Whatever happened with the Lee HBC 200gr 308 molds?

[Mitch in MI]

About five years ago, some chap named Aladin, or Jay, drew up a slightly modified version of the old Speer 200gr cast bullet and had Lee make molds for a group buy.

How did that work out, was the design good, bad, indifferent?

[Cat Whisperer]

The design was done to get a high ballistic coefficient.  We did that (I did the CAD work).  Getting it to shoot well was a challange - some folks did reasonably well but only with effort.  I cast up a few last night in 96.5% tin, 3% silver and 0.5% copper.  Hardness tested to be 42 on Rockwell 'a' scale - copper jacketed 500 gr Hornady .458 tested between 43 and 44.

I'd like to buy one of those in circulation if anyone has one to part with.

[Mitch in MI]

I think I got two in the original purchase but never used it/them. (memory's faded, not 100% sure I bought two) Can't even remember what it cost.

Was thinking of lapping one out to make .312-.313 bullets for my dad's old 7.65 Mauser, when I realized that I never saw any mention of these molds after the production run was made. Only thing I found in an internet search was some guys making fun of Jay around 2006, seems like he'd left the internet forums by then.

[Cat Whisperer]

Jay took a lot of crap from folks and was skillfull in handing it back.
It was the biggest group buy of moulds - that says something.  They took a little long and some folks accused him of taking the money and running - not the case.

Might want to do a search on Cast Boolets ( http://castboolits.gunloads.com/index.php ) - you'll find much discussion from days past there.

Haven't seen or heard from him for quite a while.  I do know he brewed a great wine.

[Mitch in MI]

Thanks CW. Searching for "HBC" got me hours of reading by the looks of it.

[Cat Whisperer]

Another source to search through were the posts on the Bullet Swaging Discussion forum (here on GBO).  They humored me and gave much good information on the principles of design of each part of the bullet.  Really great folks and good discussions.