Current Lyman 311284 Two Cavity Moulds from Midway

[Texasflyboy]

Does anyone here have any experience with the current production Lyman 311284 double cavity moulds as sold by Midway USA as it relates to their as cast size?

Midway's ad appears to indicate that the bullets will drop .309 or thereabouts, but I seem to remember discussions here that the nose sections on the new production are undersize a wee bit, which is why there is so much interest in the older Ideal 311284s as they run a little fatter.

Any advice here would be appreciated as my forte is in another mfg's moulds. My Lyman experience is sorely lackiing.

I would love to find a nice .311 or thereabouts single cavity 311284 but they don't seem to be around.

Tom in NC (T Minus 27 days to VA)

[Le Loup Solitaire]

Hi, The 284 is a very old and successful design. When Lyman got "enlightened" to the practice of producing oversize molds by making mold cutting cherries larger so that they would last longer, they changed the designation from 308284 to 311284
Completely and deliberately ignoring the recognized facts that cast bullets will perform best when shot as cast and that sizing damages them; the more the worse, they went on to convince the public that oversize bullets were necessary in order to allow them to be sized down. Despite the writings of several icons and legends in the handloading world like Phil Sharpe Lyman continued to crank out versions of various molds including 284 that were ridiculously oversize. When Col Harrison conducted his investigations on 30 cal cast bullets and published his findings in the NRA books on handloading, the pendulum swung the other way and molds for the 284 and other good designs suddenly appeared and hyped as "smaller"....the intent being to correct or rectify the "sins" of yesteryear. BUT they not only reduced the body of the bullet to a more correct size of .309, but they also decreased the diameter of the nose section to under .300-.301 and created a condition where the nose of the boolit no longer rode on the lands, nor was supported by them. The result is that the bullet when it starts down the barrel slumps off axis and goes out of the rifle in a cocked out of alignment position. Prominent figures in the cast boolit shooting world, to include the Cast Bullet Association, pointed out that this condition could be rectified by "bumping (up) the nose section. An extra step and extra work! Another alternative is to lap out the nose section to the desired diameter of .300 or .301 or more. This will get the correctly dimensioned boolit to start with. Yet another idea is to "beagle" the mold which entails applying extremely thin aluminum(sticky on one side only)tape to the face(s) of the mold blocks. the prob with this idea is that it also increases the size of the boolit body as well. I have used the lapping of the nose to get a current 284 up to the right bore-riding size. It involved casting a lot of half-nosed bollits, drilling a hole in them for a shank, or casting a nose section only on a finishing nail and then slowly rotating that arrangement in the cavities with some very fine valve grinding compound to enlarge the nose section. Its a tedious process and requires a lot of patience and constant checking of the new larger castings. Its a royal PITA, but necessary to overcome the problem and fortunately if done right, only has to be done once. As for what Lyman, Midway or any other manufacturer or middlemen advertise or write in their catalog or on the box, view it with a wary eye. They are in the business of making money and despite their profoundly expressed concerns about our needs, the quality workmanship and by that I mean the type that once prevailed in the manufacture of H & G molds, is just not there. LLS

[Buckshot]

................My 2c version is about 36 years old and will drop a .310" boolit. SC's are no longer made (as you probably know) so maybe if you find one for sale, the seller might have used it and can relate the boolit's OD? Le Loup Solitaire, is right that when Lyman had got enough heat about some oversized moulds they did too much of a good thing.

It IS possible that the 311284, which came out in 1905 for the 30-40 Krag cast large due to some of the fat groove Krags?

The author/shooter Henry Beverage did an article about accuracy and bench shooting cast. I don't recall the rifle, but he wanted to use the 311284. What he did was to buy five of them from as far apart points in the U.S. as possible. His hope was to get moulds from as many different 'runs' as possible. This way he could pick the one which best fit his requirements. He did, and said he sold off the rest of'em.

.................Buckshot

[Ben]

My records indicate that I purchased my 311284 from MidSouth in August 2007.

These photos tell the tale on my mold :

It would seem that the date of manufacturer is on my block half. I've never seen this before :

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v494/haysb/311284/PICT0007.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v494/haysb/311284/PICT0011.jpg

Here is the dimension of the nose on mine :

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v494/haysb/311284/PICT0003.jpg

My front band dimension :

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v494/haysb/311284/PICT0005.jpg

Rear band dimension :

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v494/haysb/311284/PICT0016.jpg

My alloy is straight WW's.

[DonH]

[QUOTE=Le Loup Solitaire;353532]
Yet another idea is to "beagle" the mold which entails applying extremely thin aluminum(sticky on one side only)tape to the face(s) of the mold blocks. the prob with this idea is that it also increases the size of the boolit body as well.

While maybe not an ideal situtation, I have been able to increase nose dia. via this method while not materially affecting body dia. Placing the aluminum tape only on the bottom (nose end) of the blocks has allowed me to do this. The resulting bullets may not be of benchrest quality but certainly can make them more useable. DH

[Texasflyboy]

My records indicate that I purchased my 311284 from MidSouth in August 2007.These photos tell the tale on my mold :

Thanks Ben. I think I will take a chance and order a DC from the same place as you and as the others have indicated, if I need to beagle it, I may do that.


Nice bullets by the way....:)


Tom in NC (T Minus 14 days to VA)

[Ben]

MidSouth is $46.55........Kinda strange, I see ( very often ) people paying more than this for used molds that continue to be produced and sold by MidSouth :

http://www.midsouthshooterssupply.com/item.asp?sku=000152660284


Looks like MidSouth is about $10 cheaper on the mold than MidWay :

http://www.midwayusa.com/eproductpage.exe/showproduct?saleitemid=474107&t=11082005

[sagamore-one]

I purchased a new Lyman 311284 in November of 06 from Midway USA. I struggled to get bullets large enough to size at .309. The nose was only .297. A call to Lyman customer service was an exercise in futility. They flat out and told me my alloy was too soft to form full size boolits. I was using straight, fresh linotype. The conversation was kinda like trying to teach a pig to sing.... not only wastes your time, but also annoys the pig.
I sent the mould to a fellow site member who opened up the body a little and the nose a lot. It now casts .3105 body and .301 nose with # 2 alloy. I size .310 and lube with alox/ beeswax.

[ak_milsurp]

A bit late to jump on this thread, but....

My Double Cavity 311284 mold casts at .312-313.5 on the bands and .300-301 on the nose portion using water Quenched WW with a bit of 50/50 solder added to aid fill out and harden a bit.

The only other number on the mold block is "818". I generally size them to .311 lubed with "Ceresin Purple" then swirl them in "BLL" and let dry