Is fragile/brittle spruce an issue?

[mallen]

Part of this is also the geometry and timing of the sprue cutter itself. The sprye plates cavity is angled so when you cut the srue it is picking up on the sprue while cutting and slighlty before ( miliseconds) This can cause sprue to fracture and it then breaks apart when dropping onto a hard surface. This is to help hold the bullet against the plate when cutting takes place. When plate is loose it pushes down and you get the stem left if to much clearence.

over my head

[tazman]

I do wait for it that long. shrinks a little, then turns color and solidifies. then i cut. and it shatters.

Mine do exactly the same thing when I am using my aluminum molds. It doesn't seem to effect the performance of my boolits at all, however these are pistol boolits. It may effect rifle boolits more.

For whatever reason, my iron molds don't do that.

[44man]

burning works? i get little spots of lead and use wood, takes lots of scrubbing.

Yes, must be the carbon or what is left in the match head and it will not scratch. The head will break of course but I found nothing easier.