or phone would upset my rhythm and the moulds would drop rejects because of the cooling they had while sitting on my bench. It works great for me but it is something that depends on the person and how they want to cast. My mentor taught me while using 4 Lyman pots and 6 cavity H&G moulds that speed and production was the way to go. He was casting bullets to sale so that is understandable. A slower pace will do the same if you are not looking for numbers. I try to do at least 500 or more at each session,even a 1000 day would be nice.

[Bret4207]

No offense to anyone that like using multiple moulds, it just isn't for me. Same for Lee Dripomatics and flavored coffees. Do what makes ya happy.


Shiloh, glad I could help.

[btroj]

I agree this time Bret. One mold at a time for me.
I have a Lee pot but don't use it and don't drink any coffee.

Brad

[geargnasher]

What do you want for your Lee pot, Brad? I guess you wouldn't want to trade for the 20lb sack of coffee beans I have in the pantry............

Please PM.

Gear

[btroj]

I plan on keeping it Gear. It is my backup pot invade the RCBS goes down. Had the Lee first, got the RCBS as a pharmacy school graduation gift. Man, was that really 20 years ago?
The Lee pots work well, I just like the bigger capacity of the 20 pounder over a 10 pounder.

Brad

[Cherokee]

I cast two molds at a time, both are preheated. Works for me.

[HangFireW8]

Shiloh,

I only kinda-sorta run two molds at once. The second mold is on a mold warmer (500W hot plate), I turn it sprue-plate-side down a couple of minutes before switching to it. That way, I get good base fill-out from the start (or at least pretty quickly).

I use a sprue knocker made of a hammer handle, drilled, and filled with about a 1/4" wide column of lead. If I can get the sprue open with my thumb, chances are the alloy is still too soft and will smear.

Your alloy sounds good for .357. Might be a tad hard for .38 Special, or at least, harder than it has to be. Your melt temp is fine. I wouldn't go hotter. Ventilate the mold better instead.

[GabbyM]

No offense to anyone that like using multiple moulds, it just isn't for me. Same for Lee Dripomatics and flavored coffees. Do what makes ya happy.


Shiloh, glad I could help.

It is personal preference along with ones constitution , to use an old fraise. IMHO.

I like single mould casting. Have a couple fans which make a huge difference. A little 6” fan from a bargain store helps and I do have one of those. Then I have a squirrel cage fan on my Magma master caster. I move it over to my bottom poor pot when using hand held moulds. The longest I ever need to hold the mould under the fan is four seconds as I run a lame cadence through my head. Yes you can set down and pick up a mould in well under four seconds. But my gosh some of us are lazy you know. In that one or two seconds I look for the spru to turn the same consistent color. But most of all it gives me a slice of time to chant my matra. Concentrate on making the perfect bullet. When it comes down to it you will tire out and need to quite at whatever cycle count your hands can take. Faster you run the faster you get to hurting. With my busted up 55 year old set of hands. And I laterally mean busted up. I can cast more bullets on any given Sunday if I use a relaxed pace. Just like a long distant runner.
This is a hobby after all.

My casting pots are forty pounders and I’ve two of them side by side. The highest production rates I’ve achieved is by runing both pots with one as a feeder. In two pot cadence I spill no time with spru recycling until my poor pot level drops. Then I ladle over galena from the melter to the poor pot. Then dump the spru into the melter and add an ingot. Temperature in the poor pot stays stable and the mould is still up to casting temp after the minute or so it takes to move some lead around. Which includes moving perfect bullets off the drop cloth into a box.

Couple years ago I cast up 250,000 bullets in one year with my slacker pace. My significant other GF. Whom is one of the most wonderful people in the world. Works at her job in a pace I can’t keep up with. She had carpo-tunnel surgery last year on both hands. Bill was $80,000.00. Since we are still free to pay for that she had it done instead of getting the chip implanted into her arm and going on Osama’s plan of being assimilated into the Borg collective until death. Not to get off on politics but the point is you can hurt yourself by working at to hard a pace. Then what are you going to do. I've no aversion for work. Even this last winter I had a job where I was moving 15 to 30 thousand pounds of steel a day. But when I cast bullets I use one mould and set the bench up to get the best performance out of that one mould. A cooling fan is the way to go. IMHO. Let the fan do the work.

BTW:
Those five liter wine boxes can be cut from a line starting at the grab handle cutout to make a nice heavy bullet drop box