Multi Cavity Moulds

My four cavity mould for wadcutter 38s can't keep up with the voracious appetite of my 38 revolvers for this bullet. Does anyone make larger capacity moulds, like 8 or 10 cavity? I know Lee offers a 6 cavity but that probably won't be big eoungh for my needs.

Gang molds

Hensley & Gibbs, when they were in business, made a lot of large capacity gang molds for .38 bullets. I've seen 8 and 10 cavity. The come up for sale with some regularity on Ebay and to a lesser extent on GB and other forums. You shouldn't have any trouble locating one depending on what bullet you a looking for. They aren't cheap but they have another drawback.
That is it takes them a long time to come to temperature throughout the entire mold and they cool fast. Once you get them up then go hard till you are done. They are probably the best molds ever made. Also Cramer molds was a firm that pre-dated H&G and which H&G bought out latter in life, and they too made excellent molds.

flintsghost said:

Hensley & Gibbs, when they were in business, made a lot of large capacity gang molds for .38 bullets. I've seen 8 and 10 cavity. The come up for sale with some regularity on Ebay and to a lesser extent on GB and other forums. You shouldn't have any trouble locating one depending on what bullet you a looking for. They aren't cheap but they have another drawback.
That is it takes them a long time to come to temperature throughout the entire mold and they cool fast. Once you get them up then go hard till you are done. They are probably the best molds ever made. Also Cramer molds was a firm that pre-dated H&G and which H&G bought out latter in life, and they too made excellent molds.

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Flintsghost, with all due respect, I will state that this has not been my experience. I don't know where you got this information, but with me owning some 30+ eight and ten cavity moulds and having cast with them since the late 80s,I will state outright that my experience does not mirror what you stated above.

All it takes is a bit of forethought: set the mould on your electric stove and heat it there. The mould will be hot enough to cast "keeper" projectiles with the first pour, and as long as you don't stop to smoke a cigarette every three pours you will be good to go as long as you want to cast, or until the pot is empty. Get that mould hot and if you know what you are doing and have the right alloy, it will virtually refuse to pour a cull. The beauty of an H&G is that once the mould is hot there is a WHOLE LOT of metal to hold that heat, which is exactly the opposite of what you said.

Nothing personal, sir, I just happen to know better, because as Elmer once said, "I was there".

And to the OP: I am a stage IV cancer patient, was just told I am down to months (whether right or wrong...), and I have a ten cavity #527 mould from H&G (I believe it has handles as well) that I would make you a deal on if you are interested. PM me if you find this offer of interest.

Best regards,
Doubless

There is a balance in number of cavs & production rate. You have to fill more cavs, the mold will take longer to setup, depending on bullet size, so 6cav seems to be a happy medium for me. Once up to casting temp, you can get a rate going that gets you 900-1200/hr. I cant imagine you shoot more in a month than you can cast in a few hours. I actually like working woth 4cav alum molds, light, easy to keep ruuning. The rate goes down to 700-800/hr though.

I have come to prefer the 6 cavity aluminum molds. The larger steel molds are just too durn heavy.

You can crank out a lot of bullets with two four cavity molds.

NOE makes a 38 wadcutter mould in 5 cavity form...Like Aphelion stated , you can crank out a lot with two moulds.
NOE moulds are so nice when it comes to volume casting , fill one while the other cools...this is my favorite method .
The NOE 5 cavity is $99.00 , but it is worth the price if you plan on casting a lot of bullets. They are just so easy to cast with .
Might be something to think about .
Gary

gwpercle said:

NOE makes a 38 wadcutter mould in 5 cavity form...Like Aphelion stated , you can crank out a lot with two moulds.

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How does 2 molds increase the production rate? I have a 3 to 5 count between pour and drop, usually. Doesn't seem enough time to be worth alternating molds between pours. Might even be counter productive.

AlHunt said:

How does 2 molds increase the production rate? I have a 3 to 5 count between pour and drop, usually. Doesn't seem enough time to be worth alternating molds between pours. Might even be counter productive.

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While the sprues are setting up on one, you are filling the other. Blocks are less likely to get overheated. You don't have to deal with the weight of the larger gang molds. The price of two molds may be less than the price of one big one, depending on the manufacturers. And you have two molds instead of one.

AlHunt said:

How does 2 molds increase the production rate? I have a 3 to 5 count between pour and drop, usually. Doesn't seem enough time to be worth alternating molds between pours. Might even be counter productive.

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As noted, with alum molds, especially the thin Lee, they over heat. So when the mold gets hot, swap out & run the other one. This allows faster drops as the sprue sets up more quickly. It's a balancing act though between too hot or too cold. I often run two 4cav alum molds or even a 6cav Lee & a 4cav, mostly Accurate.

