Being cheap, and sceptical I wasn't sure that the pressure on a bullet mould made much of a difference.

Well I caved and ordered a Cabine Tree Locking Mould holder last week.
I figured I couldn't loose because of  the warranty:
Warranty: If you are not happy with anything you buy from us, return it for a full refund or give us a chance to fix it, your choice.  If you have ANY kind of a problem with something from us, we WANT to know about it, no matter how small a problem.  We want to improve our products and all feed back is important.

So I got it this monday and tried it twice this week.

What a big difference in consistenty of  bullets weights.  I guess it does make a difference in  how the mould is held.

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KAF;
I am happy that you found the Cabine Locking Handle worthwhile. I now use mine for all of my precision bullets. Jim Borton "sicked me" on the Locking Mould Handle and I am a believer.

Dale53

whiskeyralph wrote on Sep 29^th, 2007 at 11:50am:


I am a pretty intelligent and capable guy but have never been consistently able to get results that close. This is with much experimentation and with a number of moulds. Only with two moulds have I been able to get results that close, one a 6.5 mm and the other a .32. I have used the timer method as well as simply counting and found the two methods about equal. Until I am able to prove otherwise to myself I consider bullet weight consistency to as much about the individual mould itself as any other factor.
The most consistent results I have obtained were with a particular custom .32-40 mould. That casting session produced appr. 300 bullets, all but the first few of which were with .3 gr total spread. Of note is that the mould used happened to be one of the most cantankerous to find the ideal casting temp. for of any I have used.

Joe using a Jones Mould with the cabintree handles I cast 10 bullets and then start to save them. The first 15 to 20 raise in weight  about .5 grain then the rest will be with in .2 grains for the rest of the run.

40 Rod

40_Rod wrote on Sep 30^th, 2007 at 9:13am:

I inspect each bullet under a 4X lighted magnifier, then weigh them. I can cast a lot of bullets ~110 with a standard deviation of ~.12 grains. Attached is a workbook showing the results for 15,300 odd bullets. 
I would be amazed that anyone could cast 100 bullets after recycling the startups and inspecting them, that varied +/- .2 grains. It ain't impossible, but I'd be amazed. How about trying it and telling us the results?
joe b.

After thrashing this about on the CBA site, the general agreement is that small variations in bullet weight do not affect accuracy. Nobody has presented any data to the contrary. Now, what's a small variation? As I said above, I can cast bullets with S.D. of .12 or so, often better. For instance, on 6/24/07 314299, NO DOT, SOFT (1 cavity of a 2 cavity mold-the weights differ)
204.7 1
204.8 9
204.9 56
205.0 18
205.1 7
205.2 2
The standard deviation was .087 grains. The 9 + 56 + 18 = 83 were saved as "match" bullets. The other 10 were kept as "foulers". Thus, even with a S.D. of .087 grains, the "match" bullets were +/-.15 grain, and this is close enough for anyone.

So, with this kind of clustering (write that down, J0oe) in cast bullets, and knowing that small weight variations do not affect accuracy, even if the cited implement reduced S.D.s, and I'm far from sure that it does, where's the benefit? 

I do not understand how you guys shoot well without weighing those cast bullets, but the reports are scanty.
Now, go right ahead and buy the Cabin Tree  Locking Mold Holder, it gives you more equipment-always a plus-and something to talk about. And maybe, somebody will keep some records to prove its effectiveness.
joe brennan

in cast bullets, and knowing that small weight variations do not affect accuracy, even if the cited implement reduced S.D.s, and I'm far from sure that it does, where's the benefit? 

Any one thing may not make that much of a difference (selecting exact powder/primer combos, weighing charges, weighing cases, indexing cases, indexing bullets, checking runout.........) but together they make a great difference.  Why would one think that small bullet weight difference would not?  Is it not one more piece of the puzzle?

Joe, I challenge you to name me even one champion shooter who doesn't follow at least one of these culling processes you've named. According to your argument, a superior shooter who didn't cull to this degree would, by virtue of his superior shooting ability, be able to handily defeat anyone who did cull obsessively, simply because the culling (supposedly) didn't add any accuracy.

I very politely call that argument "horsefeathers".

I do readily agree, however, that at a certain level of (in)accuracy, any small variations would be lost in the general spray.

Somehow I don't believe you'll shoot any 250s without culling to a fairly rigid standard but if you do, please let us know.
Good luck, Joe