Ideal Mold 490303 - Any Idea What Caliber Rifle it's For?

[John Boy]

... got off eBay, has 2 paper patch cavities and a round ball cavity - stamped Ideal 490303 that comes attached to handles. Have looked in everyone of my reference books plus 3 old Ideal Catalogs. No clue for what rifle and not listed in any of the Ideal catalogs
Scroll down on the link for pictures
http://www.ebay.com/itm/BULLET-MOLD-TWO-BULLETS-ONE-ROUND-BALL-IDEAL-MIDDLEFIELD-CONN-/391204004673?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2047675.l2557&nma=true&si=F%252FkPpyIIC0Vn3QBpKv90QrrUJyI%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc

[Gofaaast]

Just a single cavity round ball mold from the factory, then someone added cavities to it.

[Cowboy_Dan]

.50 cal. muzzleloader? .490 round ball and conicals?

[John Boy]

Dan, 50 cal muzzle loader - this is what I'm leaning towards: 0.490 patched up but I can't find any references
Gofaaast: Nope! Look at the mold link. First of all, the mold is a large block and Ideal RB molds have the cavity cut in small blocks in the middle of it. In addition, the mold is configured to be flipped to cast either the RB or the PP bullets
I have to admit, the mold is unique - like one that I have never come across
145495

[rintinglen]

What you have is an old single cavity mold that some body out in his wood shed Bubba'd an extra couple of cavities into. Way back in the day, Ideal used to assign cherry numbers to round ball molds just like they did to every other mold they made. The 490 was the diameter of the cavity when it left Connecticut. Sometime before WWII, IIRC, they stopped assigning cherry numbers to roundball molds, using only the diameter to distinguish them. They later re-used those numbers in the 1950's when new designs came along. The 303 number was assigned to Carl Hudson's nifty little "Hi-Velo-Pen" 44 sharp-point wadcutter. Other examples of re-issued ID numbers can be found in an article in Lyman's 46th Edition Reloading Handbook.

Your mold was modified (poorly) after it left the factory, presumably by someone wanting paper patched boolits--at least I think it was done back before powder coating.:)

[Gofaaast]

I will stand behind my thoughts and add a little to them. It was produced between 1927 and 1949 approximately, and left Ideal as a 490 round ball mold, produced by cherry number 303 and was mold number 473 of that batch. I was being polite and did not add the bubba'd comment in my first reply, but that pretty much nails how the two extra cavities and a file mark to vent the round ball cavity got there after closely viewing each photo again.

[bhn22]

It's a 50 cal RB mould. 50 cal muzzleloader balls are too large for the small blocks. I've had a couple of .50s, and they were both cut in large blocks. Then somebody looked at all the wasted space in the mould and took it to the drill press in search of a little more utility. The cavities aren't even centered fore and aft in the block. Ideal would never turn out something like that.

[John Boy]

Thanks Gents - it's different and it is what it is!
When I cast with it I'll determine the diameter of the straight sides & the RB