Mold Listings for Obsolete Cartridges

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After reading various threads on Antique revolvers and rifles, I find it hard to get
a handle on listings of available molds for these cartridges.

There are lots of listing on converting brass and so on.

Could we start a thread here for everyone to list available molds that people use and where they can be bought.

Maybe a listing for brass and possible conversions.

It would be nice to have a sticky or on thread dedicated for listings instead of weeding threw a bunch of old threads.

I myself have several Antique revolvers and rifles that are looking for molds.

Listings would be nice for;

Swiss 1882
French 1873
French 1892
455 Webley
Reichsrevolver
43 Mauser
43 Spanish
and anything else that anyone can think of.
 
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There is a book called "Cartridges of the World" which lists the dimensions of a large number of cartridges both modern and antique. That should give you a basic idea of the dimensions of what you are looking for and allow you to check the catologue listings for something that matches your gun. If you are unlucky, you may have to go to a company like Rapine which I think still makes custom molds but that is an expensive option. If you are lucky, you may have a friend with a metal lathe that can modify a second hand mold to your specifications

cheers mooncoon
 
There is an adjunct to the Castboolits website, called castpics, that has scans of a great number of old mold makers' catalogs, many containing descriptions of what cartridges they were meant for. They serve as a great resource, as far as ID'ing a Mold that you might have but cannot cross reference.

They changed the format of the Castpics site a bit ago, but with a little poking around, it shold be fairly easy for anyone to find the info.
There are usually at least one, sometimes several, group buys going on over there (castboolits)that pertain to the Prescribed Antique calibers up here in Canada too. Worth a look.

Cheers
Trev
 
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In addition to "Cartridges of the World," I would also suggest "The Handloader's Manual of Cartridge Conversions" by John J. Donnelly. ISBN for the paperback edition is 0-88317-136-8. The distributor in Canada WAS --Stoeger Canada Ltd., 169 Idema Road, Markham, Ontario, L3R-1A9. This book is about 2 inches thick and has over 1000 pages of information on American and Metric Cartridges in it.

For rifles, a slightly undersized bullet with a paper jacket works very well. A book, "The Paper Jacketed Bullet" by Paul Matthews is available from Wolfe Publishing, and I picked up a copy from Wholesale Sports on sale in Winnipeg a while ago.

As mentioned, a suitable used bullet mould can be lathe bored to an appropriate bullet shape. I needed a cast bullet mould for a 9.3x57 Husqvarna hunting rifle a while ago. These are .366 to .368 calibre bore size, and I started with a 148 grain 38 Special wadcutter mould (.358-.359 calibre) and bored it out so that I now have a nice 272 grain round nosed hunting bullet. I chose the wad cutter target bullet mould because of the long bearing surface and it was a simple matter to bore out the diameter in the lathe, following the original grease grooves. I also used a 200 grain .35 calibre Lyman mould for the .35 Remington and paper patched it with good results.

By adapting, I found a "U" sized reamer on E-Bay and bought three of them that were offered for less than $10. The "U" size diameter is .367 so I not only made up a sizer for the cast bullets, but also a "bumping" die where I can take 225 or 250 grain jacketed bullets designed for the .35 Remington and "Bump" them up so that they come out a .366 diameter from .358 diameter by using the die in a large old RCBS Rockchucker press.
 
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I use twist drills to get to about .020" undersize then a spade bit to create the nose shape and the core diameter. I put the ridges (reverse of a canilure) in with a small boring bar and finish with a reamer with a series of grooves and ridges to make the cuts in the mold all uniform. I have never been 100% successful in boring (only) to the finished diameter on the ridges. You should probably allow an extra .002" or so to allow for shrinkage when the lead is cooling

cheers mooncoon
 
I used to spend a lot of time searching for bullet moulds that would fit the many old black powder cartridges I have reloaded for. Then I thought I'd try Accurate Moulds (for link, google them). They not only have a huge selection of mould designs, but they can modify the design according to your instructions for no extra charge. Their work is excellent and you have your choice of an aluminum, steel, or brass mould (I have been ordering brass moulds). The cost of these moulds is about the same as other companies, maybe only slightly more. They are usually very fast as well. I don't even bother trying to find existing moulds anymore; I just order up a mould from Accurate Moulds that is made up just the way I want it.
 
