Help for a busted Sprue bolt

[Echo]

Mercy. :( I have a 10-gang no-name aluminum mold that throws a 150 grain .38 SWC. Does a good job, but the sprue plate is very slightly warped. I decided to take it off and true it up. The bolt was very tight - VERY tight - and finally snapped. I had loosened the set screw. I tried to get the stump out, froze it for a day or so, used my left-hand drill that I have used before for similar situations, but no joy.

Rather than screw it up any more, I would like to mail it to one of you guys to fix for me. Will gladly pay whatever. Any takers?

[rvpilot76]

How big is the bolt, and how big is the drill bit that you tried to remove the stub with? I've got some Snap-On extractors that I use when working on my Twin Commander aircraft that might be of some use.

Kevin

[theperfessor]

Hi Echo - ;-)

Couple of possible solutions, from cheapest to most expensive.

(1) Try to take it out with some type of mechanical screw extractor/drill, etc. Downside is that is easy to screw up mold if not done properly. Know when to back off.

(2) Find a commercial shop or tech school machine shop that has a plunge type EDM machine. They can take "burn" out the screw without harming the mold. This is commonly done and not an unusual thing when dealing with expensive commercial molds. You could use the original sprue plate after you finish truing it up. Use some kind of decent high temperature anti-seize compound on all the screw threads when reassembling.

(3) Does your mold have a pivot pin in one block and the stop pin in the other block at the opposite end? If so, you can have somebody make you a mirror image sprue plate and drill and tap holes at the opposite corners of the block. You'd end up with a new flat sprue plate but you'd have to learn to operate in the opposite direction.

If the existing sprue plate is OK, I'd spend the relatively small amount of money it would take get the screw out with EDM.

[Echo]

Perfesser & rvpilot76, thanks for your suggestions. I decided I didn't want to mess it up any more than I already have (not much, but some), so I PM'd Buckshot and he will do it for me for a nominal fee. It pays to let pros do the pro work.