A used Lyman 452374 mold.

[kmw1954]

Just bought this mold last week and other than having the wrong mold handles it's dropping nice clean bullets. This is a single cavity mold BTW.

Being new to this mold and Lyman molds I have this question. The Boolits I am dropping from this are measuring 460" diameter. After leaving them sit over night I went to size them in my Lee push thru die, .452", I almost broke the press and the bench and after about 8 of them I quite before I did break something. I am now thinking of re-melting these and starting over and then sizing them right away. Is that really an option or is that wasting my time? Also is this normal for Lyman molds to be this much oversize?

[ranger391xt]

Does the mold close completely, meaning if you put the blocks together and hold it up with a bright light behind it, can you see any light? I have a 452460 that I had a similar experience with. Went to size the bullets and got one stuck in a .452 diameter star die. Found out it was dropping bullets as .462!

After checking checking the mold i discovered it isnt closing completely.

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[kmw1954]

On some yes. At this time I have the wrong handles on this mold. The ones I was getting with a fin on the top went right back into the pot.

[44magLeo]

Trying to size that much at once is a lot of stain on any machine. Doing it in two or three steps would be better.
How hard is your alloy? Hard bullets are harder to size. Some alloys cast larger bullets than others.
Often bullets fresh out of a mold are one hardness then at about 3 days they are harder than fresh then soften back down a bit. So sizing shortly after casting will be a bit easier.
Leo

[kmw1954]

Holy Bats Butts, we just got back from shopping at the Super Wally World. Grocery shelves are about empty. Zero eggs, near zero canned soups, Paper and soap products forget it. Took us almost 3 hours.

Back to topic. Hoped to have this started already but I think I'm going to melt it all and start over. I sized a handful after I cast them and it went much smoother which I think is what I should do now. The handles I am using are from a Large two cavity mold and this one I am trying to use is a single cavity small mold.

[gwpercle]

Lyman 452374 normally does not cast that much oversize . Try another set of properly fitting handles... Lee 6-cavity handles work on all my single cavity Lyman blocks with no modifications .
If you're not getting proper closure then you will have problems .
I actually prefer the Lee handles to the Lyman .
Might also try casting a little softer alloy...easier to size and don't water harden/drop them either, that just makes them harder to size .
Gary

[kmw1954]

Thanks Gary, Agreed the handles don't fit properly and are effecting this. I don't have a Lee 6 cavity set of handles either. Been suggested how to drill the Large handles to fit the small mold. So far I've had a couple responses to my post in Swapping and selling.

This alloy is very soft range scrap that is about B3 with the pencil to which I added 1% by weight of some print type I acquired, I believe it is harder than linotype and can't scratch it with any of the pencils. After adding the type it is still pretty soft at between B2 and B and I don't water drop anything.