.45-70 smooth sided mold

[725]

Request for advise: I hope to make a smooth sided paper patching mold for a .45-70. Basic .458 dimensions from slugging. Chances are I'll be using regular coping machine paper with which to double wrap. What do you more experienced guys think will be the best mold dimensions & weight? I usually size the wrapped boolits at .459, with a touch of "Bore Butter", before loading. Now instead of doing this with one of my other standard molds, I'd like to have a dedicated PP'ing mold. Buffalo Classic ~ 500 yard gong.
Thanks, 725

[country gent]

Paper thickness X 4 ( 2 wraps of the paper is 4 layers thickness) - bore dia will get you very close to wrapped dia you want. If your making the mould yourself then I would shoot for .001 - .002 under the above dimension. Since you can lap up in size easily, making smaller is alot more work. Use the alloy you plan onn using and check often when starting out.

[725]

Thanks. Plan on repurposing an old Lee mold to make this one up.

[country gent]

Should be easy enough as long as you can find lee blocks long enough for the bullet you want. A 500 + grn bullet will be around 1.4 inches long so youll want blocks 1 9/16 - 1 5/8 tall. While not neccesary my brooks PP mould is adjustable for weight and a cup base ( gives a place for the paper to fold into making for flatter bases). this could also be incorporated into your mould depending on the equipment you have access to. Another that would be a 1 piece mould with the nose form on an adjustabe stem spring loaded.

[725]

country gent,

Been a long time since I've read about one piece molds. You've got me thinking, now.

[Oyeboten]

Hmmmmm...a One Piece Mold with a shaped stopper...that is sounding very interesting to me.

I will try making one for my own PP endevor.

[725]

I remember reading an article on the one piece molds, but I can't find it now. Can somebody point me in the right direction?

[country gent]

I beleive I found some information under a search for Ideal perfection moulds. They supposedly cast a truly round bullet. The body is round with a step on the out side to gain size for the sprue plate. The inside is a bore to size for bullet to be castand a smaller threaded hole. The nose form is a close sliding fit in the bore with a stem spring loaded to hold it against the face of the threaded stem and reposition it after ejecting the bullet. The stem on the nose form has a nut on the end to make a stop for the spring and needs to be permantly attached. The threaded stem is long enough it can be adjusted in or out to "tune" weight of projectile. I think that a mould made in this style could be very versatile as one body caliber could produce round nose, postell, money style noses with just the addition of new nose forms. Its an intreaging desighn.

[Old Coot]

If you are going to use a smooth sided cast bullet for smokeless powder paper patching then you will probably need to knurl the sides of the bullet prior to patching. Smokeless powders don't "explode" like black does, and the relatively slower rise in pressure will often cause a smooth sided bullet (one without lube grooves of any kind) to squirt out of the paper jacket and go down the barrel unprotected leading the dickens out of the barrel.
Just roll the bullet between two bastard mill files using moderate pressure (depending on the alloy) before wrapping and everything should be fine.
Brodie

[725]

Thanks, Old Coot. I'm up to speed on that. Still looking for the article I read years ago about the single cavity, one piece mold made out of a bar of brass. It had a conventional sprue cutter and a handle sticking out the side, but I can't envision the nose part. I'm almost ready to make a "d" cutter and go for the gold. The only mechanism I can think of would look like a, for lack of a better description, an engine valve sticking out the nose. Tap the plunger and pop out the boolit.
Oh well, I have many projects to get to and this is just one of 'em.

[country gent]

Thats very close theres a threaded piece with a lock ring to set depth also. threaded stem is in the bottom of mould nose piece bottoms on it its stem passes thru with a spring to tension it and a llock nut. This acts as an ejetor and forms the nose.

[Hardcast416taylor]

You should look on the Accurate molds catalog page #13 for 45 cal. smooth side molds starting at 360 gr. and advancing up to 550 gr. molds, besides you can talk to the Boss there and pick his brain for the best dia. and then he will make it that dia. if you place an order. His prices are reasonable and turn around time is very short, besides his molds being of better quality than LEE.Robert

[jhalcott]

Some years back (about 20) I used a 450grain 45-70 mold for some club shoots. I used Teflon tape, 2 wraps as they came from the mold. .457/.458 dia. No other lube or check was used. They shot very well in a Siamese Mauser and a TC Contender. Both Black and smokeless powders were used. I did NOT size them, just cast and taped them, loaded into cases and shot within a week.

[big bore 99]

Shooting a Buffalo Classic here too. Been having good luck pushing my Lee grease groovers thru a sizer to .453 and wrapping back up to .460 with cigarette papers. The grooves don't seem to make any difference.

[725]

Thanks, fellas. I'm really eager to try all these ideas.

[montana_charlie]

Shooting a Buffalo Classic here too. Been having good luck pushing my Lee grease groovers thru a sizer to .453 and wrapping back up to .460 with cigarette papers. The grooves don't seem to make any difference.

Is that where you use light charges of Unique behind pure lead?

How far do you shoot 'em?

[big bore 99]

I shoot about 100 yds mostly. The soft lead works good with a paper jacket. I've read where light charges of Unique have been doing good at long ranges too. I tumble the slugs with Alox and paste wax before and after sizing. The boolits and jacket paper I got from you worked great too. Appreciate the help getting started with it. With the Unique I can shoot 405gr.all day without getting beat to death.

[Nrut]

725,
For a "one piece mold" idea check out Ross Seyfried's article on PP in Handloader 220, Dec-Jan 2003 pg. 63..
From the picture of the mold it looks fairly simple to make and versatile in that you can change inserts for different bullet sizes, wt. and length..

[725]

Will do! Thanks

[Good Cheer]

OK, so my 45-70 was destroyed thirty years ago by a friend and his son that let it sit for months without cleaning it after shooting.
But I still have a .458 bore TC New Englander to shoot so I can say

Three cheers for light loads!