One thing I would recommend for casting, is a lead thermometer. You''l need to cast at about 700 - 720°, you can go higher with aluminum blocks. How large the mold blocks are, will effect the casting temp. You're casting cadence will effect it also. Cast faster to heat the blocks, slower to keep from over heating, especially with the small Lyman/Ideal blocks.

It takes practice to produce good bullets. In general, if the bullets come out wrinkled your to cold, raise the temp and cast faster. Your to hot if the under side of the sprue plate smears lead or the sprue hole takes more than 1 second to solidify or the bullet has fins on it.

There are more subtlety's but, the more you cast, the more you'll know how to control it.   

Good luck and have fun!

If you get at least a 14 twist, a good start is the tapered 32 spitzer mould that CPA sells.

Dr.J
Be careful not to get the cart-before-the-horse. Best approach (in my not-so-humble-opinion) is get your barrel first, slug in to determine bore & groove diameter plus rifling twist - then get a mold or have one made that properly fits "that" specific barrel (diameter & bullet length). Subtleties matter.
You will jump through a bunch of hoops and travel a few miles, figuratively, in putting together a rifle that I'd recommend a custom mold, even though this is your first venture into the Schuetzen game. Remember that old saying: quality is remembered long after price is forgotten.

bpjack wrote on Dec 21^st, 2024 at 2:22pm:


Ah, the Hoch 322205, yeah I have that one and one of my CPA's really likes it.  It looks like the Mos bullet is basically the same but has a sharper taper.  I will let you know how it works.  It will be a while though as most of my casting stuff is at our cabin and I won't likely be there for a few months.  I'll just have to stare at the mold.

Chris.