What was the most difficult mold you've ever casted with?

[Jumbopanda]

It seems to be common knowledge that every mold behaves differently, and that casting methods that work for one will not always work for another. So out of curiosity I'd like to hear stories about the most difficult to use mold that you've ever had to deal with. What kinds of problems did you have? What did you do to solve those problems? And most importantly, how long did it take you to figure out the solution?

[ku4hx]

I never met a mold I didn't like. That's my story and I'm stickin' to it.

[bobthenailer]

Lee moulds have been the the hardest to make good bullets with , both 2 & 6 cavity, but i did get all the quirks corrected so they now work fairley well !
I have had no problems with Saeco , RCBS , Ideal , LBT & Mountian moulds

[btroj]

NOE 4 cav 314640 RG mould with HP pins in. Needs to be run very hot and very fast. The pins cool so quickly that getting good fill in the nose is hard.

[41 mag fan]

RCBS 348 mold I got......I've been casting with it, have about 1k cast and have been each time doing QC on it.
Too dang lazy right now to fully correct the problems with it, as all I needed was 1k cast for it and it's liable to be 10 yrs before its used again.
It's one of my fathers molds, he gave me all his casting equipment, and he don't shoot like he used to. It'll be quite awhile before he goes thru this 1k of casts.

[41 mag fan]

RCBS 348 mold I got......I've been casting with it, have about 1k cast and have been each time doing QC on it.
Too dang lazy right now to fully correct the problems with it, as all I needed was 1k cast for it and it's liable to be 10 yrs before its used again.
It's one of my fathers molds, he gave me all his casting equipment, and he don't shoot like he used to. It'll be quite awhile before he goes thru this 1k of casts.

[felix]

Might be mo'betta' to ask what is/was the best mold out of the box that was perfect for all conditions and all alloys used to date. Only one out of about 20 that I have. A custom LBT with very rounded cavity edges fits that demand. Some of the other molds in the stable work extremely well. Across the board, though, I'd pick RCBS molds because they are coppered-iron in composition and hold boolit dimensions with any kind of lead at any reasonable temperature range. My Saeco molds are equally fine except some of the sprue plates have to be "fixed" to make them work as advertised as equal to RCBS. At any rate, a perfect mold is too rare to speak of and can be of ANY brand on any particular casting day. ... felix

[Beagle333]

Biggest learning curve... definitely a NOE RG4. But they make my favorite boolits and I'd never sell em. They are fun once the secrets are learned. 8-) I will be buying more. :-D

[Sensai]

Not brand, but style, those Loverin style boolits in the smaller calibers sure like to hang onto the mold. They are among my favorite style to shoot and least favorite style to cast.

[dragon813gt]

A Mihec 30 silhouette mold. Third cavity would hang on to the bullet like it life depended on it. The other cavities were hit and miss as well. I have plenty of his molds, over ten and counting. That one had the narrowest temperature range where it would work properly. My fix was to buy the hollowpoint three cavity version mold. It's a smaller block and the pins should help w/ any stubborn bullets. I still haven't tried out the hollowpoint mold so it could be even worse ;)

All of the Lees I had were problematic in one way or another. Solution was to replace them w/ better quality molds.

[detox]

My new Lee mould with receeding alignment pins was the most difficult to figure out. I learned that i must be gentle when closing mould halves and cast at a lower temp -700 degrees.

When temps are correct my RCBS 358 diameter 158 gr Cowboy mould is one of my easier moulds to cast with.

[NoZombies]

Ideal 429303. Deep square lube grooves. and when I say square, I mean no draft at all.

[Hickory]

The NOE 4 cav 314640 RG mould is a tough one for me too.

[gunoil]

lee 2 & 6. No mold should have a alum. spru plate IMO. Lee handles are the worst out of the box, ya can pin em. Ya can drill,tap,&set-screw the bolts on top. I have a mihec steel spru, w/a lil' machine work it fits lee six cav..

[243winxb]

Lee 1-Cavity Shotshell Slug Bullet Mold 12 Gauge 1 oz. Had to remove all burrs. Pressure cast. Lube it. Be very careful how you closed it. Must use pure lead if you want the slug to ever come out of the mold. Worst in 40+ years of casting. http://i338.photobucket.com/albums/n420/joe1944usa/Lee12gaSlug.jpg

[Jupiter7]

My first 6 cavity .225 mold followed by my first RG brass HP mold. Mostly just figuring out what each "needed" to produce quality boolits. I'd say it was more growing pains as a new caster vs. hard to cast molds.

