I was casting some 475 gr. 45/70 bullets from a Lyman mould, tried casting at 700'(wrinkles) at 800'& 850' and the bullets stick in the left half of the mould and come out with that side of the bullet looking frosted and feeling rough. I don't think it was frosting from being too hot. It felt like something dirty on the bullet but the mould looked clean. I smoked the mould and the left side released just fine. I have not had problems casting up to 405 gr. bullets. Also my first time with a cast iron mould, all my others are Lee moulds. Any advice?

Steve E.........

[ 02-16-2003, 09:14: Message edited by: Steve E. ]

Steve what are you using to coat the mold with smoke? Any chance the vent lines are clogged with residue per smoking?

Are you using 457658?

I keep some cut off Q-tip shanks, the cardboard portion, on the bench while casting. I use these to scrape out the mold cavities as needed.
Sometimes there will be abuild up of carbon in the cavity, junk from the lead, grimlin crap, who knows.
I can scrape out the cavity or run Q-tip down vent lines and under the sprue cutter as I see the need.
Jim

Id still bet it was getting to hot iron molds cool alot slower then alm. if the rough spot is where the tow bullets are seperated it is no doubt getting hot thats why most rcbs big bullets are made in single cavity. My big ballistic cast .475 and .512 molds do the same thing if I dont go real slow with them I sometimes have to run 5 molds at a time and still give them a little cool off time once in a while. Another thing Ive learned is that if its happening more to one side then the other rotate which cavity you fill first everytime you fill the mold. It seems to me that the one that is filled second is the most likely to do it. Hope this helped

Try holding the mold perpendicular, aww shucks, I mean straight? Metal hitting one side only right outa the pot can cause that. My pot was pissin diagonally, all kinds of grief! Reemed drop hole, fixed the problem. Just a thought. Jeff

Thanks for all the good advice, that will give me some things to try.
Steve E.

I have a bunch of the ingot molds for those times I'm cleaning lead up in large quanities. I'll use a couple of the molds, upside down, to support a piece of aluminum plate to use as a heat sink. When casting pistol bullets I'll use two or three four cavity molds to get a bunch of bullets. The molds can heat up real fast so cooling them on the heat sink allows me to keep at it with out frosting or taking to long for the lead to cool.
With rifle bullets I'll cast with two molds and do the same thing.
Jim