I used to cast with 2 multi cavities moulds but I was looking for a better solution since that involved lots of arm movement that get tiring;I had to stop casting after 2X 20# because of that.
My wife's hair dryer has a function that will blow unheated air at a good velocity.I bought her a fancy one(great gift idea) and inherited the old one which I clamped on my casting bench so as to cool the blocks.I preheat my mould,then start casting and after a few casts when the sprue begins to take too much time to cool down,I turn the switch on and bingo!Way less hand and arm movement and I can sit longer casting me shiny bullets!
Qc

I have an H&G #10 10 cavity mold
It does cast a lot of bullets
You can easily cast over a thousand in a session

I had to rethink how I was casting.
The mold is big and heavy, requires preheating, I had to make a new mold guide for my Lyman 20# pot, use a mini dead blow hammer to cut the sprue, A sturdy rest to put the hinge on when you are doing that. A pan positioned to catch the sprue A 20lb bottom pour pot becomes very small, you have to be constantly preheating ingots to refill the pot. The particular #10 bullet design didn't like the powder charge I was using, I had to back it down a bit. It turned out to be a mini-adventure.

For the time being I have gone back to a four cavity mold.
It is nice to know I can crank up the 10 cavity if needed

Yeah something often not spoken about is the amount of effort to cut sprues. A 6cav can be quite a bitch until you get it really hot, then the bullets get frosty & take longer to set up. Again, a balancing act keeping a pace that allows quick casting & not overheating the mold. Why I am quite happy going with a 4cav for most of my casting. I also have a Magma Caster, 2cav, runs like a reloading press. No faster than a 4cav mold but you can stand or sit for longer casting sessions, less hand movement & a built in fan to help keep the mold temps down.

I fire up a h&g #50 10-cavity mold when I need wc's for the 35cal's. It doesn't take long to cast #100 of bullets/sprues. 100# of lead gives me around 3,000 bullets and the rest is sprues. It's not that hard to do and takes 3 to 4 hours to cast them. Here's what I do:

Pre-heat the 10-cavity mold on a hot plate.
Heat the 20# pot up to temp
Use a propane stand with a pot full of lead and heat it to temp

When the molds hot & the #20 pot is up to temp I start casting. When the #20 pot is empty I fill it with a ladle from the #80 to #100 of lead that heating in a large pot on the propane burner. With a 10-cavity mold it doesn't take long to empty a #20 pot, around 20 minutes of actual casting time.

The 10-cavity molds are heavy but it doesn't take long to cast a mountain of bullets. If you do allot of shooting a 10-cavity mold is the only way to go. Back in the day I shot 500 rounds of 148gr wc's a day, 6 days a week. And no there was no rest on the 7th day. That was the casting day. Back then ww's were free, 10# of powder was $60 and primers were $6 a 1000. Used to use federal primers, 3.2gr of ww452 and the h&g #50 bb wc's for a 38spl target load. Down to my last couple pounds of ww452.



You want high volume casting get a 10-cavity mold.
You want a high quality bullet/mold get a h&g mold.
You want a mold that doesn't overheat get a h&g 10-cavity mold.

Ya their heavy but there's nothing better than steel molds for volume casting.

Doubless said:

Nothing personal, sir, I just happen to know better, because as Elmer once said, "I was there".

Best regards,
Doubless

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It may be that our techniques are different but I have also used some of the larger molds in the past in particular an 8 cavity for a 452 230 grain rd nose from H&G. I never could get it to hold the heat. But the difference may be that I cast with a pouring ladel and always would cast all my molds at the same time. I don't have a stove to set molds on and I have never been able to pre-heat any. I use a black iron deep skillet to hold my lead so it never cools and once I get everything up to temp it goes smoothly except for the one large H&G that I used. My skillet sets on a large hot plate. I did cast in my kitchen just once and gave that up years ago due to the mess and wife problems. My current set up works well on a bench in my garage where I have lots of ventilation with the main door open.

I have been there also. Good luck with selling your molds.

It may be that our techniques are different but I have also used some of the larger molds in the past in particular an 8 cavity for a 452 230 grain rd nose from H&G. I never could get it to hold the heat. But the difference may be that I cast with a pouring ladel and always would cast all my molds at the same time. I don't have a stove to set molds on and I have never been able to pre-heat any. I use a black iron deep skillet to hold my lead so it never cools and once I get everything up to temp it goes smoothly except for the one large H&G that I used. My skillet sets on a large hot plate. I did cast in my kitchen just once and gave that up years ago due to the mess and wife problems. My current set up works well on a bench in my garage where I have lots of ventilation with the main door open.

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It may just be that large multi-cavity molds are meant for production. You cannot use an 8 or 10 cavity mold using a ladel. IMV, it just does not compute. Production and ladel pour are mutually exclusive terms. It is not an issue with the H&G mold.

Bruce