Mold Maken

[Sliver Shooter]

:?:I read here and there that different fellers have made their own molds. I think it was 303 Guy that had made some for the .303 British round. How are these molds made? They are push through, which I think I get the just of but does it require a metal lathe?:?:

[deltaenterprizes]

If you are really, really good at hand metal working you may be able to make a mold with hand tools. A lathe and mill make it a whole lot easier.
I have a lathe and mill and most of the necessary tooling and have made a few molds, but it ain't easy.

[Frank46]

There is a group buy going on for NOE's 316299. Which is a fatter version of lyman's
314299. Still open and slug your bore first. Supposed to be .316 on the body and about .305 on the nose. Good molds and Swede Nelson is good to deal with. Frank

[JIMinPHX]

I use a Bridgeport & a lathe. I would need at least a vertical mill. I don't know if others, who are more crafty than I, may have come up with ways to do it with only hand tools.

My exploits - http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=45741

[ZebDeming]

I've modified Lee molds using just a lathe with a 4 jaw. I first cut the cutter to the profile I wanted from O1 tool steel.

http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/zebdeming/510DD/DSCN0452.jpg

Then ground it until I had just one edge profile as a cutter. Center the mold up in the 4 jaw, drill out to just under the smallest diameter planed on the bullet (usually the grease groove). Then run the cutter into the bottom of the mold and while the lathe is spining slowly, bring the cutter to the outside of the mold, until the diameter is reached that you want. Remember to run the cutter back to the inside before you withdraw it from the cavity or you'll wind up with a mold without grease grooves. Here is a pic of the cutter in my lathe getting ready to cut.

http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/zebdeming/510DD/DSCN0459.jpg

Here are the mold blocks when done, it's for a boolit .510 in diameter

http://i235.photobucket.com/albums/ee41/zebdeming/510DD/DSCN0463.jpg

I'm going to very soon making another mold, but this time from scratch, I'll post a build thread on it here, pretty much step by step. Nice thing about doing it this way is that one cutter can do multiple calibers. If a person was carefull in measureing, you could make nose cutters and body cutters and mix and match.

Zeb

[longbow]

Yeah, I make push out moulds mostly. I have made split moulds but I have a small Atlas lathe and no milling machine so milling slots for handles on a split mould is awkward and slow.

If I got set up with a Tee slotted cross slide it would help immensely! One day.

In the mean time I have made several pushout moulds that are quite easy to make and for paper patching, knurled boolits and shotgun slugs they actually work very well. I have also used the smooth sided boolits over grease cookies.

That is the main issue though ~ no lube grooves so to get lube to the boolit bearing surface you can:

- paper patch so no lube really required
- knurl which works well
- use a grease cookie under the boolit which is easy with straight case and doable, but not so easy, with bottleneck cases
- use a bore nose rider design and tumble lube so the bore riding portion carries enough lube

Have read here:

http://www.lasc.us/Brennan_4-4_PaperPatchedBullets.htm

Scroll to the bottom and you will see the style of mould. Ideal used to make them commercially.

Mine are a little different but similar. I use 1 1/2" round bar and now mostly use a mould "insert" of 3/4" that actually has the cavity in it. That way the rest is basically a mould holder and the moulds are much easier and quicker to make ~ no sprue plate to make or holes to drill and tap, no handle to attach, etc.

I have only made single cavity to date but you could easily make multicavity using square bar.

As mentioned, I use a lathe but you could get by with careful work and only a drill press. You might manage to make one with just hand tools but it would be difficult to get the accuracy of size and perpendicularity needed. We are talking in accuracy of 0.001" to maybe 0.002" and tighter is better.

I have posted photos of some of my moulds but I think they are all deleted now because I had too many photos posted.

If you are interested I can send photos and some drawings of my pushout moulds just PM me with your e-mail address.

Longbow

[RayinNH]

Reread the OP's post again. He mentions molds but sounds to me like he's talking push through sizers. I could be wrong, wouldn't be the first time, ask my wife she'll tell ya :grin:...Ray

[Von Gruff]

The OP also mentions 303guy so I wonder if the push through mould was for pp in which case a base pour push the nose would be a much more easily acomplished hand tool operation.
I seem to remember something about a slight taper from bore to groove from nose to tail which would also make the push through aspect much easier.
Von Gruff.

[white eagle]

Thats it I need a lathe
I wanted one to do barrel work
and I also want a Bridgeport
was a machinist for 10 years
but move on for more money now I miss it
I would love to create a boolit mold

[nanuk]

I've seen ZebDeming's work on another site

talented fellow

[MikeS]

Yeah, I make push out moulds mostly. I have made split moulds but I have a small Atlas lathe and no milling machine so milling slots for handles on a split mould is awkward and slow....
Longbow

Well, if you did as Zeb is doing, and use Lee moulds as the starting material for your moulds, as long as you have a 4 jaw chuck, you should be able to make whatever mould you would want.

