Remove tumble lube grooves?

[rototerrier]

.452 TC lee mold. Anyone remove the grooves on the cheap?

[475AR]

Erik at hollowpoint molds does a great job, I have had several molds done. I think his prices are reasonable, he charges $35 for setup then $5 per band.
http://www.hollowpointmold.com
184911
Here is the last one I had him do, it is an NOE 30 cal mold and when sized the bearing surface is flat and even.

[rototerrier]

With shipping, that would be almost 100 bucks on a 40 buck mold. Definitely not worth that on a lee. I might just take the dremel to it afterall. Not really much at stake.

[1988-4551]

Erik at hollowpoint molds does a great job, I have had several molds done. I think his prices are reasonable, he charges $35 for setup then $5 per band.
http://www.hollowpointmold.com
184911
Here is the last one I had him do, it is an NOE 30 cal mold and when sized the bearing surface is flat and even.

how much weight does this add to the bullet?

[Skooterr]

Not quite the same, but!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCmUJKN1shA

[paul h]

You can do the job with a decimal reamer, but 0.452" reamers aren't cheap. That said I'm going to pick one up to convert my lee tl bullets into powder coat only.

[Forrest r]

I'd use a 13.5mm drill bit. They don't have to be pretty, just function.

I had a lee 6-cavity 9mm tl version of their tc bullet. I used a T drill http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t242/forrestr-photo/semiseat_zps9lbhbnez.jpg (http://s162.photobucket.com/user/forrestr-photo/media/semiseat_zps9lbhbnez.jpg.html)bit to remove the tl grooves. I left the top tl groove in 3 of the cavities for a roll crimp when I load them in the 38spl/357's. All of them can be loaded in the 9mm's. The bullet went from a 124gr (mine were around 122gr with range scrap) to 131/132gr bullet with range scrap. So expect at least a 10gr jump in weight.

The bullets in the upper right are the before/after with the tl lube grooves removed with nothing more than a drill press and a $4 drill bit.

[rototerrier]

I've gone after one of my seldom used molds with a Dremel and so far I've done one cavity without messing anything up. It takes a long time to do one though. I don't think I could make a living doing it this way!

[popper]

TL grooves are so small why bother?

[rototerrier]

I am actually doing a 9mm mold with a traditional single groove. I originally asked this question because I also have a TL mold I'd like to try this on, but I also wanted to do it with regular grooves.

Figured it wouldn't matter which groove I asked about, since the removal process would probably be the same.

Once I got my mind wrapped around the fact that sizing will swage out any minor imperfections, it really isn't a big deal.

[paul h]

TL grooves are so small why bother?

More bearing length and a heavier bullet.

[swheeler]

TL grooves are so small why bother?

You can sell them once they are removed, Waksupi buys and sell lube grooves.:bigsmyl2:

[475AR]

how much weight does this add to the bullet?

I will have to weigh them, if memory is correct in my lead the groove bullets were 190 ish and the groove less is 208, but I will verify that.

I did weigh them and with groves in my lead they cast 196gr (as cast) and after groves were removed they weigh 214gr with 3 coats of HI-TEK black and sized to .309

[popper]

I push 308W to 2700, GC, w/wo LGs. Can't tell a difference. Now if you have an old mould with huge LGs? Otherwise does 10% wt make a difference? It will move the CG back on long boolits. Grooveless has more bearing surface but also more frictional surface. Additionally, grooveless has a lot of Pb to move to the rear of the boolit, creating an uneven 'tail' at the base. I PC, hitek, BLL, LLA and have found no real HUGE advantage to grooveless. It does make sense for PB moulds that have a very thin base band.