thoughts on the 475 mold.

[Lloyd Smale]

i bought 3 of these but gave two of them to friends. Ive been casting with mine and am stuggling. Part of it was my own fault. I didnt look my mold over well and just went to town casting was stuggling with it from the get go. A major part of the problem like i said was my own fault for not checking it. One of the female inserts for the alignment pins was pushed to far back into the mold body and the aluminum around that alignment hole got beat up to the point it was about ruined in about 200 bullets. I boxed the mold up and sent it to lee to see what they could do. The other problem with this mold is heat. My 45 300 mold casts great. But this mold just goes from to hot to to cold to fast and is a real bitch to keep in the good zone. It may be a matter of ajusting alloys. Ive tried #2 and ww plus 2percent tin and when its all said and done im getting about 1/3 rejects. It takes alot of patients to keep this mold casting in a sweet spot. At least with these alloys. If i had to make a call right now id have to say that bullets that big in those 6 cavity lee blocks are kind of pushing the limits. Anyone else having simular problems or have ideas. Dubber was kind enough to sell me his as it wont fit in his FA gun. So sometime this week ill run his mold and see if it was just possibly that mold or if theres some truth to my thoughts.

[475/480]

Hi Lloyd ,
My mould heats up quickly with straight WW,but casts good frosty boolits.Very few rejects.

Sean

[Lloyd Smale]

I can get my old one to do that too but the weight variation was pretty high.

Hi Lloyd ,
My mould heats up quickly with straight WW,but casts good frosty boolits.Very few rejects.

Sean

[JimL]

I took mine and treated it just like all other BIG HOLE 2 cavitys. Fill them slow! Multiple cavitys and with this much alloy it may be a simple Venting problem. If they cant breath then bullets wont fill out in uniform. Try it! bet it works for you Pal. All are a law unto them self. Have had many that like the alloy gushing into them and others just a slow steady trickle. Easpecially the 475 and 500 diameter blocks. LBTs to me require a different fill rate than Lymans or NEIs. Let us now how it works out. have a good'n.

Jim

[MGySgt]

I am not having a fill out problem - the boolits I am getting look real good, well filled out, the weight seems to be within reason (+/- 3 grains on the ones I checked - that is less then 1%)

They are out of round - the first few fills are fine - nicely formed - and sized at .476 they are uniform - but after that they come out oval - .476+ on the form line and 90 degrees to that 478 to 479.

The only thing I can think of is that the mold is expanding on the sides were the metal is thinner (too thin?) between the cavities.

I had thought that I was dumping them too quick and they were oval shapping because they were stil too close to the molten state.

I am going to try 2 more tests.

Test 1 - pour, BruceB, cut, dump set mould down and pick up other one, pour, BruceB, cut, dump, set down, etc......

Test 2 - use cavities 1, 3, 5, etc... then 2, 4, 6.

The few good ones I had, I shot over 13 gr of Unique - sub 2 inch at 33 yards - open sights. MV - about 1150 according to Quick Load. Real mild to shoot in the BFR with a 7.5 in barrel.

Drew

[2 dogs]

Im running mine with at least 2 other molds....when they start to get frosty on me I just let it sit open for a few minutes.....mine is working fine...

[Lloyd Smale]

well i casted with the mold That dubber kindly parted with today and it did much better then my original. I didnt check them for weight or roundness but the reject rate was alot better.

[frank505]

I cast about three hundred yesterday and can say I like the mold. It does heat up quick and makes a frosty bullet since all I was casting was just this mold. They are weighing about 380 grains and measure allright. The proof is in the shooting as Elmer would say. I will load some at 23 grains of WC 820 and a Federal 155 and see what they will do.