[mold maker]

6 cavity LEE that appears to have been cut off center. Lemented twice before it would drop even half without abuse. I finally sent it back and got one that worked right out of the box.
I never had another that I didn't master right away.

[tomme boy]

I will second the Mihec 180 SIL mold in 30 cal. The 2 center on a 4 cavity will not come out unless you literally beat the mold. It is on one side only and is a known problem for this design. I sold it on EBAY.

[Iron Mike Golf]

NOE 40 cal RG-4.

[dragon813gt]

I will second the Mihec 180 SIL mold in 30 cal. The 2 center on a 4 cavity will not come out unless you literally beat the mold. It is on one side only and is a known problem for this design. I sold it on EBAY.

Glad I'm not the only one to sell theirs. I sold mine here hoping the new owner would have the forethought to search out the mold before buying.

[mpmarty]

311421 hp group buy. The pin is always too cold and nose fillout stinks. I'm running a pid and have cast up to 775* and as fast as I can empty and refill and still poor noses.

[NVScouter]

Custom Accurate 375 3 chamber mold.

I tried everything and could not get base fill out. I tried 4 pots (yes pots) of various alloys, temperatures, cleaning, recleaning etc. I finaly opened up the fill hole 1/16" and wham! I may open it up another 1/32" since I have a high reject rate but I went from 5 out of a 100 keepers that were so-so to 50% keeper rate of good quality.

The design has the large block, a heavy/long boolt on each end and a short fat one in the middle. Tom's molds are dense alluminum and heavy sprue plates. It was just cooling the lead down to get a junk base. One adjustment and its a keeper!

The only mold I own I dislike is my 22 Bator. Its a small mold with tiny boolits, cast hard and hot and its OK. The reason I dislike it is that I hate gaschecking those little things. I just keep it in case I cant get any 22s during Obama's forth Presidental term after he suspends the constitution!

[BruceB]

[QUOTE=mpmarty; The pin is always too cold and nose fillout stinks. I'm running a pid and have cast up to 775* [/QUOTE]

TURN UP THE HEAT! You clearly have a too-cold problem, which you have already identified.

My casting is routinely done at the maximum temperature my RCBS furnace can manage.... 870 degrees. The bullets are fine and the procedure works perfectly. (Search for "speedcasting" if you're interested.)

I've never understood the reluctance of casters to use plenty of heat. It's as if there was a prize or a merit badge for those who use the lowest-possible temperature! It's not so. Do what ya gotta do, and if it needs higher temps, USE higher temps.

[Bent Ramrod]

It kind of varies. Some moulds will cast great almost from the first on a given session. A month or a year later I get them out for another run and it's a battle royale to get anything out of them. Some do fine for a while and then get balky and difficult. Some finally submit after I'm almost exhausted from heating them, pouring bad ones, loosening or tightening sprue plates and heating and trying again.

Generally, the sexier cavities are harder to cast, i.e., Ideal 25720, 319247, 40392, and the like. Moulds for either tiny or very big boolits have a lot of "issues" to deal with. Boolits with oversized grease grooves, hollow bases or hollow points require a lot of what Frank Marshall called "skulduggery" to run smoothly. Hoch moulds generally have to be lived with for a session or two before anything useful comes out of them. I think this is a combination of having a lot of attached machinery to get up to temperature and what seems to be an absolute lack of breaking in when I get them.

After use I always leave the blocks open until they cool so the maximum air can contact the heated surfaces and oxidize them. This often results in much better casting the next time, and never does any harm.

[dragon813gt]

I've never understood the reluctance of casters to use plenty of heat. It's as if there was a prize or a merit badge for those who use the lowest-possible temperature! It's not so. Do what ya gotta do, and if it needs higher temps, USE higher temps.

All well and good w/ pure lead. Once you have a tin alloy you will start oxidizing the tin out when you get to around 800. If you have a thick layer of flux on top it will prevent this. But this is one of the main reasons people don't go overboard w/ the temp.

[Reverend Recoil]

Lee C309-113-F is a pain to cast with. It has to be run hot and fast. It was more trouble than it was worth.

[wildwilly]

NEI 41 cal Keith semi wadcutter 245gr gc double cavity. Requires high casting temp. to get the cavities to fill completely.

[BruceB]

I've been in this "game" for about 45 years. My total bullet production is in the millions.

My own experience has disproved many "everybody KNOWS" beliefs.

