Newby on the block... well, to casting anyways.

[2A Georgia]

Got a PM from a senior about Beagling so I cast a dozen NOE68FN and picked the roundest .300 polishing stone, jammed a drill bit in it and smeared with toothpaste and gave each cavity a 30 second spin with the corded drill.  After cleaning off the paste they fell out of the mold like butter all smooth and shinny but now .2975-.2995....hmm...
I guess I'll have to give each cavity a good minute and maybe add more grit to my toothpaste....or go by the auto parts store and buy proper valve grind paste.....

[avator]

I had the Avenger out yesterday and saw that I only have around 200 .25 cast pellets in the container. At 50ish shots per fill those ain't gonna last very long. So I reckon I'll fire up Casting Corner today. I have some Nascar, PBR, F1 and Motocross stuff recorded so I can put some of that on the flat screen.
The 4 cavity mold can make a pretty good pile in just a short time. If I can get some good consistent drops I can pump out 500 rounds pretty quickly. I'm going to check the pin settings, wax the alignment pins/sprue cutter screw and smoke the mold before I start.

On second thought... I think I'm going to drill and pin the handles before I do anything.

[avator]

Poured a 10 drop (40 pellet) test run and I realized i had the medium pins in the mold last time I poured and they didn't shoot well. So I let the mold cool and swapped pins but that didn't seem to be quite right either. The mold was sticky opening and closing. So I swapped to a different set and they fit right. First ones must have been from a different mold... I thought they were all the same... maybe different from .22 to .25. ?

[WobblyHand]

60 pages so far!  Wow.  Time for me to get back to this.  Have a 27gr mold BBT in 22 to try out.  It's finally getting nice enough to consider casting outdoors here.  Maybe I can give it a try tomorrow afternoon.  I bet once it heats up it will be loads easier to cast than the WC mold.

As an aside, I hope NOE gets back in production again soon.  Got an email today describing some of the issues they have been having to deal with.  Probably be the end of the year before things get close to normal again.

[Mr.P]

This just arrived thanks to NOE

41 gr bbt .25 cal (somewhat lighter w/HP inserts). 

I have wanted one one of these for a looong time.

[avator]

I have always tuned my guns with accuracy and shot count in mind. It may be time to rethink that in some cases.
Tuning for shot count, as we all know, required reducing power/fps. The down side to that, from my experience, is that I need to use lighter projectiles. My current .22 tunes shoot 18.1 and less. The problem there is that available molds are 20 and heavier.
So maybe I need to explore bumping power up to see if I can get better accuracy from the heavier molds I have here.
As for .25... not a problem there, the Avenger shoots what ever I feed it very well.
I've swapped the Sentry from .25 to .22 and it shoots production pellets well at it's current tune... not so much with the heavier cast stuff (Hunters and Magnums). That gun might be a good one to start testing at higher power levels.
I have compressors and the ability to cast. I no longer need to worry about the cost of shooting as when I was paying to have tanks filled and buying pellets and paying shipping.
I've probably said it 1000 times, I'm not a hunter. I pest and plink/target shoot. Big power was never a goal for me but if I expect to sling heavier stuff down range I should probably change that goal some.

Sweet... a new adventure.

[triggertreat]

That's a fairly heavy mold for a typical .25 cal. unless you have something to sling them well with.

[avator]

That's a fairly heavy mold for a typical .25 cal. unless you have something to sling them well with.

Oh yeah.... the Avenger stacks them.

[2A Georgia]

Still no joy with the toothpaste beagled NOE68s in the .303 Challenger....went overboard with the corded drill and valve grind paste so one cavity is now a .305x.309 oval.  The other Cavity is now dropping .3015x.302 at 63 to 63.8gr so I'll see how those group soon.  I'll either end up with the Lee Hand Press and NOE sizer dies or keep my one cavity .302 mold for hollow points if they group

[avator]

Rockin' up some 217 24 RF Magnums with the long pins this morning. First batch of around 100 is in the tumbler. Sprues back in the pot coming back up to 700f and the mold is in the oven set at 140c.
Gonna grab some brunch and head back out to drop another batch.
With the rain on the tin roof, the a/c running and the tumbler going I almost need ear plugs. I asked Betty Lou to knock on the door if she happens to come out. My back is to the door and I wouldn't hear her come up behind me. I would most likely jump and dump hot lead all over myself.
What better to do on a rainy day?

[avator]

Dropped a total of 300 pellets. I tumbled and sorted into 2 weights... 22.20 (+- .10) and 22.40 (+-.10).
About 50 pellets didn't pass muster and went back to the pot. Ended up with slightly more 22.20 than 22.40.

