Hollow point struggles

[WRideout]

Some of my Lee Al molds can be sticky. I have found that a [I]light[I] coating of automotive bulb grease in the cavities can cure it after about three or four pours to eliminate wrinkled boolits. Alternatively, I have used the spray silicon lube, but found it puts way too much on.

Wayne

[megasupermagnum]

Thank you. That’s a very generous offer! I’ll have to figure out private messages on this site now. I’ve got a zip-loc bag of 40 S&W brass I was planning to put up on the pay it forward page, but if you want first shot at them, they’re yours. Deprimed and wet tumbled.

I have no need for the brass, thanks. I sent you a PM. Check the top right of the page.

[Barry54]

So busy helping people the mailbox is full!
megasupermagnum has exceeded their stored private messages quota and cannot accept further messages until they clear some space.

[megasupermagnum]

I fixed it. You can reply now.

[fredj338]

Unless the hp is very deep & wide, you cant expect mush expansion below 800fps or so. Cast soft, 30-1, big hp, it will mushroom just fine at 750 or so.
Make sire the pins have no machine marks, you can try mold release & you want the pins hot, so cast at a bit higher temp than normal.

[megasupermagnum]

Unless the hp is very deep & wide, you cant expect mush expansion below 800fps or so. Cast soft, 30-1, big hp, it will mushroom just fine at 750 or so.
Make sire the pins have no machine marks, you can try mold release & you want the pins hot, so cast at a bit higher temp than normal.

It is very deep and wide. The HP on the 452-232 is gargantuan. I'm sending him some cast of 20:1 to try.

[fredj338]

It is very deep and wide. The HP on the 452-232 is gargantuan. I'm sending him some cast of 20:1 to try.

Under 800, i would go 30-1. I run 20-1 with cup points running 1200+.

[rockrat]

As said, I would try air cooling your alloy. You could probably have left out the partial roll of solder and been just fine.

[Professor]

My NOE molds required quite a bit of coaxing. They now cast great but were very slow to get all cavities running. I think it's the aluminum. Yours being brass may have its own issues. I'm using MP brass molds and not experienced any of my old problems. Just have to figure out the temp each likes to run best at.

[pjh421]

An electric heat gun if you have one, can provide heat in a very specific area (like your hp pins). Easy does it. Creep up on it. If you haven’t fixed your cavity yet, consider a very gentle lapping. If you want to try this, get the mould up to temp. Cast a boolit in that cavity and cut the sprue. Leave the boolit inside the mould and let everything cool so you can handle it with bare hands. Disassemble the sprue plate from the mould. Mark the center of the boolit base with a prick punch. Drill a hole in the base of the boolit while it’s still captured in its cavity. Don’t go through the boolit and into the mould metal. Turn an appropriately sized sheet metal screw into the hole in the base of the boolit. I like hex headed screws so I can use a nut driver on them. Carefully open the blocks and capture the boolit/screw assembly from the problem cavity. Coat the boolit with automotive valve lapping compound. Just a light coating works fine. Replace the coating boolit/screw assembly into the problem cavity and work it around until you either get the mould closed or are close to doing that. Attach your nut driver and gently twist while still attempting to close the mould. The goal is to get the boolit to make a complete revolution with the blocks closed. As soon as you attain this degree of fit, stop. Clean everything up with brake cleaner and Q-Tips. Whatever minuscule bits of mould metal that were hanging onto your castings should be gone and the mould should drop freely. Too much lapping will cause an egg shaped cavity so go slowly through the process and sneak up on the goal. I’ve done this exact process many times and it works. If everything was lined up and properly dimensioned from the gitgo the mould would rain boolits, which it’s not. It sure is nice to not have to beat the handles every time you open the mould.

[Barry54]

It is very deep and wide. The HP on the 452-232 is gargantuan. I'm sending him some cast of 20:1 to try.

Your package arrived in the mail today! The post office tried to destroy it but the tape on the box on the inside saved the day.

I got my set of 12 pencils yesterday for comparing alloy hardness.

On top of all that I read about the lanolin/Heet blend of case lube. I’d been using the Lee car wax case lube and applying it one at a time on each piece. Dreaded it...
The lanolin works like a charm! My poor tumbler has been working overtime this week.

Thank you all for all your help and especially thank you for sending the samples for me to try out!

[Teddy (punchie)]

pencil lead the mold, olive oil. I had a brass mold with the range lead I had it was like solder it was a pain to get seasoned. Not to talk about getting the sweated lead off of the brass mold.

