Bent Ramrod
07-06-2007, 12:11 AM
This was a recurrent and largely unsuccessful feature in the old paper magazines (anybody remember those?:) ) It was recurrent because it basically was a good idea; unsuccessful because the logistics of the magazine trade worked to ensure that by the time somebody had sent in and published the answer, everybody had long since forgotten the question. Now, of course, with the Internet providing instant communication, we have the opportunity to solve all the world's mysteries in an exceedingly short time.
So, "submitted for your consideration" (in my best Rod Serling imitation voice), are hopefully three pictures of what appears to be a boolit mould. I have seen exactly two of these in 32 years of haunting gun shows. It casts a boolit approximately 0.373" in diameter and 0.790" long, if you don't count the approximately 0.330" long stalk attached to the base of the boolit. The mold has no sprue plate nor any provision for one. It has no nippers for the long sprue, like the old Sharps moulds had, although there is plenty of metal and leverage to incorporate one.
Can anybody tell me why anybody would set a mould up this way, with a long, thick sprue that would almost have to be machined off to make an even boolit base? There is nothing cut-rate about the mould otherwise. It says "Hans Shieder" is very elegant script on the right side, and I'm especially impressed with the cunning (and to my mind, expensive) way Herr Shieder handled the block alignment problem. I kind of wish I'd looked more carefully at the second mould I saw; all I remember is that it was pretty badly rusted.
So let's see if I can incorporate these pictures in here...Hey, I think it worked! Anybody else have any real oddballs for the group to mull over?
So, "submitted for your consideration" (in my best Rod Serling imitation voice), are hopefully three pictures of what appears to be a boolit mould. I have seen exactly two of these in 32 years of haunting gun shows. It casts a boolit approximately 0.373" in diameter and 0.790" long, if you don't count the approximately 0.330" long stalk attached to the base of the boolit. The mold has no sprue plate nor any provision for one. It has no nippers for the long sprue, like the old Sharps moulds had, although there is plenty of metal and leverage to incorporate one.
Can anybody tell me why anybody would set a mould up this way, with a long, thick sprue that would almost have to be machined off to make an even boolit base? There is nothing cut-rate about the mould otherwise. It says "Hans Shieder" is very elegant script on the right side, and I'm especially impressed with the cunning (and to my mind, expensive) way Herr Shieder handled the block alignment problem. I kind of wish I'd looked more carefully at the second mould I saw; all I remember is that it was pretty badly rusted.
So let's see if I can incorporate these pictures in here...Hey, I think it worked! Anybody else have any real oddballs for the group to mull over?