[2A Georgia]

The toothpaste beagled slugs did not group.  I am gently beagling and casting 20 or so pellets then break out the calipers...I must have recycled my sprus so much that my 40:1 is near pure as I'm dropping at .300 but at least round again....7 weeks left before the Accurate Molds arrives....
Cast up a batch of 217RF20s which I will sort into 19.3, 19.4, 19.5 and 19.6 tins and pot all out of spec and visual blemishes...I am getting consistent results resting the mold on the crucible during the warming process....still haven't frankensteined the oven to PID control....
The same weight RFs are grouping ragged hole at 15 yards in the Notos...about twice as large as the hole Apollo 18s stack in, but fine for backyard reactives and technically MOS accurate.

[Insanity]

Are you lapping the mold? Because to do what you are saying involves placing material in-between the mold halves to make the projectile larger. It is temporary.

[Mr.P]

That's a fairly heavy mold for a typical .25 cal. unless you have something to sling them well with.

True.   Not a problem in this case but thanks for the warning

[avator]

Back in Casting Corner this morning...
I finished up with the Magnums yesterday afternoon. I ended up with a full tin of each weight range... 22.10 - 22.30 and 22.31 - 22.50.
This morning I swapped over to the Hunters. The 2 weight ranges I'm dropping with these are 19.30 - 19.50 and 19.51 - 19.70.
Anything over and under these ranges goes back in the pot. With these tighter keeper specs I'm getting a 20 - 25% cull rate. Even if the pellets look good (no visible flaws), if they don't pass the weight range muster, they go back in the pot.
Why am I doing this?
Because if a gun don't throw acceptable groups, I want to narrow down the reason. I think .2 is an acceptable tolerance. If a particular gun can't do 1/2" groups at 30yds. then I know that the gun can't love my cast pellets and may need some tuning to get there... or it just can't get there.
Again.. the goal is to stop paying the ridiculous prices (including shipping) of production pellets.
Once I run out of the production pellets I have on hand, the guns that won't acceptably shoot my cast pellets will be candidates for the chopping block and will be culled from the arsenal.

[avator]

I did test the .22 Senrty yesterday and got 1/2" groups with the Hunters but that was from a batch that weren't sorted. The Magnums opened up to 1" groups at 35yds. I had cranked the power wheel up to 4.
I posted those results in it's respective thread...   
https://www.gatewaytoairguns.org/GTA/index.php?topic=206991.msg156533789#msg156533789

[avator]

This morning I broke out the Hatsan Flash QE .22.
I was pleasantly surprised at the results.
I didn't even mess with the tune to get a baseline.
Both weights of the Hunters virtually stacked at 35yds and opened up to 1/2" at 45yds.
The Magnums gave me 1/2" at 35yds and opened to 3/4 - 1" at 45yds.
I was able to spin the center of the TSC .22RF spinner 1 full rev at 45yds.
Even more impressive was the fact that results didn't change over 3 12rd mags per fill   
With that, the Hatsan Flash QE .22 has a home.   

[avator]

Up next will be the NoDoze (Umarex Notos)..
If there was ever a gun that I would consider buying production pellets for, it would be this one. 
Not being a fan of the tactical style guns, this one wormed it's way into my heart. If anyone followed my thread on this gun they would see I have this gun set right where I want it ... with the JTS Dead Center 18.1 pellets. (and to be honest, I hate that  )
I am hopeful that it will do well with at least one of the 4 cast pellets I'm dropping.
I'm going to begin with the Hunter 19.4 and if they perform I'll be as happy as a kid with a pet frog.

[avator]

DERAIL ALERT !!!   (I can do that, it's my thread  )

Speaking of frogs.. While I was completely immersed in focusing on the Flash I heard a bone chilling scream. I'm not a scaredy cat by no stretch but this was so close and loud that it definitely got my attention.
A rather large toad had crawled it's way to the top of one of the natural tree posts I used to build the lean to roof. Apparently it was in the mood for love and looking for a partner because it went to screeching out it's love song.
I encouraged it to take it's dating app elsewhere.

[Madd Hatter]

DERAIL ALERT !!!   (I can do that, it's my thread  )

Speaking of frogs.. While I was completely immersed in focusing on the Flash I heard a bone chilling scream. I'm not a scaredy cat by no stretch but this was so close and loud that it definitely got my attention.
A rather large toad had crawled it's way to the top of one of the natural tree posts I used to build the lean to roof. Apparently it was in the mood for love and looking for a partner because it went to screeching out it's love song.
I encouraged it to take it's dating app elsewhere.

It took one look at ya and fell in love 💕💕💕.