Time to make the donuts....

[c2a4r3l]

Any idea how many presses Ferris pindell made like that.

I know of one still being used.

 

[Kiwishooter]

Any idea how many presses Ferris pindell made like that.

I know of one still being used.

I have no idea how many Ferris made, but the one I saw was a work of art

 

[David Conder]

Ferris I think he made trips to serria bullet plant to help with there bullet machines
An dies setup maybe someone can give us further information he made many
Bullet dies sets

 

[Phys86]

This is very neat. Thank you for sharing. I had wondered how some of you make your own bullets.

If you're making boattail bullets, how is the boattail formed? Do the jackets and cores start in the same cylindrical shape and the die forms the boattail, or do the jackets and cores already have the boattail along with the die?

 

[jackieschmidt]

The BT is initially formed when you seat the core. The core seating die forms it.

The BT is finalized in the point up die.

 

[JoeDuke]

The jackets and cores are exactly the same as flatbase bullets. As Jackie said above, the boattail is formed in the dies.

 

[Mulligan]

sometimes jackets are preformed before seating cores as in long range bullets the 3 jackets are preformed.
the photo of the 2 seated cores the one on the left was seated without preforming the one on the right was preformed before core seating. about the only difference is the radius size on the corners and it takes way less core seating pressure with the preformed jackets. I have also had customers that had me make core dies to match that the boattail was also preformed on the core. you get a real nice sharp corner preforming.

Of course, George is correct.

Long 6's and I suspect any bullet with a long boattail, may need (shoot better) the boattail preformed on the jacket prior to core-seating.

CW

 

[JoeDuke]

sometimes jackets are preformed before seating cores as in long range bullets the 3 jackets are preformed.
the photo of the 2 seated cores the one on the left was seated without preforming the one on the right was preformed before core seating. about the only difference is the radius size on the corners and it takes way less core seating pressure with the preformed jackets. I have also had customers that had me make core dies to match that the boattail was also preformed on the core. you get a real nice sharp corner preforming.

Nice! Having never made any long boattails, I was not aware. Thanks for your knowledge George.

 

[jackieschmidt]

Learn something every day.

 

[JoeDuke]

Jackie, did you draw any conclusions on your “wet core” bullets?

 

[jackieschmidt]

Jackie, did you draw any conclusions on your “wet core” bullets?

Joe, Friday, they shot phenomenal. I was shooting my regular load of 30.4 of 133. As you remember, we had a really nice right to left condition that was really honest. I was able to do a head to head with the same bullets made with clean cores. I think the wet core bullets were better.
That evening, that front came through, it rained like all heck. Sat morning, it was cool, with no humidity. Lots of wind, now left to right.
I was stuck on .350+ vertical. I tried about every trick I knew, nothing helped. It was a miserable day.

The next morning at the 200 yard matches, it did no better. I just about convinced myself that the darned rifle was broke.

After the first group in Sporter in the afternoon, I decided to switch to LT-32 that I happened to have. I put 29.0 grns behind that bullet and the rifle suddenly came to life, I nailed a Three, Four, and a small Five to finish up in some really tough conditions.

The wet core thing is definitely worth exploring.

I cored up 300 30 caliber jackets last night, using the same wet core formula. I will point them up and shoot them Sunday.

 

[JoeDuke]

Joe, Friday, they shot phenomenal. I was shooting my regular load of 30.4 of 133. As you remember, we had a really nice right to left condition that was really honest. I was able to do a head to head with the same bullets made with clean cores. I think the wet core bullets were better.
That evening, that front came through, it rained like all heck. Sat morning, it was cool, with no humidity. Lots of wind, now left to right.
I was stuck on .350+ vertical. I tried about every trick I knew, nothing helped. It was a miserable day.

The next morning at the 200 yard matches, it did no better. I just about convinced myself that the darned rifle was broke.

After the first group in Sporter in the afternoon, I decided to switch to LT-32 that I happened to have. I put 29.0 grns behind that bullet and the rifle suddenly came to life, I nailed a Three, Four, and a small Five to finish up in some really tough conditions.

The wet core thing is definitely worth exploring.

I cored up 300 30 caliber jackets last night, using the same wet core formula. I will point them up and shoot them Sunday.

I was actually shooting some "sorta wet core" bullets as well. I had washed the cores in Coleman fuel and then just let them dry. But I had a miserable match with all sorts of rifle issues starting with a very old barrel and ending up with a broken bolt handle. But I could tell that they shot better than the flat base bullets I had.

 

[AlNyhus]

Not sure how long he's been doing it but Randy Robinett has been preforming the boat tail on his 104 gr 6mm bullets for some time. -Al

 

[Mulligan]

Me, my first year making long 6’s

 

[brcman]

One thing no one has mentioned- "air assist" presses. What info does anyone have on this? Where does one get air assist assemblies? Or, is this a home brew device that one engineers himself? Would be nice on 30's for us old guys.

 

[WSnyder]

One thing no one has mentioned- "air assist" presses. What info does anyone have on this? Where does one get air assist assemblies? Or, is this a home brew device that one engineers himself? Would be nice on 30's for us old guys.

Pneumatic punch press comes to mind. One could be built or an existing likely modified to work. I used to see them used all the time.

 

[tom]

I already don't move my fingers out of the way in time, lol.

Tom

 

[D Coots]

Punches are sharp...I've changed MO since then....naughty finger was a bit slow...

 

[RGRobinett]

One thing no one has mentioned- "air assist" presses. What info does anyone have on this? Where does one get air assist assemblies? Or, is this a home brew device that one engineers himself? Would be nice on 30's for us old guys.

I have and use three pneumatic press actuators which were built by Charlie Hood - mostly use them for core forming (squirting), but also point the long-for-caliber BT bullets on them. Charlie built them to work with the Lee CLASSIC CAST presses . . . they could [probably] be adapted to RCBS (RockChucker, A2, etc.) types also.

The Hood pneumatic assists have been in use for close to 16 years now, and function perfectly. As with anything associated with Charlie, the engineering & fabrication are very well done. Depending upon the task, I operate them on about 60-70 PSI, which provides about 70% of the muscle. While higher PSI would make for less effort - I like the feed-back - tactile judgement (feel) provided by the lower end assist . . . the good news is that just tweaking a knob allows the desired assist level.

I believe Charlie quit making them due to people not understanding how to set-up and operate safely - lack of mechanical aptitude and [UN]common sense could - no matter how careless/clueless the operator - lead to liability. Ya gotta be aware of where yer fingers are! And to remain on the straight & narrow, unless Charlie says otherwise, I will not post pics, as his concepts are widely pirated - I do not want to contribute to that. I'd guess that, if the pirates would credit the origin . . . the concept pilfering probably wouldn't bug Charlie . . . as much . . .

A LONG time ago, Bill Neimi offered plans/drawings for a hydraulic assist to work in conjunction with the various RCBS type presses - except in photos, I never saw one.

The BIG benefit is extreme uniformity of all measurable/meaningful attributes . . . not a bad thing when making BR quality bullets. RG

 

[AlNyhus]

Having seen Randy's Hood pneumatic assist actuators in operation many, many times...they are impressive. Heck, even girlz could use 'em!