"...listings of available molds..." Said molds are about the bullet diameter, not specific cartridges. Look at Lyman's site. Lyman is the 'go to' company for a lot of odd stuff.
Cartridge Conversions is one of the books anybody who plays with odd or obsolete firearms needs. Mind you, sometimes the case used for converting is just as hard to find.
 
Hi guys

Thanks for all the information in the above postings.

There are alot of great ideas and methods to follow in these posting.

I myself am not new to reloading, casting and so on.
I have been at it for over 40 years now.
Cartridges of the World is also great information.
Also there is some great information on custom mold enhancement in the above postings.

I attend the North South Skirmish Association every spring for the National's.
I know Ray Rapine of Rapine molds well.
Too bad he is not in business anymore.
He likes to lay back and play his guitar.

Why I posted is to make a list of these calibers for people to have a quick lookup in the future.

What I and others would like is a list, lets say for instance, 8mm French Lebel.

Who makes the dies.
What brass can be bought or adapted for use and how to adapt.
Who makes a mold that can be bought and ordered, custom made and so on.

Antique cartridge reloading information is scrambled all over the place.

You all love Antiques as much as I do.

There is more than a Kings Ransom's worth of knowledge here amongst everyone.

But it is a real pain to scroll threw tons of posting trying to glean information, especially on molds.

Win 38-55 sounds like he has been down this road before.

In the "Antiques for sale section" there are posting of the firearms for sale with loading information.

The one shortfall, seems to always be available molds.

Most postings say,,,you can buy some cast bullets from so and so.

green posted, that Lyman makes molds for 43 Spanish and Mauser.

Buffdog and mooncoon, your posting are excellent source of information.
 
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Most of my molds are custom made and not readily available, so that wouldn't help you a lot.

Mold makers are not good at telling you what gun the mold is intended for, I guess they expect the buyer to know what bullet type, weight, and diameter he needs for his particular firearm. It's not not an unreasonable assumption.

Accurate molds has a very good listing of bullets by daimeter with detailed drawings. It's pretty simple to use if you have an idea wht the bullet looks like.

Mountain molds will let you design your own bullet online. I use them for making the really oddball molds that aren't available anywhere else.
 
Perhaps where I don't particularly see the merit of a long list of molds and cartridges is that when I chose a bullet to go with a particular rifle, I normally will slug the bore and measure the twist rate. Greenhill's formula (150 D squared over T) gives me the longest bullet that the rifling will stabilize. I would chose a length and diameter that is a little under length and the same diameter from the formula. The formula tends to err slightly on the long side. At least with original guns it is not unusual to find that bores do not match statistics and if different are usually oversize. I had a 38-40 for example which was .410 instead of .401 and a 40-82 that was also .410 instead of .407. I currently have a 32-40 with a groove diameter of .327 instead of .321 and I am on the verge of altering the chamber to accept a larger slug. Soft bullets do bump up but give mediocre accuracy.

I think the point I am trying to make is that a significant part of shooting antiques is finding out what dimensions your particular gun has rather than what dimensions a generic gun has

cheers mooncoon
 
I agree with Mooncoon. I've never found a mould that will do well with several rifles or pistols of the same caliber, at least for the old ones. For reasons Mooncoon states, that is why I just order a custom mould as mentioned earlier.
 
I think there is merit in having an area to discuss and share info on availiable molds and brass for antiques here in this section rather than the general reloading section.
It seems to me to be a little more specialized than regular buy off the shelf loading.
 
ruger22

Thank you also.

Boomers Moulds - Canadian too boot.

Both links are interesting and good to know.

What is it with the spelling of MOLDS, or is it MOULDS.
 
When it comes to molds, I'm not looking for a specific listing of a given mold for a caliber.

What I'm looking for is who makes molds for these calibers.

Molds that have been pointed,

Accurate Molds
Mountain Molds
Boomers Molds
Brooks Molds
Lyman
Lee

This is the type of information needed in this forum.

Lyman and Lee are pretty generic, albeit you may adapt some of their molds for Antiques calibers right off the shelf.

We also need listing of where to purchase and what brass can be adapted for specific calibers.
 
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Boomers Molds
Brooks Molds

These guys make moulds (or molds) for the top BPCR shooters in N America.
But there are others too.
Note Paul Jones has retired, or so I have heard...

I would not put lee/lyman on the same page at all...
 
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