[Barry54]

Carefully open the blocks and capture the boolit/screw assembly from the problem cavity. Coat the boolit with automotive valve lapping compound. Just a light coating works fine. Replace the coating boolit/screw assembly into the problem cavity and work it around until you either get the mould closed or are close to doing that. Attach your nut driver and gently twist while still attempting to close the mould. The goal is to get the boolit to make a complete revolution with the blocks closed. As soon as you attain this degree of fit, stop. Clean everything up with brake cleaner and Q-Tips. Whatever minuscule bits of mould metal that were hanging onto your castings should be gone and the mould should drop freely. Too much lapping will cause an egg shaped cavity so go slowly through the process and sneak up on the goal. I’ve done this exact process many times and it works. If everything was lined up and properly dimensioned from the gitgo the mould would rain boolits, which it’s not. It sure is nice to not have to beat the handles every time you open the mould.[/QUOTE]

“It sure is nice not to have to beat the handles” Thanks for the detailed instructions for lapping the cavity. I’m curious why too much twisting would cause an egg shaped condition?

I’ll give the mold another couple of chances to straighten out on it’s own before I get aggressive with it. I intend to put a flat point pin in the third cavity and see if that helps.

If I had a troublesome Lee mould, I’d get right with the valve lapping compound, but at 5-6 times the cost for this brass mold, I’m going to try to be patient and see if more use will help any.

I don’t remember the model number but my first NOE mold was a 30 caliber tumble lube at approximately 230 grains for 300 Whisper. It was trouble free right out of the box.

[Barry54]

pencil lead the mold, olive oil. I had a brass mold with the range lead I had it was like solder it was a pain to get seasoned. Not to talk about getting the sweated lead off of the brass mold.

I had read somewhere about using a pencil to apply graphite to a mold cavity. That’s one of the reasons I tried powdered graphite with a q-tip, but it didn’t stick.

Maybe I’ll try one of the soft pencils from my new set.

[pjh421]

I can’t actually promise that you would get an egg shaped cavity but it’s a rare mould that drops perfectly round castings, so your lead lap is not actually round to begin with and of course the cavity is not round. Combine this with having to start the lap moving while the blocks are perhaps still slightly open and the probability that the nut driver and screw are not likely in perfect alignment with the long axis of the cavity. You can see how the lap might cut more on one side than on the other. By keeping the cutting to a minimum you can probably get whatever is holding onto your boolit out of there without removing anything extra. It doesn’t take much and if it still won’t drop you can always go back and try it a little more. I’ve never had to do it twice to the same cavity. It seems like sometimes I’ll get a mould with a cavity that is not perfectly bisected by the part line. I can’t prove that nor even attempt to measure it but I’ve long suspected that situation to be the culprit.

[megasupermagnum]

I can't wait to see how they do. Those aren't my best castings ever. They are unsorted, but there should be enough good ones in there.

[Barry54]

I can't wait to see how they do. Those aren't my best castings ever. They are unsorted, but there should be enough good ones in there.

I was surprised at how many you sent me. Thank you! I immediately tried the fingernail test on one when I opened the package and they are softer than what I had cast.

It’s spring here. Already cut the lawn twice this year... put new blades on the mower yesterday. Trying to make a big push to accomplish stuff outside before the weeds and bugs take over. Only 221 more days till November.

I’m looking forward to testing them as well. Still accumulating water vessels currently. Need to put batteries in the chronograph and verify it. So much to do.

[megasupermagnum]

If I didn't mention, those are certified 20-1 alloy. I think I bought those ingots from buffalo arms.

[Larry Gibson]

For 800 +/- fps I use 40-1 if maximum reliable expansion is wanted.

[Walks]

An electric heat gun if you have one, can provide heat in a very specific area (like your hp pins). Easy does it. Creep up on it. If you haven’t fixed your cavity yet, consider a very gentle lapping. If you want to try this, get the mould up to temp. Cast a boolit in that cavity and cut the sprue. Leave the boolit inside the mould and let everything cool so you can handle it with bare hands. Disassemble the sprue plate from the mould. Mark the center of the boolit base with a prick punch. Drill a hole in the base of the boolit while it’s still captured in its cavity. Don’t go through the boolit and into the mould metal. Turn an appropriately sized sheet metal screw into the hole in the base of the boolit. I like hex headed screws so I can use a nut driver on them. Carefully open the blocks and capture the boolit/screw assembly from the problem cavity. Coat the boolit with automotive valve lapping compound. Just a light coating works fine. Replace the coating boolit/screw assembly into the problem cavity and work it around until you either get the mould closed or are close to doing that. Attach your nut driver and gently twist while still attempting to close the mould. The goal is to get the boolit to make a complete revolution with the blocks closed. As soon as you attain this degree of fit, stop. Clean everything up with brake cleaner and Q-Tips. Whatever minuscule bits of mould metal that were hanging onto your castings should be gone and the mould should drop freely. Too much lapping will cause an egg shaped cavity so go slowly through the process and sneak up on the goal. I’ve done this exact process many times and it works. If everything was lined up and properly dimensioned from the gitgo the mould would rain boolits, which it’s not. It sure is nice to not have to beat the handles every time you open the mould.

Best method I've heard/read yet. An absolutely great well detailed set of instructions. ��