mold questions, newbie

[Lefty SRH]

I have a few questions being a newbie to casting. The mold numbers on the side, what should they be telling me? I am using a single cavity Lyman 358311, 358 is bullet diameter but what is 311? I see all the mold numbers and can usually get the caliber but the shape and weight I'm not getting from the numbers.

All these abbreviations, NOE, RG4, RG2, ......

I am very interested in participating in one of the groups buys for my .44mags and for my .45 colts. How do I participate?

Why do people order extra hollow point pins when they order a mold?

Thanks

LEFTY

[georgewxxx]

If you go to http://www.castpics.net/subsite/HistMolds/IdealCN.pdf you'll find all the Lyman/Ideal cherry number listed. The second three numbers you asked about are what's call cherry numbers. It took me quite some time to make up that chart because there will always be new people to the hobby looking for answers like yours.

Some people buy a pin for their mould so they can make solids also with not hollow point using the same mould.

Use the Wheel gun tab here at CastBoolits for your .44 & .45 sounds good to me.

Those other abbreviations you mentioned are always a pain to me. Every company has their own agenda and unless your really dedicated, understanding them all is about impossible even for an old buzzard like me that's being casting for 45 years.

[Lefty SRH]

I had a suspsion the 2nd three numbers were weight and style, but 311 didn't make sense when it came to a .38/.357 round.
All those numbers somehow people know exactly what mold you are talking about, amazing.

[Hurricane]

For Lyman molds the second three numbers are simply a mold identifier. It does not give any weight or style information. Mold number 358311 would be 358 in diameter and the 311th mold design they put in the catalog. The molds often cast a little bigger than the diameter number. This is good because you can easily size it down to fit your gun. If it is too small you will have a bad mold. NOE is the name of a company, Night Owl Enterprises, that is currently making a lot of group buy molds. NOE offers some of it molds (those over 30 caliber) with a hollow point mold that will put a hollow point on all cavities of the mold. RG2 is for a 2 cavity mold and RG4 is for a 4 cavity mold. The RG desigination is a comic name they gave to their mold. RG stands for Rube Goldberg which is an old comic strip about making very complicated methods of doing simple things. After a while you will pick up a lot of things that are new to you now.

[41 mag fan]

I was confused myself for quite awhile on all the abbreviations, mold #'s ect. Took me some time, searching and asking to find what I was looking for.
NOE and MIHA are awesome mold makers on here.
Miha is across the pond, but makes excellent brass molds.
I have several Lee molds, but once you get your hands on one of these 2 gents molds, you'll realize that what you get from them far exceeds the savings you get by buying lee molds

In fact I got another mold coming in today from NOE.

Scroll down to the bottom of the forum and you'll see where theres the group buy discussions. Thats where you can get in on the group buys.
Below that is the vendor sponsor sales. you can scroll thru there and see what is being offered for sale.
NOE has a long list of molds on his thread for sale, as does Miha.
One thing to remember though, I learned like everyone else has, when you buy from Miha, you're at the mercy of the postal system, and sometimes I think they put the molds on a slow boat. I waited almost 5 weeks for my mold to get in, but when I got it , it was worth the wait.
When you buy from Al at NOE, he's out in Utah, so it only takes a few days to get to your doorstep. The quality you get when you get one of his molds is one of a kind, top notch.

[MtGun44]

Lyman contains no direct information in the second 3 numerals. Then again, many other
makers have their own system.

After a while you know the particularly good designs.

Bill

[MikeS]

I had a suspsion the 2nd three numbers were weight and style, but 311 didn't make sense when it came to a .38/.357 round.
All those numbers somehow people know exactly what mold you are talking about, amazing.

When I first started coming around here, I was amazed too that somebody could mention something like 452423 and it seemed like everyone knew what that is. Once you learn the numbering systems and their logic (or lack of) you can start figuring these things about too. It's really not all that hard, people tend to learn all the mould numbers for moulds of the calibers they're interested in. I'm primarily interested in 45's and 30's, so usually if somebody mentions a mould that starts with 452 or 311 (or 308) I either know what the mould looks like, or I cheat, and go to the website than has a chart of all the Lyman moulds:

http://www.three-peaks.net/bullet_molds.htm

If it's not a Lyman number, then usually it's easier to understand. Like I have an NOE mould that's got a number if 314129 and in that case the mould casts a boolit that's designed to be sized to .314 and should weigh 129gr. Then there are other systems, like the H&G system, where their numbers don't mean anything, other than when they first made that style mould. Common H&G numbers you might see are #34, or #68, or #130 and the only thing the numbers tell you is that they made the #34 before they made the #130! But again, there's a cheat sheet available for H&G moulds:

http://hgmould.gunloads.com/casting/hgmoldchart.htm

and while it's not as easy to see example of boolits like the first site, you can spend lots of time there, as there's so much info, a testament to the site's creator, who is also a member here. I'm sure there are similar sites like those for other mould makers, but I don't know them, but maybe somebody else here does, and will post the info.

[georgewxxx]

SAECO is just like Hensley & Gibbs, you need to scan their whole catalog to find a mould number.