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Ball molds

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Bad Karma

Bad Karma

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I have a few revolvers which were reamed to .456 by Charlie Hahn. They’re great shooters but I don’t like the way the .457 balls fit. That’s not so bad since most of the time I use a .458 homecast bullet from 195 to 245 grains weight. Still, I’ve wanted to make up my own round ball for field use, small game and so on. Problem is that the manufacturers skip right fro. 457 up to 485. After an internet search I located www.ballmolds.com and ordered a new .461” mold which should give me the nice ring of lead, load easily and offer the answer to all my prayers. Well, two of three would be good enough for me. All for less than 50 bucks shipping included.
In summary. If you have an oddball lurking around in need of ammo, this may be a solution. Happy hunting!


E7901669-8C24-4BB2-A17F-F434A4491DBA.jpeg
 
I bought two a couple of years ago. They work fine. You furnish the handles. Since there is no sprue cutter, you can cast like crazy. Then come back after the balls cool and cut the sprues off with wire cutters. I smoke mine in a candle flame to help the ball release from the mold.
 
Woodnbow said:
I have a few revolvers which were reamed to .456 by Charlie Hahn. They’re great shooters but I don’t like the way the .457 balls fit. That’s not so bad since most of the time I use a .458 homecast bullet from 195 to 245 grains weight. Still, I’ve wanted to make up my own round ball for field use, small game and so on. Problem is that the manufacturers skip right fro. 457 up to 485. After an internet search I located www.ballmolds.com and ordered a new .461” mold which should give me the nice ring of lead, load easily and offer the answer to all my prayers. Well, two of three would be good enough for me. All for less than 50 bucks shipping included.
In summary. If you have an oddball lurking around in need of ammo, this may be a solution. Happy hunting!


View attachment 54748
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I have lots of these moulds, but then I am in England and not too far from where they are made. Great ball moulds in any caliber you might want
 
I’m pretty stoked. The price, particularly considering the international shipping, can’t be beat! I wish they had a sprue plate but I guess I will develop a technique for cutting the sprue and ending up with balls of close to the same weight... any hints you care to share!?
 
tenngun said:
I don’t want to knock England but we have a maker here in America that turns out custom molds. Calahanns bag molds of Missouri
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I did look at those but the convenience of using my own wooden handles made it an easy choice. Cool company though.
 
Woodnbow said:
I’m pretty stoked. The price, particularly considering the international shipping, can’t be beat! I wish they had a sprue plate but I guess I will develop a technique for cutting the sprue and ending up with balls of close to the same weight... any hints you care to share!?
Click to expand...
A little bit off the subject, but I have an old steel mold that was purchased from Dixie gun works many years ago. Single ball, no sprue plate cutter but seemed like a pretty nice mold. I'm sure it's probably much similar to what was used two hundred years ago. Anyway, I heated it up, melted some waterpipe lead and poured about 21 good bullets that didn't have wrinkles in them from intermittent pouring. I took a pair of side cutters, grinding them flat on one side, I nipped off the sprue as close as I could, cutting it two different ways. Weighing the balls, they varied between 175.7Grains to 182.3 grains. Now we know that they probably couldn't weight their balls 200 years ago, so I have got them marked and I am going to shoot them when weather permits, which will probably be two months, and see how they work. Only one was 175.7. Two were at that heavy number. The rest of them were pretty uniform at about 176.3 to 176.8. When I get it done I will put the results back on this site.
Squint
 

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