Inexpensive mould for my 357 Maximum
- Thread starter Ben
- Start date
RBHarter
West Central AR
If ya believe all you read I must be the luckiest man alive ....as far as moulds go anyway . In 30 or so , some stayed some went , I've had 1 that wouldn't shoot that wasn't what it could have been . I'd forgotten about the 2 RB moulds bought yr apart .....dang it .....it wasn't that they were under size but that the tangical cut off was too short . Not a big deal if I'd wanted them for 0000B but not cool in a 36 cal 1858 . If the sprue weren't dead up or down it left a gap .
I guess that's about 1-10 but I was just counting as I was typing and through gifting , swapping and buying it's probably north of 40 moulds .
If I had 40 Lyman/Ideal moulds , I only have maybe 20, 1 casts undersized , which I knew when I bought it , and 1 isn't even in the same subdivision with what it is advertised to be . It should be a 250 gr RNFP HB for the old BP Colts instead it's a 285 Minnie and the only thing flat on the nose is the sprue cut .
I have 9 NOEs one hacked on before it came to me . 1 of which I have had to do a bunch of fidgeting with , prue plate mostly , and it wasn't the hacked on mould . 2 of them are exactly what they are supposed to be but I can't use them in what I bought them for because the zero miles bbls are still to tight .
I have 1 M-P , brass no less , it's marked 462-420 . Now I could cry foul on it as under size and weight as it only drops a 460-414 and the HB that was supposed to be 400 is only 380 . However I learned that this was an over run from a group buy and half of the buy was speced for 460-4- whatever it came out.
RCBS I have 6-7 . The 7mm 168 sizes nicely for a 270 and needs only seat .020 short of the top of the top band . The nose is only .273 , sloppy even in new 7mm bbl at .277×,284 .
Based on this M-P has a 100% fail rate plus 3 GB that I backed out of over a yr after adding my name to a yr old list .
Lyman can only manage 80% useable moulds at best .
It looks like in my sample RCBS at best only pulls about 87.5% .
Using those stats Lee looks like a way better roll of the dice .
Mountain Moulds is the only maker that has delivered a perfect mould under budget , and under time . LBT did a good one also but the very similar Lee 6C cuts casting time by 2/3 by count and shoots just as well in the heavy bedroom gun .
Like M-P however a sample of 1 isn't really a fair shake .
Cramer is one that the sample of one really lived up to the hype . The Herters makes good bullets also , sort of a hype man selling unbranded seconds in new packaging . Lee but with more colorful hype .
I'm not saying Lee is the creams cream , but anybody can get a bum product . Did anyone read that thread over there about the 1895 Remlin ? How do you get 4 bad bbls ? What are odds ? Especially when at least 2 of them were factory rebbls ?
Luck of the draw in mass production where the line is inspected at 25% ,50% at best .
I guess that's about 1-10 but I was just counting as I was typing and through gifting , swapping and buying it's probably north of 40 moulds .
If I had 40 Lyman/Ideal moulds , I only have maybe 20, 1 casts undersized , which I knew when I bought it , and 1 isn't even in the same subdivision with what it is advertised to be . It should be a 250 gr RNFP HB for the old BP Colts instead it's a 285 Minnie and the only thing flat on the nose is the sprue cut .
I have 9 NOEs one hacked on before it came to me . 1 of which I have had to do a bunch of fidgeting with , prue plate mostly , and it wasn't the hacked on mould . 2 of them are exactly what they are supposed to be but I can't use them in what I bought them for because the zero miles bbls are still to tight .
I have 1 M-P , brass no less , it's marked 462-420 . Now I could cry foul on it as under size and weight as it only drops a 460-414 and the HB that was supposed to be 400 is only 380 . However I learned that this was an over run from a group buy and half of the buy was speced for 460-4- whatever it came out.
RCBS I have 6-7 . The 7mm 168 sizes nicely for a 270 and needs only seat .020 short of the top of the top band . The nose is only .273 , sloppy even in new 7mm bbl at .277×,284 .
Based on this M-P has a 100% fail rate plus 3 GB that I backed out of over a yr after adding my name to a yr old list .
Lyman can only manage 80% useable moulds at best .
It looks like in my sample RCBS at best only pulls about 87.5% .
Using those stats Lee looks like a way better roll of the dice .
Mountain Moulds is the only maker that has delivered a perfect mould under budget , and under time . LBT did a good one also but the very similar Lee 6C cuts casting time by 2/3 by count and shoots just as well in the heavy bedroom gun .
Like M-P however a sample of 1 isn't really a fair shake .
Cramer is one that the sample of one really lived up to the hype . The Herters makes good bullets also , sort of a hype man selling unbranded seconds in new packaging . Lee but with more colorful hype .
I'm not saying Lee is the creams cream , but anybody can get a bum product . Did anyone read that thread over there about the 1895 Remlin ? How do you get 4 bad bbls ? What are odds ? Especially when at least 2 of them were factory rebbls ?
Luck of the draw in mass production where the line is inspected at 25% ,50% at best .
Some swear by Lyman, I'm not one of them.
I'll buy an old Lyman / IDEAL mould , but won't spend a penny on any of their new moulds.
Too many other mould makers out there that will provide you with a trouble free experience.
Ben
Ian
Notorious member
I don't recall exactly now, but I think only two Lee moulds out of about 40 in the stable had issues. The long Blackout bullet is as ridiculously undersized as everyone reported it to be, but does ok if powder coated. One of the single-lube-groove .45 230TC 6- bangers I got casts at about .4555", but I don't use it much anyway. IIRC that one also had chattered-out cavities, probably why it casts fat, maybe a loose tool in the CNC lathe was the problem. Other than that they've all been good, cast on size, cast round, and just flat worked with a little smoothing of the sprue plates and judicious application of soot and lube to get them broken in properly.