recommended gas check for JTknives mold

[autodidact]

New to the gas check thing. Looking for recommendations for appropriate check material thickness for the mold I just purchased from JTknives. Searched the gas check forum and only found general advise for different calibers.

JTknives mold specs .227 drive bands with a .214 check shank, so a .013 difference. Divide by 2 and nominal material thickness comes to .0065. I plan to size no smaller than .225, a thou or two bigger if the gun requires. How much extra thickness is required to assure a good crimp? I will be crimping with a Lee sizing die.

Any vendors/members selling checks appropriate for boolits from this mold?

Thanks in advance for any advise.

JB

[grampa243]

338RemUltraMag sells checks that is what i'm going to try on that molds boolits

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...-ordering-info

runfiverun has already loaded some up and shot them not sure what checks he used.

[Mike Hughes]

Are you using a freechex III? I recently acquired the mihec nato mold and none of my material would make a good fitting check. Home depot has some amerimax aluminum flashing that is .008 (#68314). The material is gold on one side and shiny silver on the other. The material must be annealed to remove the spring. I cut the strips to 3/8" and put them in the oven, 450 degrees for one hour and the allow material to slowly cool. Now the material will be gold colored on both sides. A 14" x 10' roll for $10 will make approx. 10k checks. The checks go on easy and crimp tight. Hope this helps, has worked great for me

[Mike Hughes]

I just noticed you are looking to buy checks that are already made. Maybe this will help someone else.

[blikseme300]

JB,

I also bought one of these molds. In the first post in that thread JT had added a pic of 2 boolits with GC's fitted. One Gator and one Hornady. The new generation Lyman will work as well as the oem is Hornady. Maybe one day I will also make my own GC's but currently I have a sufficient stockpile of GC's to last me a long time.

[338RemUltraMag]

I have some .009 aluminum checks at 15/K or .010 copper checks at 17/K shipped, these will crimp on all 22 cal boolits up to .228 in size. PM me if you need some.

Josh

[Jupiter7]

I'll vouch for 338RUM's checks, I use them in 30cal and ordered 5k in the 22group buy on his checks. I also bought the hm2 225-62 and will be using his checks. I'd be a happy camper if only the mihec 75gr NATO wasn't so far out...

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

I've already cast and sized some of the HM² 225-62 boolits.
Gators checks fit very snug...it's a bit of a challenge to hand seat them.
The homemade checks from my FCIII tool with .008 alum lith plate, slide right on and when sized to .225 in my lyman/ideal lubesizer, cannot be pulled of with my finger nail. Sage Outdoors makes/sells those exact checks, google his website. He uses the same tooling and same material.
Jon

[Doc Highwall]

JonB, what are you using to seat the gas checks with? I have the same mould on order, and I have a SAECO luber sizer that has a gas check seater built in that works great.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

I usually just use my fingers.
for stubborn ones, I use a lyman 45 with homemade seater plate.
I have a ideal/Lyman #1 lubesizer setup for .225 and Lotak.
I don't have a seater for that...yet
Jon

[Doc Highwall]

JonB, when they go on hard, the SAECO will allow you to seat them square before sizing them onto the bullet.

[dragon813gt]

If you have a check maker contact member Yonky for aluminum. It sounds like you need to use .008 material. I can vouch that his aluminum works great. I use that thickness for my 357s w/ great results.

[autodidact]

Thanks, all, for the suggestions.

I was originally interested in purchasing checks, but instead decided to give a freechex III a try. Happy to say that I have successfully crimped checks made of Yonky's .008 aluminum coil onto boolits from JT knives' mold by sizing/crimping with Lee sizing dies at .225 and .226. The checks are on very snugly and I can't imagine them coming off.

Haven't had an opportunity to shoot the checked boolits yet, but can't wait to get to the range.

JB

[blikseme300]

I did my first cast yesterday using the mold by JT and fitted the boolits with Hornady checks. They went on snug with a few that needed a tap with a small wooden stick. Lube sized through a Star to .2255 and using Tac#1 lube.

[tjones]

Charlie of FreeChex writes "from yonky and or jkh" on sample metals included with his tools. When quizzed he said it was a crimping issue and staying put for him and thus the deciding factor. Same thicknesses in HomeDepot etc. aluminum often tended to spring or pop off. I'd referred to the brass shims that were included recently, he said that he was out of yonky's metal for the particular tool.