Maiden voyage of the 38 long colt hollow base ideal mold

[Blackpowderwarrior]

Well guys im gonna put her to the test today.

Scored this little diddly via eBay a few months back.

38 Long inside Lube Ideal tool.

Anyone here load these guys?

A few will get the holy black , the rest are getting shooters world 3F black "blackMZ"

I will update later after this casting sesh is over.

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

Update.

The old molds over 100 years old but once it got up to temp she cast a fine hollow base 38 bullet.

 

[hawg]

I bought an old Ideal tool at a flea market. It casts 32-20 bullets. I don't have a 32-20 but they didn't know what it was and it was frozen open. They had it priced at 5.00 so I bought it. After I got it freed up I found out one of the mold blocks was warped.

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

I bought an old Ideal tool at a flea market. It casts 32-20 bullets. I don't have a 32-20 but they didn't know what it was and it was frozen open. They had it priced at 5.00 so I bought it. After I got it freed up I found out one of the mold blocks was warped.

Id love to have a ideal mold tool in 45 colt, ive seen a few and past them up since I have quite a few 45 colt molds that I'm fond of and use frequently

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

Loaded up 50 cartridges with the tool and some black mz tonight.

They sure dont make things like they used to. I'm extremely impressed with the quality of this tool.

And to think there was no cnc machines when this tool was crafted!

 

[shootemup58]

Those look great what are you going to shoot them out of? Something with a 375 bore or just a 358 bore?

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

Thanks!
I'm going to shoot these out of a .36 cal 1858 remington with the oversized bore.

 

[Navy Six 2]

My bet is those hollow base bullets will shoot great. I have a pair of single cavity hollow base Rapine 158/.358 molds that I use in a pair of Uberti 51 Navies. Unlined bore with the larger chamber mouth Kirst cylinders that accommodate heel bullets. I can only describe accuracy as outstanding, but they are long and take up a lot of 38LC case capacity. I just ordered a 4 cavity hollow base wadcutter mold from M-P Molds in Slovenia. That should speed up production but until the weather breaks I won't be able to cast yet. I tried using commercial hollow base wadcutters but both Hornady and Speer bullets are coated with something that causes the worst fouling with black powder that I've ever encountered. For example, after about 50 rounds both the above mentioned Navies started to key-hole bullets and I later got the cleaning rod stuck in the bore trying to clean that mess. Since that happened on more than one occasion, I'll stick with my own cast bullets.

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

My bet is those hollow base bullets will shoot great. I have a pair of single cavity hollow base Rapine 158/.358 molds that I use in a pair of Uberti 51 Navies. Unlined bore with the larger chamber mouth Kirst cylinders that accommodate heel bullets. I can only describe accuracy as outstanding, but they are long and take up a lot of 38LC case capacity. I just ordered a 4 cavity hollow base wadcutter mold from M-P Molds in Slovenia. That should speed up production but until the weather breaks I won't be able to cast yet. I tried using commercial hollow base wadcutters but both Hornady and Speer bullets are coated with something that causes the worst fouling with black powder that I've ever encountered. For example, after about 50 rounds both the above mentioned Navies started to key-hole bullets and I later got the cleaning rod stuck in the bore trying to clean that mess. Since that happened on more than one occasion, I'll stick with my own cast bullets.

I look forward to testing these bullets out! I will either shoot a few today or tomorrow when I have the day off from work!
I'll post the results and some grouping from this bullet fired out of my ol' lady's 1858 pietta .36

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

My bet is those hollow base bullets will shoot great. I have a pair of single cavity hollow base Rapine 158/.358 molds that I use in a pair of Uberti 51 Navies. Unlined bore with the larger chamber mouth Kirst cylinders that accommodate heel bullets. I can only describe accuracy as outstanding, but they are long and take up a lot of 38LC case capacity. I just ordered a 4 cavity hollow base wadcutter mold from M-P Molds in Slovenia. That should speed up production but until the weather breaks I won't be able to cast yet. I tried using commercial hollow base wadcutters but both Hornady and Speer bullets are coated with something that causes the worst fouling with black powder that I've ever encountered. For example, after about 50 rounds both the above mentioned Navies started to key-hole bullets and I later got the cleaning rod stuck in the bore trying to clean that mess. Since that happened on more than one occasion, I'll stick with my own cast bullets.

I wonder how much the wider throat diameter on your kirst cylinder helps the accuracy of your hollow base bullets?

I loaded up around 50 cartridges with Shooters World Black FFF substitute since the lube grooves on this particular bullet are tiny and the shooters world black needs no lube.

 

[hawg]

They look like they would hold enough lube. I use cast bullets of a smokeless design with narrow grooves and they worked well out of my 20 inch Rossi 92 in 44-40 but they didn't leave a lube star at the muzzle.

 

[Navy Six 2]

wonder how much the wider throat diameter on your kirst cylinder helps the accuracy of your hollow base bullets?

I never measured the chamber mouth dimension of the Kirst cylinders because at the time I bought them(almost 20 years ago) it was the only size available. I later determined heel bullets would also work which I also shoot. In a older article in 'THE BLACKPOWDER CARTRIDGE NEWS" the author did a lot of work with older .38 Colt revolvers with oversize chamber mouths that got me started. One surprising thing I recall was if the hollow base bullet was seated too deeply accuracy would suffer. The author theorized that the hollow skirt was not given enough time to expand? My original Rapine molds drop bullets with very thin skirts so I never encountered that problem.

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

I never measured the chamber mouth dimension of the Kirst cylinders because at the time I bought them(almost 20 years ago) it was the only size available. I later determined heel bullets would also work which I also shoot. In a older article in 'THE BLACKPOWDER CARTRIDGE NEWS" the author did a lot of work with older .38 Colt revolvers with oversize chamber mouths that got me started. One surprising thing I recall was if the hollow base bullet was seated too deeply accuracy would suffer. The author theorized that the hollow skirt was not given enough time to expand? My original Rapine molds drop bullets with very thin skirts so I never encountered that problem.

Do you have any pictures of the bullets it cast?

 

[Navy Six 2]

Do you have any pictures of the bullets it cast?

Sorry, I loaded up all my bullets into 38 LC cartridges so none available for pictures.

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

Finally got around to shooting those black mz 38 LC loads, they had some thump to them! They were a very accurate bullet though the mz is nice for clean up I think the real BP loads will thump a little harder.
I need to purchase a chronograph ad I have no idea what they were spitting out at but they did drive thereself deep into a few birch trees.

 

[LonesomePigeon]

Very cool Blackpowderwarrior! What diameter is the hollow base bullet you are casting? I have a hollow base wadcutter mold from MP Molds that I use for .38 Special. It casts about .359".

 

[Blackpowderwarrior]

.357-.358 ish