Hollow base mould cavity size

[pull the trigger]

Hello folks. I recently lucked into a Ballard in 38 long. I had a few 38 hbwc swaged bullets that worked in it. They had a really deep cavity. This is the limit of my experience with hollow base bullets. My question is, will a boolit with a shallow cavity still bump out enough to go from .358 to .375ish? Some of the designs I see only have a ".200 deep hole. I'd rather have a round nose style boolit than the wadcutter.
Or, should I just pony up the $180 and buy the heeled boolit mould and collet crimper? Thoughts please

[bigboredad]

If it was me I would talk to Tom over at accuratemolds.com pretty sure you could save some money and get exactly what you want

Sent from my SM-T377V using Tapatalk

[USSR]

^^^ Good advice, talk to Tom.

Don

[Good Cheer]

Thinking out loud here a moment, how much the bullet bumps up is going to depend upon powder charge, bullet mass and inertia, how soft it is... Maybe you could tinker up a load without a hollow base. Getting close to two hundred bucks would set my DIY drive in high gear.

Maybe a soft lead round nose like with Lyman #358430 or some other similar design would work. A .36 caliber maxi mold might even work.
Don't know what kind of weight you're wanting but something else just occurred to me, remember those Lee .36 caliber revolver molds? If you lucked into one of the old Ideal / Lyman .36 molds, they're even longer and heavier. What I'm thinking is that you could size the back end of the boolits to fit the case. That's the process I go through to make slugs from .45 molds small at the base to slip into the chambers on .44 percussion revolvers so perhaps it would allow you to adapt .36 revolver slugs (.375-.378 diameter) to your required base dimensions.

The old Lyman #358395 HBWC mold is a real booger to get it to fill out but it might be another option.
And another possible, if you were to find an old Lee single cavity 150 grain round nose mold, the front of it could be lapped out while leaving the back half .358.

That's about the best I can do without another cup of coffee.:)

[Good Cheer]

Oh, by the way, I went off down the tinker track and didn't address the question you asked, about hollow base dimensions.

Once again, it's a question of powder charge. The skirt wall thickness is going to be of more impact to you than the depth of the cavity.

The skirt thickness that worked on the boolits you used will work again but how much the boolit bumps up ahead of the skirt might be a problem if it doesn't provide enough alignment. Can you make it a bore rider at the front end? And how big is the bore diameter? Did the HBWC's actually provide bore contact?
On my way to the coffee pot and to let May Bell outside.

[pull the trigger]

I have one of the Lee 36 cal molds, I have not figured out how to get the base down to the .358. I do like the idea of lapping out the front of another .358 mold tho, genius!!

[Good Cheer]

Yeah, the Lee design is pretty short for it's diameter.

This is one of the old Lyman "conical" .36 boolits with the base run part ways into a .359 H&I sizer.
The very bottom of the base ring is .359 diameter. Might have to zoom in to see the reduction.
http://i.imgur.com/hRdTO9w.jpg (https://imgur.com/hRdTO9w)

[pull the trigger]

Do you know if the collet crimper would squeeze it down the rest of the way? I wonder if pushing the lee boolit base first into a 9mm taper crimp die would get me there.

[pull the trigger]

If it was me I would talk to Tom over at accuratemolds.com pretty sure you could save some money and get exactly what you want

Sent from my SM-T377V using Tapatalk

He has some heeled moulds, and one hollow base, but does not provide any pins. NOE has a tempting hbswc, with pins. Accurate has a bunch of designs, holy cow!!

[pull the trigger]

I just ordered a 357 mag collet crimp die to experiment with. Lee brags about how strong they are, maybe it will squeeze the shank down the .018-.020 I need with out the brass on it, then with the boolit in the brass. I do enjoy this experimenting

[Good Cheer]

Do you know if the collet crimper would squeeze it down the rest of the way? I wonder if pushing the lee boolit base first into a 9mm taper crimp die would get me there.

Don't know about the collet crimper but the bullet can be sized with the H&I die for whatever length is desired.

[pull the trigger]

I don't have a lubersizer. Aren't they tapered pretty good? I use the lee sizers when I need to.

[Good Cheer]

The lubrisizer dies? Yeah, a little bit.

[NoZombies]

The only decent accuracy I got from hollow based bullets required a custom cut mold with a diameter of .362 when cast from soft (50-1) alloy or pure lead. The smaller diameters I tried weren't pie plate accurate at 50 yards. I speculate that once I got to .362 they were riding the bore for alignment, and the hollow base was just acting as a gas seal. And I went from 9" at 50 yards to 3" with no other changes.

My rifles are rook rifles in .380 rook, both have .362x.378 bores.

I finally started getting accuracy in the 1.5" range (at 50yds) when I changed to my final heeled bullet design. My heeled bullets have a .362 heel and a .380 major diameter. I might be able to improve that accuracy slightly, but with the sights and bore condition, I'm taking 1.5" as a win. I've also found better accuracy with faster, rather than slower, powders, though that was more pronounced with the hollow based bullets than the heeled bullets.

[beagle]

Good idea and workable. I tinkered with PB .458s and was able to do the same thing. Basically swaged a GC shank on a 457122HP for the .45/70. It works./beagle


Yeah, the Lee design is pretty short for it's diameter.

This is one of the old Lyman "conical" .36 boolits with the base run part ways into a .359 H&I sizer.
The very bottom of the base ring is .359 diameter. Might have to zoom in to see the reduction.
http://i.imgur.com/hRdTO9w.jpg (https://imgur.com/hRdTO9w)

[GregLaROCHE]

If you can afford it, I would opt for a mold made for the gun.

[pull the trigger]

If you can afford it, I would opt for a mold made for the gun.
Based on what I am finding, in a relatively short amount of time, I'm starting to think this might be the best route. I am trying to stay cheap, but I do like the idea of the original form of ammo for it.

[GregLaROCHE]

Based on what I am finding, in a relatively short amount of time, I'm starting to think this might be the best route. I am trying to stay cheap, but I do like the idea of the original form of ammo for it.

Cheap isn’t always the most economical in the long run.

[Bent Ramrod]

I’ve only loaded the heel-type boolits in my .380 Rook rifle, but have used both heeled and undersized hollow-based in my .32 Long rifles. The hollow-base boolit is vastly inferior in accuracy to the heeled type, in that caliber anyway.

Come to think of it, I got some .38 Special factory HB wadcutters with the rifle, that the previous owner said shot well. They did offer good plinking accuracy. But the heeled boolit shot to the sights at 50 yards, and grouped much better.

[45workhorse]

Paper patching???

[pull the trigger]

As in, patch the exposed portion of a 358 boolit? I wonder if the paper would stay on?