Casting .22 pellets

[Tallbald]

Extremely late to this discussion, which I found Googling .22 pellet casting GTA---
 Is this mold suitable for casting to feed my Diana 460 Magnum springer .22? Or is mine a "well that depends..." question. Thanks. Don

[Madd Hatter]

The hunter? If you can shoot hn cudas 21.14 gr round nose you shouldn't have a problem with the longest pin which Wayne says drops 19.? gr or so.

[35 shooter]

Extremely late to this discussion, which I found Googling .22 pellet casting GTA---
 Is this mold suitable for casting to feed my Diana 460 Magnum springer .22? Or is mine a "well that depends..." question. Thanks. Don

I bought my 20 gr. mold mainly for my 392 steroid, but I found out my crosman summit ranger np2 absolutely loves them too.
I would think your 460 would eat them like candy lol. I doubt there would be much more strain on the spring than an 18 gr. jsb would be.


I wish my Diana 350 springer was in 22 instead of 177 now .

[brewbear]

OK! I went to the NOE site and looking at the molds and sizing dies I started feeling like the whole world is a tuxedo and I'm a pair of brown shoes . I would like to cast my own .22 cal pellets, preferably in the 16 to 19 grain range but I'm befuddled by the choices. I don't have any fancy shooters (yet) just a couple of Benjamins (for now) but I've casted my own for a 30.06 so I'm somewhat familiar with the process. Could you gents recommend one or two molds( and the sizind dies kit) I should be looking for ?
Thank you in advance,
Ted

[scion19801]

You don’t really need to size the pellets. They should shot fine as cast. Sizers are mainly for getting slugs going. I have several noe molds. Mainly in .25 cal. I have never sized any of the pellets I cast, only the slugs if they don’t want to cooperate with my equipment.
I would suggest the .22 cal hunter mold and go from there as a start.

[Insanity]

You would be better off using a quality scale that can read x.xx grain than a sizer.

[Tallbald]

So much to absorb here. A specific mold number maybe for an 18 to 20 grain mold for a pellet that might work well in my Benji 392 and the DIana 460(?). This is great and thanks everyone for your replies! Don

[Madd Hatter]

The NOE .22 hunter would be your best bet. Wayne52 casts some beautiful pellets with one.

[35 shooter]

So much to absorb here. A specific mold number maybe for an 18 to 20 grain mold for a pellet that might work well in my Benji 392 and the DIana 460(?). This is great and thanks everyone for your replies! Don

217-20-RF-CEC Hunter. That’s the no. for the 20 gr. NOE pellet mold.
You have a choice of 2 or 4 cavity molds in al. or brass.
Unfortunately, they are sold out at the moment.

[35 shooter]

Wow, sent some 20 gr. hunter pellets I molded to my brother and he weighed them for me.
They were cast from mixed pellets from my pellet trap... soft daisy wadcutters to hard crosman premiers and everything in between.

The hunter pellets weighed from 20.0 to 20.5 with the mixed alloy pellets with only a half gr. difference total.
He also weighed some jsb 18.3 and crosman 14.3 gr. pellets and got the same half gr. difference with them too.

The heads on the NOE pellets are a consistent .217 and the skirts are consistent at . 220”.
No wonder they try so hard to get into the same hole from the bench at 20 to 25 yds. from my 392 steroid.
I’m very impressed with the Noe pellet molds.
A consistent alloy should cut the weight difference between pellets to next to nothing.

[Back_Roads]

 I and others have found weight variances more often in multi cavity molds, if more exact accuracy is desired sorting is the way to get there, that or single cavity molds, for plinkers I use multi cavity molds and may size but do not sort, but for imperfections.

[35 shooter]

I and others have found weight variances more often in multi cavity molds, if more exact accuracy is desired sorting is the way to get there, that or single cavity molds, for plinkers I use multi cavity molds and may size but do not sort, but for imperfections.

Forgot to mention,
I separated a batch of pellets from the 2 cavities before sending them to my brother.
The weight difference from both cavities weighed the same .5 gr. spread. 20.0 to 20.5 gr.
Most of them were from 20.2 to 20.3 gr.

I agree about sorting for ultimate accuracy from multi cavity molds though...especially for my pb guns.
I visual sort, then weight sort for that also.

My main point here was the fact I used a mixed alloy of different pellets and still had only a .5 gr. Weight difference.
Lol, the pellets were just grabbed from the trap randomly and melted together... I was amazed how consistent they turned out.

