358311 mold

[DLCTEX]

I bought this mold(single cavity), with handles, on Ebay with an Ideal ladle, $26 including freight. I could tell from the pictures it was a little rough, but I figured the ladle and handles were worth the price. It arrived today, so I scrubbed it and cast a few. They stuck like glue in the sprue plate half, which I thought they would from the looks of it. I removed the sprue plate and worked the burrs over with a utility knife, but finally resorted to the little file on my Leatherman tool to knock them down. It looked as if it had been closed so many times that the cavity was peened over, I can't think of any other way it could happened? The cavities looked a little scaley, so I used Bon Ami and an old toothbrush to shine it up. Then I scrubbed with a pot scrubber to smooth the edges. I reassembled it and cast some more, much better, but still needs more. The sprue plate is wavy and is either too loose or binds in spots until it works the screw loose. It also lets the bases flash enough to cause the boolit stick a little. Tomorrow I'll bring home sandpaper and flatten it and the top of the mold. I cast and water dropped about a hundred boolits and sized them to 359 and used Lyman moly lube (that's what was in the 45 sizer). The 359 die cleaned all the bands. Then I loaded some with 4.5 gr. SR7625 in 38 Special cases, and was pleased to see they shot to point of aim and appeared to be very accurate. It is good to bring an old mold back to life, and imagine how many boolits it has produced in it's life. DALE

[Dale53]

Well, first of all I congratulate you for returning a good tool to the "good side" (as opposed to the "dark side":mrgreen:). It is a shame to see a perfectly good mould damaged through carelessness. The worst I have seen was a four cavity H&G mould that had been beaten with a hammer until the cavities were damaged. That was forty years ago and I am still smarting from just seeing that (thankfully, I didn't own it and didn't have to wreak mayhem on the perpetrator).

I have seen H&G moulds that have cast tens of thousands of bullets with NO wear simply because they were treated like the fine and fragile tool that a good bullet mould is.

If you like the 358311, Midway has those in four cavity moulds for less than $80.00. That is quite a bargain if you prefer round nose bullets. I bought a four cavity years ago when I was shooting PPC and used the round nose for the speed reloading stage (the bullets just "fall" into the cylinder). This design also shoots well. It does suffer from a small hole in a paper target and doesn't work well in the field (hits are good but the round nose just slips on through without doing much damage).

However, where this bullet really shines in using it as a practice bullet for your carry gun. It reloads VERY well with speed loaders, shoots well, and you have a dandy practice bullet for little money. Then if you use high performance bullets for serious use (flat nose hollow points that speed load well) you have all bases covered.

Dale53

[DLCTEX]

I have a mold that drops the same weight boolit in SWC, but it doesn't appear to be quite as accurate, or maybe I was just shooting better yesterday. I see that it is imperative I spend more range time to find out, but I have to go to a family reunion this week end. I have to go now that I am the patriarc of the clan. My nine siblings, plus their spouses, children and grandchildren=104 people. DALE
PS Something I like about the 358311 mold is that it seats to the same depth as the SWC I have, so I don't have to mess with the adjustment on my seating die.