One of these is the matter of 'burning off" tin from the alloy. The possibility doesn't worry me in the least, and I've been casting thousands of excellent bullets at that 870* temperature for many years. I did a controlled experiment some years back, adding 4% tin to my usual wheelweight alloy just to see this reputed "easier casting, better fill-out, etc"....Hah. All the addition accomplished was the increase in the cost of my raw material.

If you haven't TRIED the higher-temp casting, don't believe that you "know" what the results are like.

I must point out that the high temperature process doesn't take extra time, because of the method I use..... 400-500 per hour from a 2-cavity mould is my normal rate.

[dragon813gt]

You can't change chemistry. Say whatever you want but the tin will separate from the lead. As to what degree it depends on how hot. If you could precisely control the temp you could heat both up to liquid point, and slowly cool it down. The lead will solidify first leaving the molten tin on top. This is chemistry and you can't change it.

Will you lose all the tin when running a really hot pot? If it's over a prolonged period and you don't mix it back in then yes. Even w/ no flux if you stir it back in you shouldn't lose that much. As to the 4% tin. You're right, you are wasting money. There isn't much gain over two percent. I keep it as low as possible, typically one percent.

[BruceB]

The RCBS pot holds 22 pounds, and I keep it as full as possible.

Whenever there's room for one of my 3-pound ingots, one is added. The ingots are pre-heated and no break occurs in the casting run.

The TIME available for this supposed loss of tin is very limited, especially with the larger bullets. The virtually-continuous addition of fresh alloy is also a given.

I'm not trying to "change chemistry", but I AM saying that if there is tin loss, it just doesn't concern me, nor does it affect the quality of my bullets.

The 4% was simply a convenient figure at the time. I was using 1/4-pound bars of lead-free solder, and arithmetic is not my strong suit! Since it was just a one-time experiment, there's no on-going tin cost at all.

[detox]

TURN UP THE HEAT! You clearly have a too-cold problem, which you have already identified.

My casting is routinely done at the maximum temperature my RCBS furnace can manage.... 870 degrees. The bullets are fine and the procedure works perfectly. (Search for "speedcasting" if you're interested.)

I've never understood the reluctance of casters to use plenty of heat. It's as if there was a prize or a merit badge for those who use the lowest-possible temperature! It's not so. Do what ya gotta do, and if it needs higher temps, USE higher temps.

I agree with you BruceB. Turn up the heat for best fill out.

Quote from my RCBS Casting Thermometer instructions:

The recommended casting temperatures for casting metals are as follows:

Pure Lead 700
1:20 Tin-Lead 700
1:10 Tin-Lead 700
Wheel Weights 775
Linotype 775

I normally cast at lower temps, especially when casting with Linotype. So today using my RCBS Pro Melt bottom pour pot i turned up the heat to RCBS recommended temps and casted the most beatiful filled out .308 boolits ever.

I normally cast at 800 with pure lead and larger boolits..

Lately I have been stirring and fluxing with Vita Flux about every 50 boolits. Vita Flux is what was used in older linotype machines. Vita Flux looks like a pink wax.

[dragon813gt]

I'm not trying to "change chemistry", but I AM saying that if there is tin loss, it just doesn't concern me, nor does it affect the quality of my bullets.


Well we're both on the same page then. The loss doesn't really concern me as well. People tend to get hung up in the little things. If your bullet casts fine w/out tin then isn't a need to add it.

[Jumbopanda]

Slightly off topic, but what I'm wondering right now is this: what do you reasonably expect out of a mold? If you've tried every casting technique you can think of and a mold still produces...say, 10-20% rejects, do you just accept it and move on?

[Iowa Fox]

Two of them both Ideals 35793 and 429303 Twenty at one session is about all I can stand. If anyone has suggestions to make them fall from the mold easier I'd sure like to hear them.

[RobS]

BRP 453640 HP 4 Cavity: The pins and mounting hardware along with the aluminum block and fairly square lube grooves makes it very difficult to drop boolits. The mold has to be run with hot alloy and at a very fast pace to keep the mold temp up otherwise the damn boolits stick in the cavities. This mold is a definite pre-heater on the hotplate as well. Of all the molds I've ever used this one is the most finicky and one that can try a person's patients.

[doghawg]

An old Lee .358 single cavity HP was the absolute most miserable. That one is gone now but a Lee 6 cav .44 cal 310 GC is currently the worst. I know venting is the problem but despise the wrinkly bugger too much to work on it. I know I will have "arrived" as a caster when six "keepers" per pour spill out of a large bullet Lee mold....

