Down in the bottom of my mold box is a 311284 that I purchased new about 30 years ago. The reason it lives in the bottom of the box is because the nose section drops out oversize, typically running .301 to .302. This makes it very hard to push a loaded cartridge into the chamber. I have tried this bullet in two different .30-06's and one .30-30, always with the same result.
Has any one ever had this problem, and what did you do about it?
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Mold sizes vary, depending on how often the cherry was resharpened. Several people look for that size mold as the more normal 0.300" nose is too small. Most people with this problem often buy several molds of the same number and sell off the ones that cast different than what they want. What size do the bands cast at and how much do you want for it.
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The oversize nose problem went away after NOE Bullet Molds introduced their push through sizing kit and inexpensive replaceable nose and base bushings. Both come in 1/.001" increments.
This tool allows the nose to be fitted to the bore just as the base is to the throat.
R.
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Years back RCBS made taper or swedging dies that replaced the the sizing die in the lube/ sizer. Minor changes could be made. To many broken handles and they discontinued them. I use a arbor press with a special table setup that holds the die. My own creation. Check with NOE, I think they make something. If you have deep pockets I think Corbin makes a press and dies that will enable you to do most anything.
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Boschloper: I use the Noe nose sizing tooling mentioned by Richard above to good effect. As I powder coat all my bullets this is a common problem. Some have opined that this will swage the nose out of alignment with the base. If it does, I haven't seen it to be a major problem. I typically seat my cast bullets into the lands or very close for auto loading rifles and believe any small alignment problem to be swaged out on firing. May not be up to the benchrest standards but works fine for me. Gp
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A nose diameter of .301 -- .302 is not huge for thirty caliber. Frank Marshall used to claim it as about right. I would guess that you are using a fairly hard, or hard alloy.
It might be worthwhile to try a softer alloy before going to other options. Try some with a BHN below 10 maybe 25:1. You may be surprised with not only reasonable chambering pressure BUT ALSO better accuracy than with your harder alloys.
John
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I have the opposite problem. I have an old 311284 single cavity mold, that has a .299-300 bore rider nose.
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I cast a batch of these over the weekend and the big nose slides right in to my 03A3 (which I acquired since the last time I tried this mold). Guess I have some testing to do.
45 2.1: The bottom 2 bands cast .3110 - .3115. The third band tapers to around .308
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By the size of your as cast dimensions, it sounds like the over size problem could be an oversize base or nose or combination of the two in anything other than your "03".
I find this typical when fitting cast bore riders to the throats and bores of military and commercial rifles. For the last month or so I have been sorting out a Remington 700 P 308 with a throat of .310" and bore that measures .302". So by sizing the bands .3098" and the nose at .302'' the rifle is beginning to make some nice five shot groups at 100.
It sounds like your mold drops castings that are big enough to leave some wiggle room for both military and commercial rifles. That is a good thing.
Good luck
R.
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I have 2 NOE 311 molds that run big, .303 .304. I bought the NOE nose dies to help with this problem. I'm running about 12.5 to 13 BHN and it was a struggle in my Redding Big Boss. I could not get them chambered in my 94's, but have not tried them in my Springfield 06 or my 30 Army. My first though is try to soften up to about 10 BHN as John suggests. I'm going to get my second Lee on line just a soon as I plug the drip 'omatic feature. I ladle cast anyway. Would like to keep COWW in one, and a mix of 9 to 10 BHN in the other.
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wimilkman
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Tom Acheson
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Aaron
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BRatigan
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MarkinEllensburg
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Ed Harris
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porthos
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mashburn
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Pigslayer
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