[Sliver Shooter]

I would basically like to make a push thru mold because I think I could make one without a lathe. I don't know. I'd like to hear from someone how it's done or where I could read on it.

[303Guy]

longbow is the man to ask about push through molds. They're not really push through but close enough. The nose plug pushes the casting out if IIRC. They're also adjustable. I make something similar. Mine had a nose form which made the nose and another with the same form but on a longer stem to push the casting out. It was a two diameter mold with a taper to suite the rifling leade angle between the two diameters. I used spacer sleaves to preset the boolit length. Seemed to work. I got the idea from longbow.

I also tried a mold that used the nose former as the push-out but on those small diameter (25's) it's hard to get a step inside the mold to set the nose former.

This is the first casting from that mold.
http://i388.photobucket.com/albums/oo327/303Guy/MVC-205F.jpg

[Buckshot]

..............There's a few ways to make boolit moulds. If they're not cherry cut they're done on a lathe as ZebDeming mentioned, or using some number of tools for creating various features. In making swage dies to produce boolits for paper patching, below:

http://www.fototime.com/4E6A51927B56C9E/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/FBC4A50229228CB/standard.jpg

LEFT: Ejector pin, swage die, base form punch, swaged core (core swage die not shown), and boolit from swage die. RIGHT: Ground, single flute tool (spoon) used to cut the swage die cavity.

For the larger sized size dies I make, I decided it would be to my benefit to create my own mould having increasingly larger cavities to make the 'proof' slugs I supply with the dies to prove the die is the size stamped on it.

http://www.fototime.com/9F3A3671603DFBD/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/EF0456293630502/standard.jpg

LEFT:A pair of mould blocks was made from 2 pieces of .750" x 1.5" common 6061 aluminum. RIGHT: They were setup in the milling machine vise and indicated level. Via the DRO each hole was drilled to a size and depth to remove the bulk of the material.

http://www.fototime.com/11609D54AA9989C/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/B55E2CC4F2DF8E0/standard.jpg

LEFT: Next a simple single edge cutting tool was ground to the desired shape. I simply used a HSS drill blank. Very similar to a simple "D" reamer, or RIGHT: These "Half bit's" purchased on E-Bay, as I have no sofisticated means of grinding HSS.

http://www.fototime.com/A0D59ED4A51A13D/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/77030C7565C1C60/standard.jpg

LEFT:The tool was then loaded in a boring head, and zeroed for depth. For each suceeding hole the boring head was adjusted out for increasingly larger OD's, then slowly plunged to depth.RIGHT: No face venting was done as the cavities were without any features (like lube grooves) and I felt the slight radius on the top inside edge would be sufficient to allow air to easily escape as the cavity filled.

http://www.fototime.com/55D15A4B5F3108F/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/530DD5A2E476BA1/standard.jpg

LEFT: Cavities bored. RIGHT: Blocks, sprueplate, top hardware, and handle bolts. Yup, the reason for NOT chamfering that 7th cavity spot on the SP escapes me now, but it did eventually get done. Surprisingly enough for me, the boring head did a bangup job as each cavity has LESS then a thousandth out of round.

One of these days I'd like to gin up a profile cutter for a GG boolit, and try boring a set of blocks set up on the rotary table and using the X or Y axis to increase the OD. This way to maybe use the same cutter for a few closely related calibers.

...............Buckshot

[longbow]

Nice work Buckshot! Far classier than mine. Nice photos too.

MikeS:

Yes, ZebDeming did a nice job on that mould! Vey nice.

I have thought about using a Lee as a blank but for the most part I have either made push out moulds for paper patch or slightly underisze for knurling. For smooth boolits, I think it is easier to make the push out mould but certainly if you want grease grooves the mould has to be split.

An advantage of the push out design is that it allows variable weight by simply spacing the nose form up or down to suit. I have .44 mould I have cast as light as 220 gr. and as heavy as 300 grs. and a .30 cal (0.301") for PP that has cast 100 gr. and 180 gr. so kind of a nice feature.

303guy:

.25 cal is small for sure but I have used 3/16" rod for the push out ejector pin so that will leave enough step for the nose form. Alternately, you can use a D bit to form the exact cavity and use the ejector pin as a flat nose or HP pin.

I don't think I would want to go smaller than 3/16" or it is likely to bend. I think you could get right down to .22 using 3/16" ejector pin. There wouldn't be much step but enough if tolerances were held tight. It only takes a few thou.

There are lots of ideas out there and it is nice to see them and share. It is always a learning experience.

Longbow