Another crappy Lee mold!

[dikman]

I have several Lee molds (round ball) and they've been fine except for the dud I bought a while ago. Lee were no help and weren't interested in me, so my next order with Titan I bought a replacement which works fine (it would have cost me more to send it back to Lee than buy the replacement!!). Having just taken up cartridge reloading, I bought a couple more molds from Titan and thought I'd better try them out today.

First one is a .358 semi-wadcutter (two cavity). The boolits were coming out with wrinkle lines, so I figured I'd keep going as maybe the mold needed "breaking in" - 100 later and no better. Hmmm, got out the other mold (.429 round flat nose) and tried that. The first few were a bit iffy, but then it settled down to making nice boolits. Ok, it's not the melt or the temp.

I had a close look at the mold under a magnifier and could see little flat bits of metal that had been folded flat along the face of the mold at the edges of the cutouts! WTH? I carefully filed them off with a small flat file and tried again. Better, but still a couple of wrinkles appearing even though I can't see anything wrong anywhere.

I'll try the Lee-menting process with some very fine polish, but if that doesn't work I'll just have to put up with it. After my last little effort with Lee I have no intention of wasting time contacting them, as they just don't care. I have quite a bit of Lee gear for reloading, including a new press, an old Pro1000 and various dies and bits and pieces. Some has needed a bit of work, but that's no big deal as the quality is generally pretty good - BUT NOT SO THEIR MOLDS! I have had a 20% failure rate!

Doesn't say much for their Quality Control.

[mattd]

If you'd have called them before casting to tell them about the burrs, they would have told you to not worry about them and cast anyway because they are in the vent line and won't affect casting. Then once you do that, and get crappy bullets cause the pins don't align, you cant take it back to where you bought it cause it's now used. Then you'll spend a bunch of time going back and forth about the situation and at best they will say send it in for testing. Which cost darn near as much as the mold.

Ask me how I know.

[cuzinbruce]

I have always found that wrinkled bullets are a temperature problem, either the lead or the mold. That is my experience, anyway.
Good Luck

[TheDoctor]

I have too much of a good thing with one of mine. Have a 6 cavity that is supposed to drop .356, and the turkey drops .363-.365! Run one through a push through sizer, and it comes out wearing a hula skirt. Might try it again one day with the mold SMOKIN HOT, and see how small I can get them.

[gunoil]

Sell all, buy rcbs pro melt & hardline molds. These will make you a pro.

[sparky45]

The newer style Lee Molds with the Pins in the mold face work great. No need to pay a $100 for a Hardline (which are very nice molds) when a $40 Lee will do the job.

[r1kk1]

Didn't know about Hardline Gunoil, thanks! I wish the made moulds for the Linbaughs. The biggest looks like it for a 500. Not enough diameter. I have Lee custom moulds that work well.

Take care

r1kk1

[jmorris]

I had a close look at the mold under a magnifier and could see little flat bits of metal that had been folded flat along the face of the mold at the edges of the cutouts! WTH?

Part of the territory when dealing with parts that cost less than it does to ship them.

[rasto]

I will never do the same mistake again. To buy Lee molds again. Cheap means poor materials, craftsmanship and service. No other things to add. Buy steel made molds from normal company.

[mdi]

One of these days folks are gonna stop complaining about Lee products. "Another crappy mold"? How many "crappy" Lee molds do you own? Your post says just one!

I've only been casting for 15 years and use mostly Lee molds (9). I have never had wrinkles that I could blame on the mold. It's always been either temperature of mold or melt, or alloy. I have only one mold, a Lachmiller, among a couple Ideal and RCBS (?) molds, and 9 Lee molds, that has never given any trouble with good bullets dropping from the first pour. Each mold seems to have it's own "personality" and may prefer slightly different temps, methods, or alloy. I have always cleaned my new Lee molds, then cleaned them better, finishing off with a bath in brake clean. I would preheat and toss the first 20-30 bullets (for a new mold), and then start dropping good bullets. I have a new Lee mold that after cleaning and preheating drops good bullets, but the "new style" pins fell out. One out of nine? That ain't too bad...

