beagleing a 31141

[wmitty]

I'll start this by confessing to purchasing a Lyman 31141 single cavity off evilbay a few years ago and knowing at the time that the gas ck. shank had been removed. I had asked the seller what dia. the mould now cast at the base and his one word response was .314". Well, I foolishly took him at his word and went ahead and bought the mould. Turned out the base miked .323" using WW. I wondered what alloy he used to come up with a base dimension as he described and came to the sad assessment that I had been duped. Well, I decided to run the misshapen projectiles thru the Lee sizer (.311") and wound up with .311" boolets with bases of questionable squareness.

I have now acquired a .32
Special with a .318" groove diameter. My question is: Can the mould be beagled ( or otherwise modified) to accomodate the somewhat undersize dimensions of this Marlin?

[beagle]

You can give it a shot but that's a lot of diameter to pick up and the more you pick up, the more distortion you have.

Start with two thicknesses of tape on either side of the blocks along the groove section of the mould and see what you get. When the bullets start having "wings", you'll know you have surpassed the limits of enlargemnet you can get with "beagling".

Some moulds respond better to beagling than others for some reason.

Let us know how it works out./beagle

[HORNET]

IIRC, Eric at HollowPoint molds will bore out the driving bands on existing molds. Probably wouldn't be any cheaper than buying the RCBS 32-170-FN, though. Of course, it'll require gas checks if you want to push it hard, like full throttle.

[pdawg_shooter]

Or you could paper patch the bullets you have, forget the gas checks and load them like jacketed.

[358wcf]

Gentlemen,
I have experience with Erik Ohlen of Hollowpoint Mold Service with respect to enlarging driving bands to increase overall boolit diameter. He did a fabulous job enlarging my Lyman 375248 (photos shown on his website) to allow it to drop a boolit fully .005 (from .376 to .381) larger to allow sizing to fit the bore on my 38-55. His work on this is excellent, to say the least.
Be aware, Erik says, that he can only get these excellent results with Lyman steel molds, which he calls "butter steel", which machine easily and allow a very smooth finish. He claims that iron molds such as RCBS are less machinable and the metal tears away rather than allowing a super smooth finish as desired.
If I remember correctly, his cost was most affordable, certainly less than a custom mold, and turnaround was super quick. A great option, if it works for you.
However, IF ther is a stock mold at standard pricing available, I would suggest that as your course of action-
We've all bought other people's mistakes on EvilBay, and live to regret it. Since joining this fine forum and trying the services of Erik, NOE, Buckshot, Lars, and others, you'll never consider getting used junk on EvilBay again.

Chuck
358wcf[smilie=1:[smilie=1:[smilie=1: