Casting standard diablo pellets .22

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Gabpan

Gabpan

Member
Mar 29, 2020
123
1
MI, United States
Hey guys question for you. I am interested in obtaining molds for casting .22 diablo shaped pellets. Preferably one with a close resemblance to crosman premier 14.3 grain hollow point.

I have noticed that a tin of 500 used to cost about 7.00 usd shipped now they are selling for 16.00 usd. What is worse is the fact that Walmart has them still at the 7.00 price point however refuses to ship them to my location, nor is it available for local pick up. Without getting to political I would say this is a new method of ammo control to certain geographic locations.

This last year has taught me to become self sufficient. A small virus nearly brought the infrastructure to its knees. I can only imagine what more serious situation would do. I have since built an arsenal of weapons ranging from simple slingshots and pellet rifles to high power powder burning firearms. I also plan on collecting water and storing it in my basement. I believe the future currency will not be gold or silver rather ammunition lead for casting and pellet rifles for small game hunting.

I've done a little research but most of the stuff that I've seen come up is for casting slugs not Diablo shape pellets. Any information would be helpful. 

And while I'm still aware that yes you can get them from pyramid Air or air gun Depot which I appreciate for the moment as stated I'm looking for a long-term self-sufficient solution.

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Considering what it would cost to get into casting pellets, you are probably better off to buy $200 in pellets now. PA has Crosman's in stock. $200 would buy 22 tins and get free shipping. That's only 11,000 rounds. I'd bet that getting into casting would cost at least $200.

PA has the Crosman pellets at $11.49 but if you buy 4, the average cost is about $8.65, and they might ship to your area. I wonder if Detroit has restrictions on shipping pellets, and being so close, might put Flint in a no ship zone. You should be able to call and ask the folks at PA if they ship to your area. 

Considering time and money that casting pellets requires including a step to make a skirt, I personally would rather have 20 tins in stock that someone else made. Just me.

I just checked your zip on PA's site and it says $8.99 shipping for 4 tins of Crosman Premier Domes so they might just ship to you.

Good luck on your search


 
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NOE molds has a few options for diabolo .22 pellets. 

I think there's a wadcutter but for domed I know there's a "Hunter" and "Hunter Magnum." I have the Hunter and using the deepest skirt pins, pellets weigh 19.6 grains. The Magnum is around 24 or 25 grains I think I've read but no personal experience there. The NOE molds come with four sets of pins for varying skirt depths. The solid and most shallow two pins made nearly useless pellets. The deepest skirt pins made the more accurate pellets. 

Theyve not shot as well as premium pellets for me, but in your scenario, theyd be better than nothing. 


 
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Check out NOE Molds, although almost all will be out of stock. I would suggest you start a post on the NOE molds forums indicating the specific mold you are interested in, and then post a link to your NOE post here on AGN in a separate topic. When enough people show interest on the NOE forum, they should put it in production. 

By no means am I an auth on casting, I just started this year but have had good results so far in .30 and .25 diabolos and .25 slugs. Took a few tries to get the right cadence and heat to produce a relatively consistent result, but getting better each time. Have not figured out the ROI but it was more than 200 startup and plenty of time to become consistent and also find a right lead/antimony ratio, weight and sizing my guns like. From what I found molds have the wait time for starting, but that allows time to source all the other items needed. Also opted for the mold thermometer probe, not sure its needed after gaining some exp, but it helped me learn about heat transfer and timing which no doubt sped up the learning curve. I chose a bottom pour pot as well over a ladle which added cost. Extras like an additional hotplate, fan, gloves, skimmer, flux and an inhot mold all add up too. Plenty of good info on this site about casting methods, techniques, etc. Hope it helps, best of luck.
 
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Considering what it would cost to get into casting pellets, you are probably better off to buy $200 in pellets now. PA has Crosman's in stock. $200 would buy 22 tins and get free shipping. That's only 11,000 rounds. I'd bet that getting into casting would cost at least $200.

PA has the Crosman pellets at $11.49 but if you buy 4, the average cost is about $8.65, and they might ship to your area. I wonder if Detroit has restrictions on shipping pellets, and being so close, might put Flint in a no ship zone. You should be able to call and ask the folks at PA if they ship to your area. 

Considering time and money that casting pellets requires including a step to make a skirt, I personally would rather have 20 tins in stock that someone else made. Just me.

I just checked your zip on PA's site and it says $8.99 shipping for 4 tins of Crosman Premier Domes so they might just ship to you.

Good luck on your search

Click to expand...

Thanks for the leads. I have no idea why Walmart has a restriction on my address as I was able to purchase the .177 pellets from their site just a moment ago. No rhyme or reason. 

I have been wanting to get into casting anyway and I'm doing it fairly cheap. I was going to go out and buy one of those smelters. Special molds and dipping spoons and all that and then I remembered how my uncle used to melt lead for fishing weights. 

He simply made a fire and took a cast iron pot setting on top of the fire. He added some lead to the pot and it would all melt down.

Then he'd make some rough holes in the sand on the ground pour the molten lead in there add a piece of wire hanger that he cut into a loop and make his own fishing weights.

The kind of scenarios that I'm trying to plan for it's best to go back into history and look at the old ways of doing things. I guess the cowboys used to do a very similar way of smelting lead to cast bullets. Those plugins melters that have a thermostat and keep the lead at a constant temperature are really nice except for what I'm planning on is the grid going down. Which would essentially render them useless under those conditions.

