Bullet Mold for 303Brit

joedude

joedude

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Hi guys,
Looking for advise from the Casting guru's. I know that Lee makes a bullet mold for the 303 that casts a 185gr .312 bullet. But before I buy a mold I want to know that the bullets I'll be casting will be right for my barrel. I also want to Gas Check the bullets so I need a sizing die that'll be size appropriate.

So I slugged my barrel... only problem - the Enfield has an odd number of grooves, so I can't get an accurate measurement. Any advice? Anyone else ran into this?
 
it's a ##### to measure a slug from an odd numbered grooved barrel.Talk to the guys on castboolits.com Lee makes a $25 lube/size GC seater in .312 that fits standard reloading presses 7/8" Harold
 
joedude said:
Hi guys,
Looking for advise from the Casting guru's. I know that Lee makes a bullet mold for the 303 that casts a 185gr .312 bullet. But before I buy a mold I want to know that the bullets I'll be casting will be right for my barrel. I also want to Gas Check the bullets so I need a sizing die that'll be size appropriate.

So I slugged my barrel... only problem - the Enfield has an odd number of grooves, so I can't get an accurate measurement. Any advice? Anyone else ran into this?
Click to expand...

You might want to give the guys at castboolits a try. I remember there being a thread there involving trigonometry and steel pins to measure bore diameter.
 
Mostly plinking. But I'd like something that can be loaded up to plink at 100-200yds and be acceptably accurate. I think I'll stick to loading store bought bullets for my hunting rounds. But in the meantime, I want to get some trigger time with bullets that have comparable ballistics.

Also I'm new to casting and this will be my first rifle mold.
 
Lee C312-185-1R mold
Lee .314 sizer kit
Hornady .30 cal gas checks
Bullet lube (Lee kit includes alox tumble lube) you can also pan lube with wax type, but you WILL need lube at all velocities.

I can send you some of these Lee bullets to try.


Also these guys specialize in molds for oversize and normal .303 Brit
http://www.castbulletengineering.com/page003.html
 
hk33ka1 said:
Lee C312-185-1R mold
Lee .314 sizer kit
Hornady .30 cal gas checks
Bullet lube (Lee kit includes alox tumble lube) you can also pan lube with wax type, but you WILL need lube at all velocities.

I can send you some of these Lee bullets to try.


Also these guys specialize in molds for oversize and normal .303 Brit
http://www.castbulletengineering.com/page003.html
Click to expand...

.314 sizer eh? but doesn't the mold drop .312 bullets or are they oversized?
 
The bullets in my mold with my lead alloy dropped .313"

The .314" sizer doesn't touch them, but it does crimp the gas check on.

One could order a custom .313" sizer from Lee, and for some things I do. In this case for my 7.62x54r and 303 British I use them as cast with only gas checks and lube added.
 
As stated above go to castboolits. There is a ton of info there for all cast biolits and alot.for the. 303. I have decent success witht hat lee mold and size to 313" in my lubrisizer or 314" in a lee push through. Mine drop at 313" with an alloy.of 50/50 ww/range scrap and work well. This is a great way to get started with this caliber. Best of luck.
 
Try holding the cast bullet in the micrometer and slowly rotating it. Do this several times and note the highest reading you get - it's not perfect, but you don't have to be within 1/10000" in these things. For the 303 Brit in a Lee Enfield, it's rare that a bullet smaller than 0.314" in diameter works best, so I'd aim at that. The Lee 90385, 90361 and 90371 all work well, and typically drop at 0.313" or 0.314".

Get to know these guys: http://www.ranchdogoutdoors.com/

They sell a bullet for the 32-20 that makes a good plinker and drops at 0.313" or more depending on your alloy



They also stock a Lee 0.313" lube-sizer - no need to order a custom one.

I recommend that mold, or any of the three Lee molds and a 0.314" sizer.

Lyman, RCBS and others make much higher quality molds, but they are priced accordingly. For someone just starting, those prices might be just high enough to turn you away from casting, much less experimenting. Nevertheless, the Lee molds will provide thousands of bullets before they crap out, certainly enough service for you to decide if you'd like to get more serious about casting.
 
I've heard of and tried wrapping a peice of paper around the bullet. Measure the bullet then subtract twice the thickness of the paper from your measurement. Either the Lee 155/160 grain mold, or 185 grain mold work fine or the Lyman 314299 200grain is even better.
 
You've got the right idea with the paper, but i wouldn't use paper :) It can compress a bit. If you can get some real shim stock, .001, .003, that would be tyour best bet. Barring that, a piece of aluminum pop can can work. cut a piece abotu half an inch by 2 inches. Fold it over the slug, and pinch it tightly together with your fingers, and measure over that. Then, measure the shim/aluminum, and subtract 2x that thickness for the diameter of your grooves. Please, use a micrometer. You can buy a 0-1" and 1-2" at canadian tire for 30 bucks when they go on sale, and they're as good or better than most of the asian mate mics out there (except mitutoyo, perhaps :) ) A caliper isn't really that accurate and when you're dealing with bullets, .0002" might actually make a difference.