[Wayne52]

I always cast mine with pure lead myself.  You'll definitely get better consistency with pure lead in my opinion. The NOE molds are really fantastic built molds and pay for themselves in a hurry if you're doing a lot of shooting.  I'm finding out that the big bore slug molds for my AEA are paying for themselves in very little time considering the price of big bore pellets, they are expensive buying just pellets, it's a heck of a lot cheaper buying a big split pig ingot from Rotometals that will last for a very long time.

[brewbear]

@Wayne52, I bought 15lb wheel weight lead, still in the PB frame of mind. First question : what in God's name is "a  big split pig ingot"?
 And second question: could (or should) I use a mix of pure lead and WW lead and slowly make the switch to pure lead or just keep the two types of lead separate?
 I know what a splue plate is, but what/how do you use the splue plate lube?

[Wayne52]

Here's where I get a split pig ingot of pure lead from, it's about the same price it was 4 years ago too for $150 shipped https://www.rotometals.com/cut-in-half-lead-pig-ingot-57-62-pounds-99-9-with-freight-included/
I use sprue plate lube on the pivot point of the sprue plat and that's it, some people use it in other places too but I don't.

[brewbear]

Here's where I get a split pig ingot of pure lead from, it's about the same price it was 4 years ago too for $150 shipped https://www.rotometals.com/cut-in-half-lead-pig-ingot-57-62-pounds-99-9-with-freight-included/
I use sprue plate lube on the pivot point of the sprue plat and that's it, some people use it in other places too but I don't.

My first reaction the amount of lead (56 pounds) was: Daaauumm! That's a whole lot of lead!
Then again, I received my Diana Chaser a few days ago and today was the first time I had a little time to take it out of the box, run a few patches thru the barrels and actually shoot it. This is a whole different enchilada from my little 1322 pumper! I didn't count the shots but 2 CO2 cartridges and a half tin of pellets later, I can see how you can actually go thru 56 pounds of lead and need to buy more! Thank you for the info and the link, now I'll wait until my better half gets really busy with work and will not notice the delivery truck pulling up the driveway.....or maybe start with 20 pounds for now....
Stay healthy,
Ted

[Wayne52]

Ted one of those split pig ingots lasts me over 2 years, I'm on my second one right now and recently started hacking of hunks of the second half of it.  I do salvage all the pellets from my pellet trap though which saves a lot of it for more casting.  I've got a pellet trap that needs to be clean out right now.

[brewbear]

Ted one of those split pig ingots lasts me over 2 years, I'm on my second one right now and recently started hacking of hunks of the second half of it.  I do salvage all the pellets from my pellet trap though which saves a lot of it for more casting.  I've got a pellet trap that needs to be clean out right now.

[/b]
I'm quite sure it will last me a bit longer than two years and I seem to recollect reading somewhere about cleaning a pellet trap. Could you possibly point me in the direction of pellet traps and how you folks make them? Thank you.

[Firewalker]

Ted one of those split pig ingots lasts me over 2 years, I'm on my second one right now and recently started hacking of hunks of the second half of it.  I do salvage all the pellets from my pellet trap though which saves a lot of it for more casting.  I've got a pellet trap that needs to be clean out right now.

I will say that at 46gr, my largest AG slug is 1/4 that of my smallest PB boolit, lead is lasting a lot longer casting for AG's and if I shoot .22, I can shoot 10:1 over PB.

[Wayne52]

Ted one of those split pig ingots lasts me over 2 years, I'm on my second one right now and recently started hacking of hunks of the second half of it.  I do salvage all the pellets from my pellet trap though which saves a lot of it for more casting.  I've got a pellet trap that needs to be clean out right now.

[/b]
I'm quite sure it will last me a bit longer than two years and I seem to recollect reading somewhere about cleaning a pellet trap. Could you possibly point me in the direction of pellet traps and how you folks make them? Thank you.

Ted I also do a lot of in door chrony testing for the smaller calibers, for that trap I use an old Crosman target(needs replacing bad) with wadded up flannel shirt rags and jean rags packed in it, for plinking indoors with my co2 pistols I use a box with the same kind of rags packed in it also.  I'm thinking about buying me a nice heavy gauge steel trap for indoor chrony testing doing the same as I did with that dilapidated Crosman target trap.