[newrib]

Temperature of the alloy and the method of which you cast cause the wrinkles. Do you cast using a PID ? Are you using a proven and known alloy ? Is the mold in question being preheated ? LEE molds are one of todays good values.

[LUBEDUDE]

I have always found that wrinkled bullets are a temperature problem, either the lead or the mold. That is my experience, anyway.
Good Luck

Yup ^^^^

[Shooter6br]

I have Lee molds from my father..................40 yrs old. Not up to my old H&G 4 cav #50 or my Milhec or Accurate molds, but workable

[garym1a2]

I buy my Lee stuff from Midway, if I have a problem with it than I return it to MIDWAY. I have used Midway returns before and they are very good customer support. I suggest you return them to where you buy them (Titan). If Titan does not take returns than find a new supplier.

[DaveInFloweryBranchGA]

yup ^^^^

+yup^^^^

[DaveInFloweryBranchGA]

I buy my Lee stuff from Midway, if I have a problem with it than I return it to MIDWAY. I have used Midway returns before and they are very good customer support. I suggest you return them to where you buy them (Titan). If Titan does not take returns than find a new supplier.

Yup on this too.

[DaveInFloweryBranchGA]

I own a lot of Lee molds. I seldom buy anything but the 6 gang version. I've never been disappointed in what I got vs. what I paid. I avoid the 2 gang version, as it appears to give more problems than the 6 gang, but I have a few 2 gangs. I've been on this forum for many years and if someone has had a problem they could solve with a Lee mold, they could post it here and someone knew the solution.

I suggest those that are complaining about the Lee molds or casting problems instead post pics of the mold and give data on what they were doing. Someone here should be able to talk you through solving the problems. Casting is somewhat art/somewhat science and that's where your solution will be and someone here can help you.

[jmorris]

I have never had a problem with any of my Lee molds. For the money they are a good deal.

Then again for the price I don't expect them to be artwork.

[dikman]

As always, thanks for the comments, but a couple of points -
I have had two faulty molds out of ten, a 20% failure rate like I said. I obviously didn't make that clear enough. I don't consider that as something any company should be proud of.
For those who say temp/alloy is the problem, re-read my post, I switched to my other new mold and that cast fine, using the same temp/alloy - so it's not the temp/alloy (which, by the way, I had been using previously in an older Lee mold, same size, lent to me by a friend and that cast fine. And yes, I'm using a PID). I also tried varying the temp, but that didn't help.
Mattd, these were more than "burrs". Also, the faces of the two mold halves are not flat all over, there are obvious raised flat sections running along the top and bottom faces, leaving the mid-point a couple of thou. lower. Quite bizarre, none of my other molds are like that.
Measuring a boolit shows a variation from .355 - .359. This is on a .358 mold (supposedly guaranteed to be within .001 round by Lee).
Yes, I have had a pin drop out of a "new design" mold too (I much prefer the older style).
As for returning it, I'm sure that Titan would do the right thing but it will cost me more to send it back than it cost to buy!

Jmorris, I don't expect them to be works of art either, I just expect them to do what they're supposed to.

I've only been casting for a bit under two years, unlike many of you, and certainly don't consider myself an expert by any means, BUT I've spent a lot of time on here (and other places) reading about the process and like to think I know enough to tell when it's a mold problem or not.

[RogerDat]

It would seem that you took logical steps to isolate the problem, having the edge not properly de-burred which it sounds like you are describing while not great is probably not that big of a deal. I mean for the most part caster are mechanically inclined, which you seemed to be since you did some work to address that problem.

One question. Is the .429 mold holding a lot more lead than the .358 swc mold? Or possibly distributing it better? More lead mass or different shape might have an impact on the mold temp that could be addressed.

Your friends mold is broken in, yours is new and may have had some residue oils trapped under those flakes you filed off.