why wont my parker and hale accept a 575 minnie

[afwagner]

i purchased a parker and hale made in great britian pre 1970 and am trying to use a 575 525 grn. minnie and im having trouble getting these bullets down the barrel cab you give me some help with this

[R. McAuley 3014V]

It might do you good to get yourself a .577 and .576 sizer to run those minies through beforehand, just to insure they are at least .575. Some molds though cut for a certain size do not always throw the correct size bullet, and so it is a good idea to keep a sizer handy to insure that all of your bullets are the same size if you want to maintain consistency. I would recommend sizing your minies to where when you put a minie into the muzzle, you should just barely feel any contact with the lands. If the minie is still tight, you will want to size it another thousandth undersize to compensate for your lubricant and potential fouling in use. I've owned several molds over the years and have yet to find any that cast exactly the size claimed by the maker. I you can, look for either the threaded sizers that NW Trade has that fit a standard reloading press or get yourself a Lubricizer with a .576 sizer. Most every Enfield except the Euroarms will take a .576. Generally, you'll need a .575 for the Euroarms Enfields because they are straight-rifled rather than progressive like the P-H.

[toolmaker251]

My Parker Hale 3 band Birmingham has a .577 bore and I use a PH Lyman cast bullet which comes out at .576

[dml1296]

Are you sure that you Minie balls are .575" ? Have you actually measured them? My Parker Hale musketoon's bore measures .576". My earlier PH 2 band measures .578". Chances are that your bullets are either not .575" or may be out of round. You need a bullet sizer.

[Blair]

Bullet sizing dies are good! Even if the bullet castings are close to your actual bore diameter.
Knowing your actual "minimum" bore dia. is a must if you want to get a sizing die that is appropriate to that bore dimension.
I would suspect your cast bullets are too large for the "minimum" bore diameter.
Blair

[afwagner]

thanks to all of you this gives me a place to start and i will start checking different thing to find out why .

[mwmoore10261]

You didn't specify which mold you are using but the bullet weight and 575 size are about the specifications for the Lyman 575213. I have this mold and it puts out a bullet closer to .578 than .575. Like the rest, I size this bullet to .575 for most of my muskets with the exception that my Zoli Mississippi likes a .574 bullet. I would mic the barrel and then size 1-2 thousandth's under. If you are using an aluminum mold, then the expansion with continued heat tends to make for inconsistent size from the beginning of the run to the end. Another good reason for sizing bullets. Good luck.
See you on the line.
Mike Moore

[pastore]

You didn't specify which mold you are using but the bullet weight and 575 size are about the specifications for the Lyman 575213. See you on the line.
Mike Moore

I have a Lyman 575213 mold that produces .579-.580 bullets