[Mk42gunner]

I have had two molds that really gave me problems. One is fixed, one isn't.

The one that is fixed is a Lee six cavity, 314120 RNFP from Wilbird's group buy. Between receipt of the mold and fixing it took me almost a year.

It was my first six cavity and I had to go through most of the learning processes with it. That wasn't the problem, the problem was that it would sometimes cast perfect boolits, sometimes they were about 0.012" out of round. I tired everything I could find on the net, or could think of. I finally decided that it wasn't closing properly, and it wasn't operator error.

I was about to try filing the face down to fix it when I smoked the whole face of both sides of the blocks, then opened and closed it several times. The problem was that the alignment pins had expanded the metal around the holes when they were pressed in, this allowed the mold to stay open most of the time.

The fix was to trim the aluminum around the alignment pins. I was so disgusted with it that I just used my pocket knife for a trial. It worked and I have never seen the need to fix the cosmetics. It drops good round boolits now, I usually cast a quart or so when the can gets low.

The one I haven't fixed is an Ideal 313445 SC. It is a venting issue, but I can get usable boolits from it by pressure casting from a Lee 4-20. I haven't fixed it because I don't really use it that much anymore. The next time I am going to cast with it I will break the edges of the blocks under the sprueplate with a stone.

Robert

[felix]

A person typically learns how to cast well when making 22 boolits that weigh within nominal range with little or no weight deviation. Tommy, my son, and BruceB have the same methods in appearance from here: Hot as Hel, fast as Hel. Tommy's boolits are within 0.1 grain per batch for 90 percent of the individuals within that batch. I'd say 50 percent have zero deviation from the norm. Yes, the alloy must be perfect for the mold on the day of casting. Usually, if not always, the evening consists of heavy atmospheric condensation when Tommy does his thing for me. ... felix

[9.3X62AL]

Lee moulds tend to present me with the more frequent challenges. Most of those can be addressed by assuring their contact points and block centering surfaces have sufficient lube, ditto the sprue plate pivot. Most of my moulds do their best work when run at a rate and temp that allows me to open sprue plates with a gloved hand, rather than resorting to a rawhide mallet. It's less work, and since I started scaling rifle boolits more frequently I've noticed smaller weight variances. A recent run of the RCBS 22-55-SP in Linotype scaled 95% of the castings within 1/2 of 1% of the mean. That's a 0.2 grain spread. I was "In The Zone" THAT day, for certain.

[NoZombies]

Two of them both Ideals 35793 and 429303 Twenty at one session is about all I can stand. If anyone has suggestions to make them fall from the mold easier I'd sure like to hear them.

Only thing I can think of is to replace the molds with something else!

The physical design is simply infuriating. The deep, completely square lube grooves are the issue. My 429303 is a 4 cavity. I spend more time banging on the handles than I do anything else when I cast with it. I can only assume the design originated from someone who had never designed a bullet mold before. There's no call for the design of the lube grooves.

[Bent Ramrod]

Those "Hi-Velo-Pen" designs are pretty ridiculous, all right. I got enough 429303 boolits out to test by using the same technique I use to free boolits with square, deep grease grooves. (I'm right handed, so if you're a lefty, just reverse hands.)

I swing the sprue plate aside. I hold the handles loosely in my left hand instead of holding them together, just enough to keep the mould from dropping out of my hand , and rap the hinge joint with my cutoff stick. I make no attempt to open the mould; I just let it jar open by itself, aided by the fact that I'm letting the handles open as the tapping induces them to. In the majority of cases, I find that a little arc of space opens on both sides between the boolit base and the cavity. Once I see that, I gingerly try to open the mould. If the boolit seems to stick in one side more than the other, I do more rapping and allow the cavities to separate further. Generally, at some point, the boolit is released enough to open the handles and drop it out.

Admittedly, this is not a speed casting exercise. I started doing this with soft, square grease groove boolits because any attempt to knock them out or dump them unsupported by the other mould half seemed to twist or dimple some of the lands at the mould joint as the heavy boolit fell out. Properly done, such marks virtually disappear.

I've never gotten any noteworthy accuracy out of my 429303, but I admit that I haven't tried any high velocity loads in my .44 Spl. revolver. Maybe it only works at top speeds.

[GOPHER SLAYER]

I have a beautiful Hoch .321 mold that I bought several years ago and after a number of tries I have given up. I have yet to get a usable bullet from it. I am going to ask Buckshot to try it the next time he casts. I sold him a nice mold thinking I didn't need two. Big mistake.