Attention! MiHec .45 200g Cramer HP 4 cavity mold

[HDS]

Hmmm I've been running the hotplate quite high, I don't think I will be doing that again. Found some aluminum plates on ebay I could used to make a nice stand for the mold.

[morme@gte.net]

I have a "coil" hotplate. I just set the mould on the coils, with the sprue plate on the coils. It heats the brass pretty evenly. I don't seem to have any problems.

[birdadly]

I had my first-ever casting session this weekend! I'm glad I knew of this thread and of a few people having troubles with this mold so I came here as soon as I had mine

I've got this mold and the SWC mold as well, preheated them both on the hotplate and in doing so came across my first issue. I thought I read that I should put the mold on the hotplate base-down, but with one pin in the mold for a solid flat nose, it wouldn't sit flush! When using a pin that way, is it safe to set it on the sprue plate so it's flush?

So this mold initially gave me shiny, improperly filled, swired boolits, while the SWC gave me mostly frosty (but a few shiny) perfect ones. All the shiny ones I had to use a rubber hammer to open the sprue plate, while the frosties I could use my thumb, also the boolits were sticking to the pins... and so I came to this thread...

Easy fixes! I cleaned, with Dawn, the HP mold (fixed the fillout issue), set all the pins to HP so I could put it flush on the burner (piece of Al on the plate), pre-heated and kept the mold heated up and worked on a quicker cadence of casting... PERFECT (fixed the sticking and need for hammer!)!! They're not shiny anymore, frosty but in a decent way, and shoot-able I believe!

The only issue I was left with is that I used the little bottle of lube, put a drop on each pin near the retaining ring (as I read it would wick to the rest of the pin)... but it ended up getting real sticky and I had to, very lightly, tap the pins with the rubber hammer to push them from the mold. The boolits immediately fell off of the pin which was perfect, but maybe I used too much lube?

Thanks for all the info fellas. Now I need to do some smelting so I can play with more than 10#s of mixed lead that I had traded for! Oh, and I really only like the shiny boolits more because I'm an artist at heart and I like shiny things, but I can do without it for this hobby; I guess I do also like brushed aluminum! -Brad

[Dale53]

birdadly;
Welcome to the club!! Sounds like you are a "fast learner"!

One drop per pin of the "sprue plate" lube in the area of the snap ring is the "correct" amount. The pins will break in after some use.

Dale53

[morme@gte.net]

unscrew the guide pins from the hollow point pins a half turn. it makes the pins "float", and they will self center and close more easily.

[chiefappraiser]

Am I the only one still waiting, or did I miss somthing?

[southpaw]

Am I the only one still waiting, or did I miss somthing?

I think that you have the wrong thread. I believe that this is the one that you want: http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...114718&page=23



Jerry Jr.