Unusual Ideal .228" Mold

[Doug Bowser]

I have a pre-Lyman Ideal mold for a .228" flat pointed bullet. I assume it is for a .22 Savage HP. It is a nose pour mold with a screw adjustable stem in the base of the mold. It allows bullets to be made from 50 grains up to 90 grains. I am wondering if anyone else has seen one of these molds and if they ever used them. The bullet has Loverin style grooves.

Doug

[wistlepig1]

Doug , a picture would help, have you cast with it yet? thanks

[uscra112]

I have read about them. Never had one.

[bhn22]

Sounds like an Ideal "Perfection" mold. The value of one in such an obscure caliber could be great. Look into it carefully.

[dbosman]

Here is a picture of one.
93396

[Doug Bowser]

That's it

[Forrest r]

Very nice!!!!

A link to a ideal mold catalog from 1900 with that mold in it.

http://www.castpics.net/subsite/HistMolds/1900_Ideal_Catalog.pdf

Thank you for posting the picture of your mold, I've only seen 1 other mold that even remotely looked like that one.

forrest r

[Digital Dan]

Would that all moulds were so fabricated

[Thin Man]

As luck would have it, I recently bought a similar designed mold on an ebay auction along with a Lyman tong mold in 38 S&W. Both were advertised as rusty and dirty, thus the winning bid of $22 (that number includes shipping). The 38 S&W tong tool cleaned up easily and casts very suitable boolits, Lyman pattern 35864, diameter is .362". The adjustbale plug mold is another story. The rust was more resistant but did eventually fall off by my using Evaporust and Kroil to scare it away. I got all of the screws and adjustment pieces freed up and functional. While the outside was coated in thin (or more) rust the mold cavity was surprisingly clean, even without a boolit remaining inside it. I warmed the mold and played with it for a few casts. It delivers boolits that measure .260" suitable for the quarter bores. I found it is difficult to align the base plug exactly where I wanted it, to create either a flat base or modest gas check (maybe?) base. Also, the base plug is ever so slightly small inside the mold cavity and allows slight leakage of fluid alloy to pass between the plug and cavity creating an irregular, uneven base on the boolit. The cavity filled out nicely, but the leaking may have been caused from too much temperature in the alloyor by my not being to align the base plug where it would do it's best job of sealing off the cavily (dang, those lube and driving band cuts in the block are small). I will work this this mold more to determine if it (or I) can create a square base boolit. With some more effort I should be able to make suitable boolits for a 25/20 Savage that has been hanging around here lately. This is a very interesting mold with much potential.

Thin Man