Big thumper for the Mosin AND a .308?

[savage1r]

I am getting into casting and I want to have some fun with some heavy 'boolits' out of my mosin, but I'm also thinking I can make it work for my .308 as well and I thought I'd run it by you guys to see what you think.

http://www.midwayusa.com/viewProduct/default.aspx?productNumber=530266

That's the mold I'm considering, what I'm wondering is: Can I get both .311 and .308 resizing dies that will get this monster down to size and, if so, what kind of powders would you recommend for pushing these guys around 1800-2000 fps? (lubed and G/C'd of course)

I really appreciate all your wisdom, finding this board has really got me excited about reloading, but I sure as hell don't want to mess up my guns or equipment so I bow before your collective knowledge and promise that I will show results in video form.

[PatMarlin]

Welcome to cast boolit heaven savage1r ...:drinks:

Another consideration is the infamous 311284. Just a magical boolit. Interestingly, I saw more loads for rifles with that boolit at NCBS and got to shoot quite a few rifles with it as well.

Mine is accurate in my bolt actions as well as lever actions. A must have. Check out our group buy manufacturers here.

[savage1r]

That is one sweet looking boolit and MAN, what a treasure of resources, it's going to take me a couple of weeks to get all the way through those reads! My mosin bore slugged out to be .315 so I'm a little leary of using the .308 as I don't want to get leaded up, but again, I'm open to suggestions, I like that extra 10 grains ;).

[turbo1889]

My suggestion is that you go to BRP and have him cut you a two cavity mold that has one cavity cut with his "311284 Improved" cherry and the other cut with his "7.63x53 Argentine" cherry that should set you up for your needs. Or you could go to AM and have him cut you a similar set-up.

Long story short I don't think your going to get one mold to cover both a Mosin with a 0.315" major groove diameter and a 308-Win without having to considerably size down for the 308 or worse yet having the boolit undersize for your Mosin. I'm especially worried about the undersize problem with a Lyman mold that is new production.

So I suggest you order yourself a good two cavity custom mold with one cavity to fit the Mosin and one to fit the 308. Normally I point people to AM since he is at or near the top of my list for custom mold makers but it is also true that all of his boolits have at least a 0.18" diameter flat on the nose and I know from experience that this creates feeding problems with the Mosin action. BRP is an excellent producer of quality molds and because he cherry cuts his molds rather then lathe bores them his rifle boolits are generally a lot more pointy on the nose and thus feed better in the military bolt guns.

A custom BRP two cavity with two separate designs will cost you less then $100 shipped to your door.

Links for BRP:

http://brp.castpics.net/default.htm
http://brp.castpics.net/R1.html
http://brp.castpics.net/Orders.html

[littlejack]

savage1r:
Welcome to the CastBoolits.
Before you get carried away and buy a mould, you need to slug your bore on your Mosin, and make a chamber cast.
I have a Model 44 MN that I sporterized. One of my favorite rifles.
I slugged the bore and it is .313.
I had a friend do a chamber cast, and the throat was .317.
Now, I tried the 314299 boolit you speak of. It is indeed a great boolit, if it fits everything.
It did not. The throat is too big. The boolit gets sideways before it enters the bore. Consequently, the rifle did not shoot this boolit well.
I posted a thread asking to beg, borrow, or steal some of the 316299 boolits that were made with the NOE' mould. Bingo, those shot very well.
I am now on the list, on the Group Buy site to get one of the 316299 moulds.
My advice; Don't buy a mould until you find out the dimentions you need to match with the boolit"
Just trying to save you some money and disappointment.
You would also be a lot better off getting a mould for each of the cartridges you mentioned, considering the great discrepencies of th MN's bore diameters and chambers, and the .308 bore won't be close enough.
Jack

[Ia.redneck]

Pretty good chance a new Lyman mould will be undersized for your Mosin. I bought that same one less than a year ago and it casts .3125 with 50/50 wheel weights to lynotype. Maybe you will have better luck. I did Beagle it to .315 and that shoots pretty well.

[HARRYMPOPE]

the lee 312-155 Harris(or the twin NEI#72) is good in both.Depending on your 308 you may have to size it smaller than 310.The Lee push through kits do a good job of sizing the bullet down. The 309 would be be a good one for the 308.Use the 314 it for the Mosin.