Having said all that I think you're correct as far as it goes for the pallets next time I see them at Wally world I'm just going to buy a ton for my own use and to barter in a you know what hit the fan scenario. 

As it stands I have about 6,000 rounds of 177 and 6, 000 or more of 22. Only about 200 of 0.25 as I'm moving away from that caliber.

Even casting for 9 mm I kind of have to be careful to make it economical. As an example I have a source for a thousand nine millimeter bullets for about $70. Now that includes the powder coating process.

Given the current cost of lead to cast the thousand it would cost me about $80 plus my time.

So I guess it's more about off the grid self-sufficiency not really cost-effectiveness. But again not to beat a dead horse you're right about the pellets. it's just easier to buy a ton when I see them. 

Knowing me I'll probably still end up getting molds for them just in case again could be another bartering item Plus heck it'll probably be fun.

Nothing will probably ever happen but I call it cheap insurance. I also plan on stocking some water in the basement. If anything did happen water would probably be the currency of the new world.




 
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Hey guys I also wanted to thank the other posters for offering the suggestion to go to Noe molds I'm going to check them out as well.

Worst comes to worst I could probably get away with running slugs in my Benjamin Maximus however the springers maybe not so much. 

One thing about those stupid crossman pellets is that both my hatsan springers and my Benjamin maximus seem to absolutely love them. Sounds like nor may have what I need soon as I'm done typing here I'm going to check them out.
 
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Just a few more things before I sign off in my sleepy stupor. They may help anyone in the future if they read this post.

I found this on the web I have no idea if they ship to the United please anyone reading this be careful doing business with the people outside of the United States because there's no buyer protection there. I have never done business with these people just came along on a web search. 

https://www.balistas.com/pellet-casting/

Also there's an instructables out there for basically drilling out a pair of pliers and making your own mold.

There are other international websites one in particular I believe was in South Africa that specializes in large bore Diablo shaped molds. 

As far as Noe I did not do a lot of digging but it looks like in 2018 they did produce some Diablo shape mold for pellets in various caliber small bore. Although I was not able to locate them on the website they were mentioned in another forum.

Again I'm a little punchy typing all this because it's late. I assume if I did enough digging on noe website I would find them.
 
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Considering what it would cost to get into casting pellets, you are probably better off to buy $200 in pellets now. PA has Crosman's in stock. $200 would buy 22 tins and get free shipping. That's only 11,000 rounds. I'd bet that getting into casting would cost at least $200.

PA has the Crosman pellets at $11.49 but if you buy 4, the average cost is about $8.65, and they might ship to your area. I wonder if Detroit has restrictions on shipping pellets, and being so close, might put Flint in a no ship zone. You should be able to call and ask the folks at PA if they ship to your area. 

Considering time and money that casting pellets requires including a step to make a skirt, I personally would rather have 20 tins in stock that someone else made. Just me.

I just checked your zip on PA's site and it says $8.99 shipping for 4 tins of Crosman Premier Domes so they might just ship to you.

Good luck on your search

Click to expand...

Thanks for the leads. I have no idea why Walmart has a restriction on my address as I was able to purchase the .177 pellets from their site just a moment ago. No rhyme or reason. 

I have been wanting to get into casting anyway and I'm doing it fairly cheap. I was going to go out and buy one of those smelters. Special molds and dipping spoons and all that and then I remembered how my uncle used to melt lead for fishing weights. 

He simply made a fire and took a cast iron pot setting on top of the fire. He added some lead to the pot and it would all melt down.

Then he'd make some rough holes in the sand on the ground pour the molten lead in there add a piece of wire hanger that he cut into a loop and make his own fishing weights.

The kind of scenarios that I'm trying to plan for it's best to go back into history and look at the old ways of doing things. I guess the cowboys used to do a very similar way of smelting lead to cast bullets. Those plugins melters that have a thermostat and keep the lead at a constant temperature are really nice except for what I'm planning on is the grid going down. Which would essentially render them useless under those conditions.

Having said all that I think you're correct as far as it goes for the pallets next time I see them at Wally world I'm just going to buy a ton for my own use and to barter in a you know what hit the fan scenario. 

As it stands I have about 6,000 rounds of 177 and 6, 000 or more of 22. Only about 200 of 0.25 as I'm moving away from that caliber.

Even casting for 9 mm I kind of have to be careful to make it economical. As an example I have a source for a thousand nine millimeter bullets for about $70. Now that includes the powder coating process.

Given the current cost of lead to cast the thousand it would cost me about $80 plus my time.

So I guess it's more about off the grid self-sufficiency not really cost-effectiveness. But again not to beat a dead horse you're right about the pellets. it's just easier to buy a ton when I see them. 

Knowing me I'll probably still end up getting molds for them just in case again could be another bartering item Plus heck it'll probably be fun.

Nothing will probably ever happen but I call it cheap insurance. I also plan on stocking some water in the basement. If anything did happen water would probably be the currency of the new world.



Click to expand...

Look at page 43 and on - Firearms.pdf (mi.gov) or do a search on .177.

It looks like it's OK in Michigan to have a .177, but anything over a .177 is treated more like a firearm. Walmart isn't a airgun dealer, so probably just chose the safest route, and if it's going to Michigan will just opt not to ship. PA may have a better handle on the rules.

I get the logic, good luck and yes, I have a backup supply of .22. I opt not to cast but just have a supply on hand. At the rate I shoot, it's a several year supply of pellets (mostly found at Walmart as my final, emergency back up) I also have the premium stuff, but not nearly as much.

It's good to have extra on hand to see one through times like the current JSB shortage.


 
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