I bought a used Lyman 54 caliber conical bullet mould and tonite started the final operation of the bullet casting. I started melting the lead ingots and fluxed with candle wax, heated my dipper in the lead, poured a mould full, and tried to cut the sprue with my wood handle. Just about beat the handle in two getting the sprue off. Hummmm, I thought, this seems awfully hard. Wonder what those guys were mixing in their bullets? Did about five or six more and the same thing. Hard as the dickens! So I poured out the lead into my ingot moulds; got the wheel weights ignot melted and started over. Long story short, I not only chewed up the mallot handle pretty good and wore out the palm of my left hand trying to hang on to the handles of the bullet mould as I beat the livin shit out of the sprue cutter. I new this wasn't right as I had 20 years earlier moulded bullets and even though it was pure lead surely this stuff couldn't be that much harder. Oh well, I'll try one more I thought. That's when I went "wack" with the mallet handle and the sprue plate went flying across the shop. Sheared the sprue plate screw off. And for some reason now the mould seems to not be flush in the middle where they join. I think I'm really gettin into this bullet casting now!! Help???

Four Tails, Since the sprue cutter went flying it will be hard to tell exactly what happened. After you get the screw replaced, check to see if the sprue cutter and the top of the mould are flat. There should be little to no daylinght visdible between the mould blocks and the cutter. Rubbing a lead pencil over the tops of the blocks and the bottom of the sprue cutter will lubricate and minimize lead buildup. A good rule of thumb is to have the sprue cutter barely able to open itself by its own weight. Also make sure you are striking the cutter at a 90 degree angle. If all the above is OK, sounds like a dull sprue cutter. sometimes they can be sharpened with a conical stone through the pouring hole. If the taper of the sprue cutter doesn't go almost all the way to the bottom of the cutter, cutting the sprue can be difficult. Normally, wheelweight metal should cut easily. If all else fails, send the mould back to Lyman, my recent experience has found them to be pretty decent about warranty. HTH, curmudgeon

Thanks again for the information on the sprue cutter. I believe I'm going to send it back to Lyman and have them check it out. If push comes to shove I'll order another one since this one has been purchased used on EBay. I was told by Lyman when I ordered handles that the particular model I had was no longer in production. I can live with that though and am happy to learn that all the work I went to in order to get my lead ready to cast was not in vain. In between the start of this post and now I have mailed the mould to Lyman. I'll keep all updated how this thing turns out and again, thanks. Mike

Sounds like you are either casting with cold mold, or letting the sprue cool too much. I like to cut the sprue just after it has lost its shine. Hot sprues cut easily, but well cooled ones can be a bugger to cut.

I've got a .458 caliber mould that I'm going to try tomorrow and see what happens. I will watch the cooling of the lead in the mould and try to wack it off while still pretty hot. Thanks for the tip. Later, Mike

I had a chance today to get the .458 caliber mould out and try casting for it. Well....the sprue cut off like butter. In fact some of it just fell off. However, right at the top of the mould or bottom of the bullet there appears to be like a crack or fragmentation or crazing 1/16th inch from the end of the bullet. Any ideas?? The wacking off of the sprue is working just fine otherwise. Could I have an unclean mould up near the top and need to clean it?

I'm finding out there is a somewhat "fine line" in the temperature control of casting bullets. I'm getting the sprue cut off now with no problems and with a count of 50 after the lead frosts over after pouring, I am not getting the crack in the lower end of the bullet. However I am still not getting a smooth surface on the bottom of the bullet? The surface of the bottom of the bullet is scragely and rough. Help!! Mike