Left target--three consecutive 10 shot groups with Russian 7.62 x 54 @100 (sized 314)

Right target--three consecutive 5 shot groups with Saiga 308 @ 100 (sized 310)

HMP

[turbo1889]

In his second post on this thread, which is the third post of the thread, savage1r stated that his Mosin slugs at 0.315" so we do have at least that much information from him to base our suggestions on. He hasn't given us what is 308 slugs at but it would be safe to hazard a guess that it isn't much bigger then about 0.311" unless it is way out of spec.

Personally I like to have all four major dimensions off of a rifle before selecting a boolit design for it: Major Barrel Groove Diameter, Minor Barrel Bore Diameter, Throat Diameter, & Throat Length

A chamber cast or the much easier for me alternative of a hammer ram swaged pure lead throat impression is even better. With the limited information given so far by the OP though and a WAG on the probably dimensions of his 308 I stick with my original suggestion above of a two cavity BRP mold with the two suggested designs one to fit each rifle.

[HARRYMPOPE]

The Lee 155 and NEI #72 shoots in most 30's i chose to shoot it in.from 30-30 bolts to sloppy 303 Brits.Kind of like "if you build it they will come" and "If it will freely chamber it will shoot"


HMP

[littlejack]

Sorry, I overlooked the bore slugging .315.
I would still try to get the boolit as close to throat diameter as possible, "IF" the throat diameter is larger than the bore diameter.
I beg your pardon HMP, just because a cartridge will freely chamber, doesn't mean it will shoot accurately.
Jack

[turbo1889]

. . . I would still try to get the boolit as close to throat diameter as possible, "IF" the throat diameter is larger than the bore diameter. . .

I agree with that line of thinking as "the best case situation". I have also found optimal accuracy in a situation where the boolit fully fills the guns throat both in diameter and depth. That said, IME so long as the boolit is at least as big of diameter as the major groove diameter of the barrel there is hope for decent results even if it is still fairly loose in the bore, but if it the boolit is smaller then what the barrel slugs too unless its a patched bullet and/or of soft enough alloy to reliably bump up then it is an exercise in futility to load such a cast boolit for that gun. Although as with all things this is a YMMV situation IME that is how things turn out and that is why I chose to direct the OP away from the Lyman mold he was looking at which most likely will drop boolits smaller then what the barrel on his Mosin slugs out at.

The BRP design I suggest he use in his Mosin is listed as a 317 diameter design and knowing BRP that probably means it will be at least that diameter with all but the softest alloys. The BRP design I suggested he use for his 308 is a 311 diameter design. Those two designs together should give him boolit diameters for each of the two guns that at the very least will be big enough to fit his barrels. I agree that boolits that fit both his throat and barrel dimensions would be better then boolits that just fit the barrel dimensions but the OP didn't give any throat dimensions and even then only gave one dimension on one of the two barrels. I thus gave my best WAG based on my experience with the cartridges and the barrel dimensions he is working with. IME a single boolit design won't do very well for both of these guns. A boolit big enough for his Mosin is going to be severely distorted if sized down small enough to work in his 308 (assuming the 308 is even close to standard specs) and a boolit that is the right size for the 308 is probably going to not be big enough to even fit the barrel dimensions much less the throat of the Mosin. The OP seems to want to start with a single two cavity mold so I suggested he go with a two cavity that drops slightly different boolit designs so that each design fits one of the two guns. There are two custom mold cutters I know of that can make a high quality mold so set-up for a reasonable price ~ BRP & AM. Since I know from experience that large meplat flat nosed boolit shapes can be problematic in the Mosin action and that is what AM offers for smaller rifle calibers I thus directed the OP to BRP instead. I pulled up BRP's catalog and sifted through the designs and taking into account both my experience with the cartridges and guns in question and the OP's stated preference for as heavy as possible of boolits I directed him to the two designs in BRP's catalog that I felt would best suit his needs based off of what little information I had and my personal experience.

As to a potential situation where a gun has a throat that is smaller diameter then the major groove diameter of the barrel, or a neck section of the chamber cut that does not allow a boolit diameter at least equal to the major groove diameter to freely chamber. Those are problems with the gun itself and the solution involves fixing the gun.

