Cutting Sprue on Dixie round ball mold?

[lar45]

I picked up a .733" round ball mold from Dixie Gun Works. It does not have a sprue plate. Does anyone have a good way of cutting the sprue off.

when they cooled I tried useing some side cutters but they leave a sharp bump. I tried useing a flat blade screw driver to knock it off when they first come out of the mold. I got several that looked pretty good, but some broke down into the ball leaveing small craters.
Any thoughts.
Cut with side cuts and then file or grind down?

I also found an antique roll crimp tool for 12 ga shells. I tried it on some different plastic hulls and it seems to work pretty good.

[44man]

Side cutters are fine. Don't worry about the rest at all. Just load with the sprue section up and shoot. It does no harm to accuracy at all.

[lar45]

Thanks. It looks like I can probably fit 2 of the round balls in a 2.5" case over a fiber wad.

[44man]

WOW, what a load! Might want to file the sprues if one ball goes against the other or if you use an overshot card.
I like that roll crimper! Wish they still made them.

[KCSO]

Two balls is a pretty heavy load, are you after bear? One ball makes a good deer laod and if you experiment you can get very good accuracy. I load 1 16 Ga ball in a 12 Ga shot cup and roll crimp. This load will shoot into 6" at 100 yards. a deer hit by one of these just flops over and is gone. Velocity runs right at 1450 fps.

[mazo kid]

Is that mold one of their "Hair straightener" ones? I have four of them and just use either diagonal cutters or side cutters on the sprue. Emery

[mooman76]

Get a cheap set of diaganal cutters and grind down the flat side to remove the bevel and it will cut allot staighter!

[lar45]

I don't think I even remember where I got the roll crimper. I want to say Ebay, but I think I found it at a garage sale. Even with it not clamped to a table, it worked pretty easy to form the roll.

The Dixie mold just has two clam shell ends on a pair of plier type handles with a small nail in one side to line the halves up. It backs out alot and needs to be pushed back in. I think I'll hit it with a center punch to dimple and hold it in place.

[drinks]

I have a Dixie mold from the '60's.
I put the mold in an x-y vise on my drill press, put an end mill cutter in the chuck and faced the mold off, then made a sprue plate from bed frame angle, a very hard steel, drilled and tapped a hole on the mold and, voila, ball mold with sprue cutter.

[leftiye]

Nippers! Don't have to be for horse hooves, can be the small ones at Harbor Fart.

[ace1001]

Hoof trimmers will cut flush. You can grind cheap end nippers to do the same on lead. Grind off the bevel. Put the balls in a metal shallow box in your car trunk and they will roll round, but you are going to flatspot them again in your loader. Ace

[1Shirt]

When I was a kid, we used to call the round ball loads for shotgun "Punkin Balls".
They were fairly accurate out of an open bore gun, but were known to split a bbl or two now and then on a tight choaked gun. When rifled slugh came into being they soon replaced the "Punkin Ball". I don't recall being able to buy round ball 12 gage factory loads much after the late 40's or early 50's. Accuracy was more or less limited to ranges of 25-30 yds. or so, and rifled slugs far out paced that distance for accuracy. In the states where shotgun only with single projectile was manditory, rifled slugs made an appreciable difference in the deer harvest. That said, tight patched round balls out of flint or percussion trade guns, or even percussion open bore shotguns will do quite well to 50 yds in the hands of a good shooter. Would really question the advisability of a 2 ball load in a modern gun due to pressures I think would be generated. If you do load and sucessfully shoot a two ball load in a modern gun without blowing it up, would be interested in your load. Good Luck!
1Shirt!

[BAGTIC]

You don't cut the sprue on the Dixie round balls. You break it off. Depending on caliber it can be done entirly by hand or you can grasp the sprue with a small plier and twist it off. Makes a cleaner break than cutting does. Ask anyone who cast lead fishing sinkers or jigs.

[357maximum]

You don't cut the sprue on the Dixie round balls. You break it off. Depending on caliber it can be done entirly by hand or you can grasp the sprue with a small plier and twist it off. Makes a cleaner break than cutting does. Ask anyone who cast lead fishing sinkers or jigs.

Straight dope there, that is thee way to do it...put your balls in the freezer for a few hours first ...they will break cleaner, at least my do-it jigs work that way, but i was not using pure either..try it while twisting your balls and hold the sprue with pliars..they seem to brak better that way...

[Dale53]

>>>"try it while twisting your balls"<<<

That hurts just thinking about it...

Dale53

[Leftoverdj]

Pruning shears do a much better job than sidecutters. When my mould is up to temperature and my rhythm is right, over 90% of the sprues break off on opening the mould. Sprue cools much faster than the ball and creates a stress line right where the two come together.

As a side note, it's quite possible to drop apparently solid balls that still have a liquid center. I did not even notice the first time it happened until I sorted the balls and found some that had flattened a bit when dropped onto a folded towel.

I would not even consider a two ball load. ONE of my .735 RBs weighs 1 3/8 oz.

[Ross]

A countersink into the sprue can create kiss gate that can be twisted off at the weakest point - maybe better than a sprue plate.
Ross