bootsnthejeep
07-11-2011, 02:34 PM
Some of you may have seen my post in the Off Topic/ Our Town forum about the barn and garage fire at my Aunt and Uncle's. My Uncle passed away several years ago, but his complete firearms and reloading collection was upstairs in the barn and was lost in the fire.
After most of the mess had been cleaned up and what was left of the firearms collected, my dad and I were poking around and I stumbled onto a pocket of bullet molds. Only found three, one so badly damaged I threw it right back in the pile, but another one seemed to be in pretty good shape.
I was writing it off, just keeping it for a memento, something to remember my Uncle by, (that and a trigger guard off an old black powder rifle), but in the course of cleaning the mould up, it doesn't appear that badly damaged. The sprue plate is warped a bit, the handles are junk, but the actual mold blocks don't look that bad.
And I got to thinking about it. That much heat can't be GOOD for precisely fitted mold blocks, but can't really hurt anything either if the mold hasn't been rendered unusable. I'm removing and replacing all the bolts and the sprue plate, etc, but wondering if there's any reason it might not case decentish bullets.
Thoughts? It's an antique Ideal mold 360271S, the version with the short driving band, and I have a friend interested in loading 38 S&W, so its worth a try. The worst that can happen is **** bullets, right?
Anyone else resurrected any fire molds?
Boots
After most of the mess had been cleaned up and what was left of the firearms collected, my dad and I were poking around and I stumbled onto a pocket of bullet molds. Only found three, one so badly damaged I threw it right back in the pile, but another one seemed to be in pretty good shape.
I was writing it off, just keeping it for a memento, something to remember my Uncle by, (that and a trigger guard off an old black powder rifle), but in the course of cleaning the mould up, it doesn't appear that badly damaged. The sprue plate is warped a bit, the handles are junk, but the actual mold blocks don't look that bad.
And I got to thinking about it. That much heat can't be GOOD for precisely fitted mold blocks, but can't really hurt anything either if the mold hasn't been rendered unusable. I'm removing and replacing all the bolts and the sprue plate, etc, but wondering if there's any reason it might not case decentish bullets.
Thoughts? It's an antique Ideal mold 360271S, the version with the short driving band, and I have a friend interested in loading 38 S&W, so its worth a try. The worst that can happen is **** bullets, right?
Anyone else resurrected any fire molds?
Boots