[badgeredd]

In his second post on this thread, which is the third post of the thread, savage1r stated that his Mosin slugs at 0.315" so we do have at least that much information from him to base our suggestions on. He hasn't given us what is 308 slugs at but it would be safe to hazard a guess that it isn't much bigger then about 0.311" unless it is way out of spec.

Personally I like to have all four major dimensions off of a rifle before selecting a boolit design for it: Major Barrel Groove Diameter, Minor Barrel Bore Diameter, Throat Diameter, & Throat Length

A chamber cast or the much easier for me alternative of a hammer ram swaged pure lead throat impression is even better. With the limited information given so far by the OP though and a WAG on the probably dimensions of his 308 I stick with my original suggestion above of a two cavity BRP mold with the two suggested designs one to fit each rifle.

Havin been in the company of a fellow cast boolit shooter that loves his Mosins, I can say with total confidence you MUST slug the rifle to get all four dimensions. Dutch4122 has about as much knowledge as anyone when it comes to what will shoot and what works. I believe he has 6 different examples and they run all over the map on any one and all four dimensions. He also found that no one boolit will work in all of his guns.

The likelihood that one boolit will work in a 308 and a Mosin is highly stacked against you.

Edd

[savage1r]

Wow, I guess I really hadn't taken into account all the different variables required for a proper answer to my question, I don't even think I asked the question right as my premise is slightly different I suppose. What I am looking for most is a heavy plinking round that can function in two different rifles (if sized accordingly) where accuracy isn't as much the focus as just shooting for fun is, hence the dual use idea. Since this (and a 9mm mold I have already coming) are my first forays into the world of casting, I wanted a few general molds that I could play around with and get used to before getting into the VERY specific mold dimensions, fitting and seating issues. I know my 91/30 barrel slugged out to .315 because the shyster gunsmith who put on my previous scope mount (ATI, please forgive me) told me that it was too big and would never be a really accurate rifle. I then went to my local 1000 yard range and dinged the far gong 3/5 times so I know he was full of you know what. He also overcharged the hell out of me for a simple drill and tap (it was my first time taking a gun to a gunsmith and I had no idea). So if anyone ever goes to Spokane, avoid Brock's Gunsmithing like the plague. I do not know the dimensions of my .308 (winchester 70 stealth), but like I said, I'm not looking for a one hole puncher, just something for fun and won't lead up the barrel too much. I looked at the BRP stuff and it looks REALLY cool, some nice heavy boolits in there that I'm sure can do the job and will probably pick up once I get my casting legs under me and I get all the dimensions of my rifles down. The only other question I have is regarding the powder charge. On a separate thread about the Lee 160grn 7.62x39 mold, a forum member said that they got good results pushing the boolit to 2000ish fps using 15gr of Alliant 2400 (from what I looked up it's a pistol powder?). Is there a similar charge of Alliant that can be used with one of these 200 gr bullets that will push it to similar velocities?

[Echo]

I'm not looking for a one hole puncher, just something for fun and won't lead up the barrel too much.

I believe it was Townsend Whelen that said "Only accurate rifles are interesting". I really don't think that pie-plate accuracy @ 100 yds would be a satifying level of accuracy even as a plinker. Golf balls @ 25 yds would be safe, as would tin cans @ 50 yds, and shooter satisfaction would be minimal. When one shoots at something, one hopes to hit it.

Saying that, I'm not saying that we need one-hole accuracy. But we DO need a modicum of accuracy. Some folks, like me, are satisfied for 3"/100yd accuracy out of our 1917. With that level, the gun will shoot acceptable scores in competition, and cans and golf balls are in danger.

[turbo1889]

Savage1r, I don't think any of us were trying to put you down or make fun of you or anything. In your OP you asked if the LY#314299 would work for both of your guns.

