Cast Bullet Association Blog Rss Feedhttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/Rss2_.aspxRss 2.0 for the user blogs.en-usFri, 25 Sep 2026 12:15:42 GMTCast Bullet Associationchefreiss@gmail.com(Cast Bullet Association)info@morganids.com (Richard Morgan)360Snippets from Fouling shot 174 March April 2005http://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2020/4/197/snippets-from-fouling-shot-174-march-april-2005 Fitting Lee Sprue Plates Mustafa Curtess; Austwell, TX Fitting the sprue plate on a Lee mould to fit nice and flat is simple and productive. I ordinarily cast with a new mould long enough to thorou....


Fitting Lee Sprue Plates

Mustafa Curtess; Austwell, TX

Fitting the sprue plate on a Lee mould to fit nice and flat is simple and productive. I ordinarily cast with a new mould long enough to thoroughly test the bullets. After that, if the bullets are good enough to use routinely, the mould will be broken in and stable. There is some-times a small amount of warpage brought on by several heating and cooling cycles.

It is common to see a wedge of light showing under the sprue plate; zero at the pivot screw to ? at the free end. I remove the sprue plate and grab the corner with the screw hole in it in the vise jaws, half way through the hole and give the plate a whack on the top side with a leather mallet. This will bend a barely visible tab down toward the blocks. This then will produce a wedge of light that is larger by the screw down to nothing at the outer edge.

Then lay a sheet of abrasive paper on a flat sur-face and set the sprue plate on it, allowing the stop flange to overhang the edge. Polish the bottom of the sprue plate until the area over the cavities just begins to show contact with the abrasive paper.

By far, most of the metal polished away will be where you bent the little tab down around the screw hole. With the screw adjusted so the sprue plate will almost pivot of its own weight, you will have a perfect fit of the plate to the blocks. Because of the wide contact area, it will be perfect and permanent. I also lightly lap the top of the blocks on the abrasive paper to remove any burrs. ¥





On .45 Steel Cases

Dave Lombard, McLean, VA


I read Mustafa Curtess’ letter on shooting steel cases in the .45 Auto with great interest. Back 45 or so years ago, I purchased a quantity of U.S. military surplus

.45 ACP cartridges with steel cases that were manufac-tured in 1943 when copper and zinc were scarce. This ammo cost about 3 cents a round and shot just as well as the 5 cents per shot brass-cased surplus stuff in my NRA/DCM pistol.

Being cheap (I still am), I decided to reload these cases. My press was a Herter’s Model 81, a C-type with two side-by side rams pushed by one handle. After siz-ing with a carbide die, then decapping and belling, primers and powder were added. The bullet was a cast 200-grain semi-wadcutter (Lyman 452460).

With the bullet seated to the correct depth, I applied a taper crimp with a separate die, enough to hold the bullet firmly while leaving the case mouth wide enough to seat solidly on the ledge in the chamber wall that maintains headspace. This 2-die approach for hand-gun ammunition eliminates the shaving of lead that sometimes results from trying to seat and crimp simulta-neously with one die. I was able to reload a steel case several times, with performance and accuracy on a par with brass cases.

Several years later, the late Lt. Col. Ellis Lea, a retired Army pistol competitor, informed me that the use of steel cases in .45 ACP pistols is ill advised. When the pistol’s slide slams a round into the chamber, it is stopped by that headspacing ledge at the front of the chamber. Brass cases are softer than steel, and cause no harm, but the steel cases tend to peen the ledge over time. In short, use of steel cases in.45 Auto self-loading pistols can damage barrels.

The steel-cased rounds might do less damage to an auto if they are loaded singly by hand, rather than being slammed home by the slide. But even then, the slide usually must be closed with some force. The high-est and best use for the steel cases, if they must be used at all, is in the revolver. The S&W Model 1917, and sim-ilarly chambered revolvers should not have the peening problem, and the same may be said for my Old Model Ruger Blackhawk with the .45 Auto cylinder installed. I just shot up the already loaded steel rounds in the Ruger, and discarded the cases. By that time I had scrounged enough .45 Auto brass to exceed my needs for years to come, anyhow.





A .35 Rem. Hunting Rifle

The late Joe Wiest; Dubuque, IA

A few years ago I got 10 lbs. of RCBS 35-200 bullets from Ed Doonan and that was the start of building a .35 Rem. bench rifle. In the bench rifle they were a poor bullet. Then came 9 custom molds and I ended up with more extra bullets on the shelves. I was hoping to find a Marlin with the old style rifling but then I met my brother at a gun show. He had just picked up this M-760 Remington slide action in .35 Rem. The rifling in it looked better then the old Marlins for cast bullet shooting.

I didn’t have a deer rifle and since we can go over into Wisconsin in the CWD (Chronic Wasting Disease) zone and get $2.00 licenses I figured it would make a good brush gun. On the table at the gun show was a Lyman 358430 mold that I had never seen before and I thought if I laid it down the fellow next to me would have grabbed it for sure. (My wife always says to buy something and eat.) This mould casts .359” plain base bullets that weigh 185 grains in linotype.

