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Just lubed 600 Mav Ds on the lyman


Iron Pony

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Either I need to save the next batch and do them at Sixgun's with our star lubesizer or, nope no other option. Doing the big bore bullets on it isnt so bad as its slow enough to really inspect each one before deciding to keep or cull it but what a non starter for doing quantity. Havent done this for a couple of years and forgot how spoiled the star can make you. Especially with the air cylinder hooked up to it.

 

Oh well it'll take me less time to load these on SDB tomorrow then it did just to get them greasy.

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Pard, I just got finished casting and lubing Mavs myself. It is a new caliber for me. I just got a 73 in 44-40. I know you know all the stuff, but I pan lube mine in a little different way than most. It goes fast for me. For others here is what I do. I take one of those trays with the holes in them that factory ammo comes in. The plastic ones work good, but foam ones will work too. In my case I had a plastic one from 45lc ammo. I take the bullets and stick them in there nose down. In my case I save those black plastic trays frozen spaghetti comes in and I then take one of those, Actually I used a bunch, but I am explaining about 50 bullets at a time. I take that tray/plate from the spaghetti and stick it on top of the tray with the bullets in it and carefully flip it all over the bullet bases are now into the spaghetti tray and I carefully lift the ammo tray off of them and that leaves the bullets in perfect formation in the tray. Next I myself have a old microwave in the garage, so I plug it in and melt up my lube which is in cakes in a plastic container that lunch meat comes in. I know I should work in a grocery store. Well, then with the lube melted I just pour gently into the spaghetti dish until the lube gets to the crimp groove on my Mavs. Then when the lube starts to form a cake and the tray can be moved, I set it on the cement floor to cool further. When I can comfortably put my fingers on the bullets to check for heat I take the tray off the floor and then I take the ammo tray and stick it over the 50 bullets. You can see where I am going here. I then flip the works over again with the bullet noses into the ammo tray and the bases in the lube cake up. I take a small dowel and push the bullets into the ammo tray leaving a cake of lube that looks like swiss cheese. I could reuse that cake and just stick more bullets in the holes, and heat up, but I use a micro wave for heat, so I just break up the cake and when reheated it all until it liquidfies and I start all over. Now by just tipping the bullets out I have them all lubed and ready to go, but in my case I want to shoot .427 diameter, so I take my cheapo Lee single stage press and with the Lee .427 sizer mounted, I just keep running them upward until the red container has a bunch in it and I now have lubed and sized bullets all ready to load.

It goes faster than you think. I have never timed the operation, but it does not seem to take me that long and it is a whole lot faster than using my lubersizer, that at this time of the year takes time just to heat up the lube that is in the tube before I can start to even use it. To me the lubersizer is slow and boring. It took me longer to type this than I could lube 50 bullets. Just sayin' :)

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Either I need to save the next batch and do them at Sixgun's with our star lubesizer or, nope no other option. Doing the big bore bullets on it isnt so bad as its slow enough to really inspect each one before deciding to keep or cull it but what a non starter for doing quantity. Havent done this for a couple of years and forgot how spoiled the star can make you. Especially with the air cylinder hooked up to it.

 

Oh well it'll take me less time to load these on SDB tomorrow then it did just to get them greasy.

 

 

Somebody asked me if I would offer my Barnstormer in BP lube as well as smokeless. "Yep, as soon as I get another Star and not a minute before."

 

Once ya get used to the Star, ain't no going back......

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Boy Howdy, that sounds like a lot of work. I used to pan lube so I do kinda understand your method. Still sounds like a lot of work.

 

Pony, when I was using my RCBS lube sizer, which is basically the same as the Lyman, 600 bullets would have taken all night. I can do that many with my Starr in a little bit more than an hour, and I don't have no fancy hydraulics nor pneumatics.

 

You really ought to spring for a Star of your own.

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Pony I hear you we ended up buying a good used second Starr,Gun E is doing the BP lubed bullets and I'm doing the smokeless bullets. It's such a improvement as far as use of time over doing BP on the Lyman,the only thing Ill be doing on the Lyman any more is BP long range bullets,difference is night and day. Adios Sgt. Jake

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Howdy that sounds like an interesting hybrid method but trust me, and the rest of us using star machines, there is nothing better then one of these little beauties running flat out. We dont have one of the collators, pricey addition, but have hooked up a compressor so you dont even have to fiddle with the right lube flow.

 

DJ Sixgun does 500 an hour with no fuss and still has time to do our second culling and as much as I'd like to have a second one on my bench money is a consideration. Plus we need to have a division of labor dont you know; right now I'm casting and he's lubing.

 

If things go as I hope and we get a bit more commercial there will be some equipment upgrades which would include a seperate large smelting pot, maybe a mastercaster for big bore bullets and drafting Labouche to get the automated lube sizer Sixgun has up and running. Not sure of the make of this last one but ouput on it should be approx 1k per hour. All you need to do is keep the feed tube full and it spits em out all done.

 

Just in case anyone wants to part with a used star,well shoot me a pm but now its time to see how much clean 44-40 brass I have on hand and start turning components into cartridges. I've got a pot of decaf brewing and primer tubes ready to fill.

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But pard, I am no longer from New Hamster. Here we have sale taxes, me and my house are upside down. I have to watch hobby expenses and I don't load for others. I just can't swing a real good lubersizer, but my labor is cheap, so I do most everything by hand and myself. :FlagAm:

 

I know you can do things a lot faster and simpler than a roughneck like me. I was tacking on to your thread for folks that just might be in my boat is all. My lube methods work well, but it is not very fast admittedly, I work on low production and don't even shoot as much as I used to. :unsure:

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No worries Howdy, I was agreeing that your method sounds like a good idea and you are the first I've ever heard of doing it that way. Running the straight thru lube/sizer in combo with mass pan lubing is yankee ingenuity in action.

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But pard, I am no longer from New Hamster. Here we have sale taxes, me and my house are upside down. I have to watch hobby expenses and I don't load for others. I just can't swing a real good lubersizer, but my labor is cheap, so I do most everything by hand and myself. :)

 

I know you can do things a lot faster and simpler than a roughneck like me. I was tacking on to your thread for folks that just might be in my boat is all. My lube methods work well, but it is not very fast admittedly, I work on low production and don't even shoot as much as I used to. :blink:

 

 

I'm with ya Pard. No $tar or Dillon or Colts in the immediate future for me. :blush:

I use an old toaster oven to melt my lube though.

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