Which mould, RCBS or Lyman?

[Bisbee]

If you had to choose between the lyman 358477 or RCBS 82032 for a 150g SWC mould, which would it be?

[captaint]

Bisbee - Truthfully, if I bought a new mold today, it would be the RCBS. I think they can be relied upon to make a mold that will drop boolits of the correct dimensions. While I haven't bought a new Lyman mold ever, we do hear often enough that the recent molds are very hit or miss. Customer service, when a mold is out of spec, doesn't sound like it's very good either. RCBS customer service has always been very highly spoken of. enjoy Mike

[knifemaker]

I also would go with RCBS. Been hearing alot of complaints on Lyman quality control. Two months ago I bought a Lyman .210 sizing/lube die for my .41 mag. It was out of round by 3 thousands. It seems the quality control problem goes beyound the molds.

[Jeff H]

I've never owned and RCBS but I'll not take a chance on another (new) Lyman.
Last three I got were undersized.

[MT Chambers]

As much as I like RCBS molds as well as Lymans, 2 of the last 3 RCBS molds have been slightly undersized and I wonder why they are never "slightly oversize".

[Hardcast416taylor]

As much as I like this mold from RCBS for this .357 dia. 150 gr. bullet I like the NOE group buy mold for this bullet that ran awhile back. I got a 4 cavity mold and all drop about .360" dia. They weigh 153 gr. using my 50/50 alloy.Robert

[cbrick]

If your only two considerations are Lyman or RCBS . . .

I wish all the questions here were that easy to answer.

It's a no brainer . . . RCBS.

You should check out NOE & MP in the group buy section first though. See what they may have available, may not even need to wait for it if one of them has one on the shelf. These molds are made to order in the group buys but it's not uncommon to have an over run and a couple sitting around. Sure worth looking into it.

Rick

[Ed_Shot]

Just got my first new Lyman mold since 1975, its a 452374. I was worried based on what I read here but both cavities drop at .453 or better and 228 gr. I've had good luck getting used Lyman's in the past on ebay including a 358477 that drops at .359. But anymore seems like you can get one cheaper at MidSouth than ebay. I just gave up and ordered a new one.

[Elkins45]

RCBS, all other factors being equal. I bought a new Lyman 30 cal recently that wasn't undersized, but I had to Leement it to get it to drop freely. The two new RCBS I bought cast like a dream.

[TCFAN]

Bisbee.If you want a 358477 look at NOE he has several different mold that he calls 360477. They are in 2 and 4 cav Aluminum and also some brass as well as some in hollow point.. Here is a link..Down at the bottom of the page and on page 3

http://noebulletmolds.com/orders/catalog/index.php?cPath=35&sort=2a&page=2
Hope it works.........Terry

[MikeS]

I would also have to say your best bet is to get one of the moulds from NOE. My personal preference would be to get one of the brass moulds, but I don't really care for aluminum moulds. Either mould will be leaps & bounds ahead of either Lyman or RCBS, think more along the lines of H&G like quality!

[Bisbee]

Thanks all for the helpful input. I will certainly look at the NOE mould in brass, good tip!

[waco]

Bisbee
I just received my brass 4 cav. 360477 from NOE. Ordered it Friday night, it was in my mail box Monday when I got home from work. What a thing of beauty! I will cast with it tonight. This is my second brass mold from NOE, and I will be a customer again in the future for sure. Way better molds than what you can expect from Lyman. IMHO.
http://i886.photobucket.com/albums/ac63/waltercoats/930BBB73-CFB8-43DE-B481-BB9201E03D72-9840-00000C249499BE9C.jpg
http://i886.photobucket.com/albums/ac63/waltercoats/65530460-EA92-4FEB-B497-FED363FFE812-9840-00000C248F573DA0.jpg

[waco]

here is a pic of one of the boolits i cast tonight with the new NOE 360477
http://i886.photobucket.com/albums/ac63/waltercoats/CBF8E7EE-DBCA-418A-80CA-7FC4BE6ED103-10471-00000D0699CC2869.jpg
sorry about the poor pic
thats not a seam, just a reflection

[Cadillo]

If you must choose between only Lyman and RCBS, you must ask yourself whether you will be satisfied with just a two cavity mould. It's for that reason that I have never owned an RCBS mould.

I have Lyman, Saeco, and Mihec. They are all good, but I find the Lymans to be the easiest and fastest to cast with. I've never had to send a Lyman back yet. I have six, and they are all OK.

When I first started out, I used to have a problem with them casting just a bit undersized, but learned that by adding some tin, and dropping my melt temp, I could get the size up to a very usable diameter. Now that I've got the alloy thing sorted out, I get good diameter bullets in .38, .40, .44, and three .45's.

[jlchucker]

Except for a couple of group buy molds bought through this website, the molds I use for my rifles and revolvers are Lyman or RCBS. Lyman when I first started casting back in the 1970's, and later on some RCBS. If starting off with this hobby nowadays, my choices would be RCBS and, depending upon what comes up, group buy molds from here. I've got one Ranchdog mold, and I understand that he's cutting a deal with Lee as part of going out of business. The Ranchdog mold that I have is a 3-gascheck-3-plainbase 44-240. It drops good boolits, but if I were to buy another mold like that it would have to have conventional lube grooves. Not that tumble-lube doesn't work, it's just a matter of personal preference.

[casterofboolits]

I love my Lyman moulds and have over a hundred four cavity moulds. I buy them in doubles at the same time to get matching moulds from the same production run. The one bad (?) mould I purchased was an attempt to match an existing mould that is over fourty years old. Didn't match!

These are all for pistol calibers and many are no longer in production.

[Finarfin]

I have an accurate mold, it seems good to me, but I have no other experience.

I would never buy Lyman anything unless I had to. Almost everything I've gotten that had Lyman written on it was of unsatisfactory quality. Just my observations. YMMV.

Here's my short list I can remember. Lyman hammer(yes, I'm going to complain about a hammer)- it came with the pin punch set and the hammer heads constantly come unscrewed. I tried caulking them in but I suppose I need to get loctite. It's just aggravating.

Lyman case trimmer- had a burr in the hole, or whatever you call where the arm goes through. It made it unusable and required a lot of work to get it to go. Put grinding compound in there and loosened it up after a bit. Now it works ok, but has to be kept oiled as it rusts more easily.

Lyman 17a front sight. Had "mud" in the threads. Just nasty dirty. Also the dovetail seemed too wide as it took considerable effort to finally get it filed down enough to fit.

Lyman spray case lube- maybe it's me, but this stuff gave me all sorts of problems. Switched to hornady spray lube and it has worked flawlessly.

I have a Lyman dipper, big dipper lead furnace, and sizing die that seem to work right so far. Not sure if it is the sizing die's fault that lube shoots up under my boolits, but probably if I had to guess.

So that's the list of every Lyman product I have used. Less than 50% success rate. Again, JMHO and YMMV.

I haven't had any noteworthy problems with any Lee or RCBS products and buy those brands if I have a choice.

[MT Chambers]

Sorry but my experience is different, I have many Lyman molds both newer and older ones, and have no complaints, same with RCBS, Saeco, NOE, Accurate, LBT, etc......I had nothing but trouble with Lees and won't use them again....Lyman wrote the book on this, all the numbers we use here are Lyman designs and numbers and I really like my Lyman molds esp. the 4 cavity ones.