I picked out bullets that I figured would fit the throat and the magazine and loaded some up. It seems like everything chambers at home and then at the range nothing fits. This chamber has no leade. Some cartridges chambered and some stuck. When I extracted a stuck round the powder spilled into the action and plugged up the rotating bolt head, then continued down into the trigger housing and mucked it up. After that some rounds would chamber okay and lock up but wouldn’t fire. After a good clean out and a few more trips back to the range I figured out how to seat the bullets and things looked a lot better.

This rifle was not drilled and tapped for scope mounting. It has a big buckhorn rear sight and a big bead on the front which works great for my old eyes, a sure thing for brush hunting deer and open area shots.

I started out at the 50-yard bench. With the four bullets pictured using 11.5 grains Unique, 28 grains BL-C, 30 grains 4895, 26 grains 4895 and18 grains WC680 I had no trouble getting 7/8” to 1-1/2” groups. The day I shot at 100 yards it was very windy and I felt I could have done better. Using 30 grains Hi- Vel. or 32 grains 4895, I could get groups of 1.6” with two flyers that still would be in the killing zone. The Lyman pistol bullet would group at 2”. I shot 39 grains 4895 with Herter’s 200 grain jacketed bullets and got 2” groups. I settled on the 32 grains of 4895 load with the RCBS bullet for hunting.

My RCBS bullets teAst out at the same hardness as linotype on my lead tester. CB shooter John Wagner told me to put the bullets in a tray of water and with a torch anneal the nose to make them expand. I decided to do this before taking them hunting.

The CWD Zone deer hunt requires that you find a farmer that will sign your tag. The season runs from October to March. The weather is real nice in the early part of the season, especially if you don’t like snow. You must shoot a doe first to earn a buck tag. The first week all I saw were bucks. The second week I found a high rock where three draws came together, The second time I hunted off this rock a large doe came down to within about 30 yards. There was some light brush but a right side shot was taken. The deer ran off as if I missed it and then stopped about 75 yards away, just before a steep climb up a hill. This time I had a left side shot and it started up the hill after I fired. Then two more does came in view and I couldn’t believe I missed two shots. Then I heard and saw the deer rolling back down the hill. At the end of its tumble it lay still.

During field dressing I found a two-inch hole where the bullet hit a rib two inches below the spine. It had blown a lot of hair off, but I couldn’t see another hole. I still couldn’t admit that I missed the first shot on the right side. When you shoot all the time it just shouldn’t hap-pen. When we pulled the skin off the next day I found I did hit it on the right side in the front leg. The bullet had exploded so badly that the front leg was nothing but jelly.

I had intended to nose-anneal these bullets for the hunt, but forgot to. I thought that a hard bullet like that would surely have gone in deeper.









]]>Mon, 20 Apr 2020 04:46:04 GMThttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2020/4/197/snippets-from-fouling-shot-174-march-april-2005Cast bullet storagehttp://castbulletassoc.org/blog/article/2020/4/195/cast-bullet-storage By Jeff Brown.I'm a self confessed dumpster diver. A magpie if you will. I don't like seeing things being resigned to the trash that could or should be re purposed. My father was a produc....
By Jeff Brown.

I'm a self confessed dumpster diver. A magpie if you will. I don't like seeing things being resigned to the trash that could or should be re purposed. My father was a product of the 'Great Depression' (in addition to other factors) and was not one to waste much if anything. To that end I keep my eyes open for things that I can make use of that would otherwise find their way to the landfill site.

Two items I find particularly handy for my loading bench and storage draws are empty primer trays and rimfire ammunition boxes. Large CCI and Winchester pistol/rifle primer trays make perfect storage facilities for .22 cast bullets and can be double stacked if need be. Shotshell primer trays accommodate 6.5mm and .270 cast bullets with ease. Using primer trays certainly helps to make bullets easily accessible whilst preventing them rolling around the loading bench and keeping lubed bullets sheltered from foreign matter.

A pair of CCI large rifle primer trays containing GC'd and lubed Lyman 225415 bullets ready for loading.

A Cheddite shotshell primer tray providing a home to two different 6.5mm designs.



Rimfire ammunition boxes for both .22RF and .22WMR, traditional the domain of CCI, have always been handy for bullet storage also and with the advent and subsequent popularity of the .17HMR these containers are readily after in trash bins at the range. .22WMR/.17HMR boxes comfortably hold 50 .30cal bullets the likes of Lyman's 314299 or double that number of .32-20 style projectiles like the Lyman 311008.



.17HMR boxes containing (top) 50 .303 British bullets and (bottom) 100 cast bullets for the .32-20.

CCI .22RF boxes accommodating (top) Lee's 6.5mm Cruise Missile and (bottom) more .32-20 bullets.

Waste not, want not. Go forward and commence to dumpster diving.

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