I slugged my enfield barrel at .3108. I've been shooting Lee TL312-165-2r and .312-155-2r (meant for 7.62x39) with pure wheel weight alloy. They drop about .313, and sized 312 with a lyman sizer, dragon bullet lube (sponsor) yellow dragon lube, and 30 cal gator gas checks they end up being about 170gr +/- 2 grains.
 
Anybody got any ideas about a mold for a Lee Enfield that with a oversize bore. My No 4 sluggs at .318 and the bore is near mint.
 
Go to castboolits.com there are several Australian firms that make larger .303 molds for just that purpose 316299 etc...........Harold.........you may be able to use 8mm instead?
 
lorne19 said:
Anybody got any ideas about a mold for a Lee Enfield that with a oversize bore. My No 4 sluggs at .318 and the bore is near mint.
Click to expand...

Buy a mold for an 8mm or 32 Special and a custom 0.319" sizer and size them down. If you're handy, you can open up a standard Lee sizer, for example a 0.314" with a "O" drill or reamer to 0.316" as is commonly done, and then go the extra 0.003" by other means such as sandpaper around a dowel.

Be careful that the neck in your chamber can accomodate such a large bullet and if the clearance is insufficient (i.e. less than one thou), you'll need to neck turn your brass. Generally this is not required, but you have to check.
 
Looking at these 2 bullets, other than the weight difference, I notice that one has more lube grooves that are thinner than the other.
p-2859.jpg
p-2847.jpg


Why the difference?

I'm also wondering about alloys. I don't really know how to get the other metals that some put in with their lead to make their bullets harder. Can I just cast pure lead used from wheel weights, put a gas check on it and load it up?

The reason I ask, is that I've read posts of people talking about barrel leading from shooting hard cast bullets that they clean up by shooting GC bullets afterwards to scrape the lead off. So if a gas check keeps the leading off, couldn't I shoot pure lead without worry?

Once again, I'm very new to this and there's so much confusing and sometimes conflicting information out there, its hard to figure it all out.

I also want to keep this as simple and cost effective as possible. My goal is to shoot more for cheap.
 
The bullet on the right is a tumble lube design and is lubed by shaking around in a container of liquid lube like Lee Alox. The left bullet has traditional luve grooves that can be filled with a wax type lube in a lube sizer, pan lubed, or tumble lubed with Alox.

Most common clip on wheel weights are not pure lead. They are usually somewhere around 95% lead, and the other part made up of tin and antimony. They are harder than pure and can stand higher velocities and pressures. Pure lead is usually only used for black powder loads and or muzzle loaders.

Pure lead or very close to pure would be found in old piping, roofing flash, stick/glue on wheel weights, and x ray shield sheeting.

Gas checks are not designed to wipe lead out of already leaded barrels whether they may or may not. They are a seal to keep the hot gases from eroding the sides of the bullet and causing leading much like a stream of warm water can melt ice.

I would not rely on leading my barrel with poor loads/bullets and wiping it out with a few shots of something else. You will likely just have a hard cleaning by hand ahead. You may not have a lot of success with gas check designed bullets lacking a gas check.

In short properly sized to your barrel clip on Wheel weight alloy lead bullets with a gas check and proper lube should shoot well with minimal to no leading.
 
hk33ka1 said:
The bullet on the right is a tumble lube design and is lubed by shaking around in a container of liquid lube like Lee Alox. The left bullet has traditional luve grooves that can be filled with a wax type lube in a lube sizer, pan lubed, or tumble lubed with Alox.

Most common clip on wheel weights are not pure lead. They are usually somewhere around 95% lead, and the other part made up of tin and antimony. They are harder than pure and can stand higher velocities and pressures. Pure lead is usually only used for black powder loads and or muzzle loaders.

Pure lead or very close to pure would be found in old piping, roofing flash, stick/glue on wheel weights, and x ray shield sheeting.

Gas checks are not designed to wipe lead out of already leaded barrels whether they may or may not. They are a seal to keep the hot gases from eroding the sides of the bullet and causing leading much like a stream of warm water can melt ice.

I would not rely on leading my barrel with poor loads/bullets and wiping it out with a few shots of something else. You will likely just have a hard cleaning by hand ahead. You may not have a lot of success with gas check designed bullets lacking a gas check.

In short properly sized to your barrel clip on Wheel weight alloy lead bullets with a gas check and proper lube should shoot well with minimal to no leading.
Click to expand...

That clears everything up very well, thank you!

I definitely wasn't planning on the leading / cleaning with a GC method... sounds like trouble to me!

I'm glad you advised against using gas checked bullets without gas check. That was another thing I was wondering about.
 
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