Just another mould..or two.

[Distant Thunder]

Now if I were to just happen to "trade" into a mold that doesn't count against my one mold every other month limit, right?

Of course right! So then I can start thinking about the next mold purchase and not feel guilty for breaking the bank. My next .44 caliber mold will be of course a paper patch bullet in the original Sharps long range design.

As far as I know BACO does not offer any such design, certainly not in .44 caliber paper patch. This most likely means I will need a custom mold maker. That being the case I'd like ask those here who they would recommend I contact to get such a mold made. It would be a paper patch, base pour at about 1.450" long, nothing to complicated, but I want it to follow the Sharps design closely, not just some round nose bullet and the diameter that I specify will be important.

[Don McDowell]

Brooks does those, and KAL makes a tapered gibbs, but don't know if he does anything but nose pour.
Tom at Accurate could probably make you what you want, but for some reason or other his tooling will almost always live you with a small meplat.

[Don McDowell]

Almost forgot about Old West moulds, he might be good to check with.

[Distant Thunder]

I don't think a small meplat would be a problem. I believe Sharps swaged their bullets and some how they didn't seem to have a flat tip, any that were cast, say by the buffalo runners, would have been nose pour and therefore would have had a flat. Right? If so then Accurate would be an option.

I had not thought of Old West and need to look into that.

I did talk to Rick at KAL about this very subject, but that was earlier this year when I thought I would have my rifle back from Shiloh like in March. Then the China bug hit, other problems at Shiloh like getting a Krieger barrel and things got delayed for months. Also that was a nose pour adjustable mold and I'm not sure that works for me, someone is always adjusting those things and I never know what I'll have when I cast! Still I may talk to him again now that I know what diameter works in my rifle.

I'm sure Brooks could do it, I have several of his molds, all grease groove, and they are very good.

Thanks, Don. I'll start looking at those possibilities.

[Don McDowell]

I have a nose pour adjustable from Bernie that is more or less the original sharps profile. It shoots pretty fair, but I understand he doesn't do those adjustable any more. Good moulds but dang those brass blocks are heavy.
You can get Tom do go down as small as .18 meplat.
Have often thought about getting another mould from him in iron. Those aluminum blocks are nice but they suffer from the same as all aluminum blocks they heat up fast.

[Distant Thunder]

I'm liking the idea of Tom's iron blocks with as small a meplat as he can do. I will see what he says.

[Kurt]

I think we all have the mould of the month problem. I guess I have it so bad that I'm starting to make my own. I have three cherries cut and ready for the final grind so they will cut and get the HSS hardened.
I'm going with the old original profiles and I want to cut some swage dies.
I think the swage dies are a little easier than the mould blocks.
And the swage dies can be made with out a flat me plat. I have several of those as well as a duplicate of the .308 Lapua rebated boat tail.
These are winter projects.

Jim that picture of your groups really look good.
What lot powder are you using?

[Distant Thunder]

Kurt,

That is my 040313 lot, (2013) that works so well in my .45-70 and .40-65. Back in August I tried to transition to that lot from a 2016 lot in my .44-77 and I could not get it to shoot worth a hoot with 86 grains. I was trying to work up a load for the Lodi Fall Classic and it would not shoot for me.

The only other powder I had in good quantity was Goex 2F and I went with that but the fouling killed me during the match.

Then in December I started play with hunting loads, something that would allow follow up shots without wiping. Somewhere in the playing around with that idea I started seating my 431ADJ BACO mold .300 deep and it was shooting pretty well. Then this new mold showed up, 431520. Well heck I might at well see how that shoots seated deep. It shot pretty well too, so I worked to the load in the picture with 80 grains and seated .330" deep. For some reason that is a happy combination. I've never seated my PP bullets that deep before except when they were groove diameter.

I don't understand why it's working, but so far it is. I did have to turn the necks on my BACO brass and they are now a very close fit on a .447" bullet. A .448" bullet would not fit the cases and if seated the cartridge would not chamber. It's tight.

My 431520 is a straight bore diameter bullet but I size the necks to a slip fit on a .4375" diameter patched bullet for about 1/8". Next I will test this same load with my 2-Diameter 441505EPP bullet. If that work I think I'm on to something! Then I'll start tweaking the primer and wad to see if I can reduce that groups to something closer to 2". There are a couple other little tweaks I can do but once you get down to the 2 1/2" 10-shot group area the improvements get so small it takes time and matches to see what really makes a difference. That's is a good place to be.

I like my .45-70, load, shoot, win, repeat. No need to play with the load or the rifle. If something goes bad, it's the shooter! And he is old and cranky and doesn't listen very well!

[Distant Thunder]

I am anxious to hear how the cutters work. I'll be headed down that road next year. You lead, I'll follow!

[Kurt]

Just be careful following me. I don't use a compass when I go into the dark woods

I have a couple more I want to make that is like the Sage mould for the .40 and .45.
I been thinking changing the Sage mould to a DD, but it just shoots to well as it is makes me a little hesitant messing with it.

When I get the final cutting and relieve edges ground I will use some of the Brownell surface hardening compound. I don't think the HSS steel rods will harden using a water quench.
The drill rod I cut these with is still soft enough that a file sharp file will still take the edge off but it's harder than mild steel.
I have used a .400" number drill bit and reshaped the cutting edges and that worked for a groove diameter PP. I might follow this through a little more but I cant quite follow the flutes on my U-3 precision tool grinder. Doing the elliptical curb is not as easy as a full ball nose.
I think this winter will pass to fast for me to get all things sorted out.