I think the collective answer you have been getting from us is that it is iffy at best with that mold for the larger bore size Mosin. Undersize cast lead boolits are a whole different animal then undersize jacketed bullets. If the diameter of a boolit is less then the major groove diameter of your barrel then a percentage of the high pressure hot gasses behind the boolit will leak around the perimeter of the boolit and “blow by it”. With a jacketed bullet this isn’t too bad of a situation since the gilding metal jacket can tolerate this to a certain extent and although accuracy will suffer to a certain extent it isn’t the end of the world. With a cast lead boolit that doesn’t have a gilding metal jacket to protect its sides those hot gases leaking around it if it is undersize act like a cutting torch and cut and melt lead of the sides of the boolit and spray it further down the bore which decrease the boolit diameter even further and make the gas cutting even worse and the cycle continues all the way to the end of the barrel. A very considerable percentage of leading with cast boolits is due to this happening as a result of using an undersize boolit diameter and one of the first suggestions you will get for curing a load that leads on this forum board is to try using a slightly larger diameter boolit and this often cures the problem. Not many of us think that a mold that is listed as a 314 diameter (especially an new production Lyman) is going to be big enough “as is” to seal the barrel on your Mosin and prevent gas cutting which is more then just an accuracy issue it is a leading of the barrel issue as well.

Since you seem intent on getting a LY#314299 mold and/or have already bought one I would say that for your intended purpose you will probably work out okay if you use the LY#314299 mold as is with a 0.310"-0.311" sizing die for your 308. Then for your Mosin you will need to "beagle" and/or lap the mold and shoot them as cast or use a 0.316"-ish lubrasizer die if you intend to lube them with a lubrasizer and not pan-lube or tumble lube. “Beagling” a mold involves applying a couple strips of high temperature metallic tape to the mating surface of a mold so that the mold does not completely close which makes it cast boolits of larger diameter then the mold was originally intended to cast. The process is the recommended method of getting a mold to cast a larger boolit without permanently altering the mold. Accuracy results are usually not as good as using the correct size mold in the first place due to the resulting boolits produced by a “beagled” mold being slightly out of round and/or fining (although some would disagree with me on that) but since you have stated you are looking for plinker loads not optimal accuracy the process should work out for your needs. Here is a link for you to read up on the process:

http://www.castpics.net/subsite2/MoldMods/BDE.pdf

If you had just asked about the 308 I think most of us would have said that the LY#314299 would serve you well in that application and that you should size it down only as much as you need to for it to chamber in your gun. A number of us, including myself, would have told you that you were better off buying a LY#314299 then a LY#311299 for the 308 if you were purchasing a new production Lyman mold since they tend to cast under stated size and just a little too big is better then a little too small since sizing down a couple thousandths of an inch is fairly easy.

Long story short we are worried about the boolit being undersize in your Mosin and that is the fly in the ointment with what you are suggesting because most of us know from experience that a cast lead boolit that isn’t at least as big of diameter as your gun barrel will usually lead terribly and shoot very loose groups. Cast lead boolits are much more sensitive to being undersize then jacketed bullets. On the other hand a considerably oversize cast lead boolit that has been sized down significantly may not provide the best accuracy possible but it will shoot okay so for your purposes the LY#314299 will do just fin for the 308 the Mosin is where the potential for a problem is.

[littlejack]

One other major accuracy factor needs mention here.
Most folks, myself included find that cast boolits shoot more accurately when seated out to touch the lands, or just short of. This being said, you will "probably" have to shoot single shot style, as the long cartridges will not fit in the magazines of your rifles,YMMV.
On the other hand, if you are not too concerned about the tighter groups, you can seat the boolits as deep as needed to fit your particular rifles.
It seems that you would be well suited to get the less expensive moulds from Lee, if the finances are an issue. That way, you would not have a lot of money tied up in them if the boolit does not perform well.
Your particular MN, is just the nature of the beast. Although two rifles" of any make" can be bored and rifled one after the other, you will never find two that are exactly alike.
The MN's, are famous for their dimensions being all over the place. Consequently, one must make the cast boolit fit the particular chamber, bore and groove.
I would get the mould that is most likely to work in the rifle as opposed to one that will work mediocore in both.
All of the posts on this thread are well intended, and for the most part correct. We want you to get the best from your rifles. Now, you need to sift through the info and fine what is important to you, and proceed.
You may want a boolit some time in the future that will deliver good accuracy.
Might as well start now.
Jack