Round ball shooters, casters

[s mac]

I recently purchased a .490 round ball mold from a member here, it casts real nice balls, but the sprue nub is about .008, is this going to have a large effect on accuracy as is, do I need to file it down? What say you? s mac

[dondiego]

Load it with the sprue up and forget it.

[mehavey]

Sprue effects (within any sensible reason) are minimal.
In fact my hand-cast/sprue-up RB shoot better than
most of my commercial/perfectly-swaged RB of the same
diameter.

Your real challenge lays in finding the right patch material,
matching ball-to-groove patch thickness, and lube.

[Hanshi]

Dondiego is correct. But if thew sprue bothers you simply tumble the balls and the sprue will mostly vanish.

[Beagle333]

Sprue has never bothered my shooting... but you can also cover about 1/3 of the bottom of a cardboard box with balls and put that in the trunk of the wife's car, and in about a week.... no more sprues.
(if you don't have a tumbler) :mrgreen:

[Omnivore]

Remember those stories of amazing, long shots by riflemen in the American Revolution? Those were done with cast, patched round ball. They had sprues too.

As has been said; you get the right combination of patch fit and charge for your rifle, place the sprue up when loading, and it should do nicely. I like a good tight fit, but your barrel will tell you what it likes by the size of the groups it shoots.

[OverMax]

Put 4-5 balls in your front pants pocket at a time. By the end of the week. (sprue's) they'll all be flattened.

[s mac]

Thanks guys, what I wanted to hear.

[curator]

Loading a patched round ball with the sprue up is done for a specific reason. If there is a "void" or spongy spot in the cast ball it will be right under the sprue. This can happen in the process of casting as the lead cools and solidifies. By centering it either up or down you guarantee the ball will rotate around the defect so it will not interfere with accuracy. Not centered, a light spot or cavity will cause a flier. Think of your front tire missing a balancing wheel weight at 60 miles per hour! When loading sprue down it is difficult to see if it is perfectly centered but not so when loaded up and in your face. Removing the sprue by tumbling removes this accuracy enhancing "trick."

[GARD72977]

I do tumble some of mine in a thumblers tumbler but I still want to see where the spur should be. I also use a set of flush cutters from HORRRIBLE FREIGHT. They were $2.97 and do a good job. I am casting with a Jeff Tanner mold so you must cut the spurs. I hate lee molds but I have to say that they seem to be some of the best round ball molds. They leave the smallest spur of any mold I have used.