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Thread: A couple of Lyman woes

  1. #1
    Boolit Buddy Anonym's Avatar
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    A couple of Lyman woes

    I recently had quite a roller coaster ride with a pair of Lyman molds. Having missed an old 454424 mold I parted with a while back, and looking for a lighter Boolit than my 285 grain NOE SAA mold spits out, I first picked up a NOS 452424 from a fellow member here.

    So I was excited for this mold as it has the flat bottom grease groove for nostalgic reasons. Sadly, this mold is grossly undersized and barely kisses my 0.452 sizing die and smears lube up and down the boolit. It is spot on at 255 grains. It seems to shoot decent regardless, but is a pain and I’m not overly interested in finding and sizing smaller. I sent an email to Lyman last weekend and after 4 business days, still no response. I’m hoping they may be able to ream it a little to fatten it up. Manufacturing date is 2016.

    Fast forward a couple days and my 452423 arrives. It is an older Ideal and true to form but with the rounded groove. Concerned about my recent experience, I got the mold hot and cast a few. These, which should be more suited for the smaller 0.452 bores, came out suitable for the 45-70 at 0.457-0.458! Wheel weight lead drops at 248 grains, so I tried Linotype tonight and reduced the weight to a perfect 228 grains, but still on the chubby side with the same waistline! To top it off, both cavities of the mold hold the boolits like a couple teens making out. I never use a mallet to cast, but pulled it out for this one. Cavities are clean and smooth without issues, but I’m scared my poor handles are going to call CPS from the beating I’ve been handing them.

    Hoping for luck with the 424 but glad I can always size down the 423. What a ride!

  2. #2
    Boolit Master
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    Good luck with CPS. getting custody of your handles back once they are fostered out is nigh impossible.
    QUIS CUSTODIET IPSOS CUSTODES?

  3. #3
    Boolit Buddy Anonym's Avatar
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    Called Lyman today. They are having me send the 452424 back to see if they can’t increase the diameter a little. Now I need to figure out why my 423 won’t release the boolits without serious rapping. Yay for Lyman!

  4. #4
    Boolit Grand Master OS OK's Avatar
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    A question about your 'rapping'?

    Rather than ask just how & where you do that, I'll just say this:

    With the old Keith moulds that like to 'hang' because of that lube groove design...I give a 'smart whack' to the hinge pin of the handles at the exact moment that I open the mould, it tends to dislodge the cast from both sides of the mould.
    I just open about 1/2" or less so that the whack doesn't propell the cast aginst the other side of the mould and put ugly marks on it...the cast tends to pop out of cavity and hang between the mould halves.
    a m e r i c a n p r a v d a

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  5. #5
    Boolit Buddy Anonym's Avatar
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    Well, i need to reiterate that the mold that hangs is a double cavity Keith, but does have rounded lube grooves in the cavities. I typically open the mold and if they don’t fall out, I shake and/or rap the partially opened mold against my gloved palm.

    If that doesn’t work, the wooden mallet starts at the hinge pin. If that doesn’t dislodge them, I hit the handles on the outside of the handles opposite of the lodged bullets so that the mass of the bullets pull away from the cavity opposite their direction of travel (with the impact of the mallet). I find that, like setting a handle in an axe, hammer, or file, that you use the mass to drive opposite the impact. Otherwise you drive it deeper into the cavity.

    This mold hangs so tight that even after several hard whacks, some are lost to me using my thumb to try and roll the boolit from the cavities from the top down, which almost ultimately boogers up the meplat and they go back into the pot to remelt.

    My 452424 has no issues dropping the pills, and neither does my NOE 45-285-swc that are of similar design with flat bottom grooves.

  6. #6
    Boolit Buddy
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    I feel your pain.

    I picked up an older 358156 4 cavity a few months ago, for a reasonable price.
    Dang thing cast tapered bullets.
    The base was .359+ while the front drive band was .354+
    No way I could lap it out, so down the road it went at the next gun show, and I made a $ 10 profit on it

    So now am on the hunt for another 358156 mold and hopefully I will find one that has better diameters of cast bullets.

    A couple of years ago I did pick up an old Ideal 452423 4 cavity that was in nice condition, and I finally got around to cast with it last year.
    OH MY what JOY, they drop at .452+ and 3/4 of the time I simply open the mold and they drop out
    One cavity will stick if I change my candance and it only take one light rap of the thumper on the handle to drop the offending bullet

    So when the GODS smile and everything is right, some times things all work out.

    J Wisner

  7. #7
    Boolit Master
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    "The base was .359+ while the front drive band was .354+"
    This is what the 358156 measured that I used to have , it worked great as a heavy bullet in 9 mm.

  8. #8
    Boolit Buddy
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    ioon44,

    My normal heavy 9mm bullet is the lyman 356634, a 130 gr truncated flat point, feeds so well in everything, and shoots even better.

    I was hoping that 358156 was the same diameter front to rear, but not to be on that mold
    Just goes to show that Lyman had a lot of variables in their cherries over the years.
    So when I find a mold that meets everything I want when I cast a bullet, I do not get rid of it.

    J Wisner

  9. #9
    Boolit Buddy
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    IIRC, that mold was designed that way, with a smaller front band. The 429215 and 429244 i have , have similar front bands.

  10. #10
    Boolit Master


    Walks's Avatar
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    Good Luck with Lyman. Three's years ago it took me two trys to get Lyman to make it right with two new undersized molds.

    Why I bought a N.O.E. 4cav mold. It was so nice I bought a N.O.E. version of the Lyman #452423, the bullets fairly Leap out of the mold. Drops at 240grs, I don't even use my #452424 anymore.
    I HATE auto-correct

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