Man I dread having to cast 1K boolits.

Just got my 45acp brass order in today and counted out 1050+ rounds of 45acp brass. I have a Lee 2 cavity 230gr Truncated Cone, Tumble Lube boolit mold and ran off about 50 the other day just to see what they'd be like. Nice looking boolit, loads nice, OAL at 1.211", hand fed great and should function great as well but I really dread having to cast up another 1050+ boolits using a 2 cavity mold. I'm almost tempted to just see what it'd cost to order 1K of already cast boolits just to load the bulk of my brass then I can cast up 50 or so for what's left.
I mean I really love saving money by doing it myself and I don't mind casting a couple hundred at a time but dang, 1000+ is going to be a full time job. Guess I'll probably just have to get at it and start doing what I can as I can until they're all done. :violin:

Just be glad you have a 2 cavity mold. I use a Lee 190gr mold for my .45 and it's just a single cavity.

Seems like it would be cheaper to buy a Lee six cavity mold, and go to town. I have a H&G six cavity 45 mold and casting 1K bullets would only take a couple of days and thats taking my time. The most I usually cast at one time is arounnd 500 and that is easily doable in a day with some time left over.

We each love to tell a tale, love to spell a spiel...but some love to cast, some love to reload and some love to it all...me I'm the all of the above

I have to agre with 41 Mag Fan. Once you get that mould dropping boolits you will be amazed at how fast you can turn out 1,000 boolits with a Lee 2 cavity.

I cast until I start getting super frosty boolits. Once that happens I cool the mould. The i cast again until I have to cool again. Doing that I can put out several hundred in short enough order. Do this over a couple days and you are set.

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Originally Posted by TNFrank

Just got my 45acp brass order in today and counted out 1050+ rounds of 45acp brass. I have a Lee 2 cavity 230gr Truncated Cone, Tumble Lube boolit mold and ran off about 50 the other day just to see what they'd be like. Nice looking boolit, loads nice, OAL at 1.211", hand fed great and should function great as well but I really dread having to cast up another 1050+ boolits using a 2 cavity mold. I'm almost tempted to just see what it'd cost to order 1K of already cast boolits just to load the bulk of my brass then I can cast up 50 or so for what's left.
I mean I really love saving money by doing it myself and I don't mind casting a couple hundred at a time but dang, 1000+ is going to be a full time job. Guess I'll probably just have to get at it and start doing what I can as I can until they're all done. :violin:

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Ahh Frank, be a big boy now. Four hours work and it'll all be done, then won't you be proud of yourself!

A river is never as wide as seen from the far shore.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by TNFrank

Just got my 45acp brass order in today and counted out 1050+ rounds of 45acp brass. I have a Lee 2 cavity 230gr Truncated Cone, Tumble Lube boolit mold and ran off about 50 the other day just to see what they'd be like. Nice looking boolit, loads nice, OAL at 1.211", hand fed great and should function great as well but I really dread having to cast up another 1050+ boolits using a 2 cavity mold. I'm almost tempted to just see what it'd cost to order 1K of already cast boolits just to load the bulk of my brass then I can cast up 50 or so for what's left.
I mean I really love saving money by doing it myself and I don't mind casting a couple hundred at a time but dang, 1000+ is going to be a full time job. Guess I'll probably just have to get at it and start doing what I can as I can until they're all done. :violin:

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I have the same mold in a six cavity.
Get one,you'll be amazed

I cast about 1000 158 swc's this afternoon, but that's with a 5 cav mold. Thankfully I also have a Star lubesizer!

There's only one way to eat an elephant; one bite at a time. :razz:And nobody says you have to cast 1,000 bullets at one setting. So, do 200-300 a setting, three or four times (much easier to handle thinking about 200 rather than 1,000! :shock:)...

I like casting and 1,000 bullets sounds like fun streached over a couple days).

With a Lee 6 cav that is only a couple hours work. Now sizing them, that is a different story. Situations like that are why I bought a Star.

I would far rather cast a bunch than I would size them.

i cast 31# of 200 grainers today. thats over 1K
i used a 4 cavity. i admit by the time i got towards the end i was ready to shut down for the day. it probably took me about 3 hours to get it all done. with some breaks and time to get the pot back up to temp as i don't have a backup pot to fill from.

i say buy the 6 cavity and don't look back

You have to figger out if you have more money than time or more time than money? I'm almost always in the latter end of the "figger'n .

Just what is the hurry? Is this a hobby, or is it a business? If the latter, you should have high schoolers needing girly money. ... felix

You have to cast them all at once? You have to make *work* out of it? Jeepers man, don't ruin a perfectly good addiction!

Walk away from it till you get the urge to *want* to cast.

For the cost of a thousand boolits you can/should buy a LEE six cavity mold and go to town and enjoy yourself.

I just think Frank has one of those love hate things going on. We all know casting is an addiction, and so is shooting for that matter. I wonder when he finally gets 1k of those things and loads them up, if in the back of his mind he's thinking, uumm...it took me X amount of hours to cast these things and X amount of hours to load these, It's going to take me X amount of hours plinking with these things. Then it's I think I need a bigger mould.

You didn't say what you are using for a pot. I have the RCBS 20 pound pot. It takes about a half hour to get it full and fluxed starting out with a cold pot half full of sprues. Using either a Saeco 3 cavity mold or a Lachmiller 2 cavity mold I can empty the pot in about 45 minutes to an hour. I don't put the sprues back in the pot so I get 10-11 pounds of boolits. This amounts to about 425 if they are 185 grain 45ACP, or 500 if they are 158 grain 38 specials. Since you are casting 230 grain boolits, I would expect 325-350 per batch if you cast the same way I do. That means 3 pots full and you have your 1000 with a total of, for me anyway, 5 maybe 6 hours spent including the time to warm the pot up. Break it up into one pot sessions and you will be done before you know it.

1000 boolits, .45 at that. Sounds like a great afternoon if you ask me! Baseball season is around the corner. Radio on, Iced tea at the ready, yup, good times. Frank

TNFrank
You could replace your two cavity with a six cavity Lee mould for around $37.00. If the speed of casting was important to me, that is what I would do.

Ken

1k is a busy staurday,a bit long if you want to load them too.
if you wanna buy some and load them gohead.
if you shoot them all in one place you might could fetch the lead back.