Reading on the H&G website Google brings up when I search, I see some people from this website have done some writing on it: http://www.hensleygibbs.com/
It's mentioned that H&G was a family business. What happened in 1999 that caused them to shut down operations? Someone die, or just decide to retire and not find a suitable person to sell the business to?
Thanks in advance for any info people can post up.
Kicking myself that I didn't buy any H&G molds while they were available.
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Send a PM to TexasFlyboy over on Boolits, he owns the H&G domain, but his day job has kept him out of the country the last few years, so it hasn't been updated in quite a while.
73 de KE4SKY In Home Mix We Trust From the Home of Ed's Red in "Almost Heaven" West Virginia
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i have a nice multi-cav. h-g mold for the 45 acp i would sell...been a while since i used it; don't remember the details . ... if interested i will dig it out, pm me
yep they are pretty, but so are those from several current makers .
kem
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I believe Ballisticast took over H&G somewhere along the way. I've never owned a mold of either brand but what little I've heard about Ballisticast has been positive. They seem to cater to commercial casters.
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A further Google search led me to Ballisticast's website, where they say “Our molds are made using the same cutters and cast iron block design used by H&G, as Ballisti-Cast purchased the mold line when Wayne Gibbs retired in 1999."
I just wondered what happened to a rather iconic mold maker, I have not bought many molds lately (I have about 100!)
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Ballisticast has changed owners a few times over the last few years. My understanding is that they purchased the H&G designs, and perhaps any residual tooling, but they most definitely are not H&G.My experiences with their quality has been favorable for the most part, but their prices are really high, and their wait times were atrocious. They also got in trouble at the “Boolit” board over a group buy that took far too long to fulfill. This took place during one of the afore mentioned ownership changes.According to their website, they were recently sold again. I wish them success, but they have fences that need mending.
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For me personally, if the product is really good, I am OK with paying more (within reason) and I am OK with waiting a while. (The old Good-Fast-Cheap triangle) I think the 2-3 week wait time they advertise is reasonable, if they more or less stick to it. But I'm an old guy with a lot of molds in my collection already.
I can see how a small outfit could get into trouble with a big group buy. Sometimes the best craftsmen are not the best business planners.
Thanks to everyone who has posted up so far, look forward to learning more yet.
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The CB group buy took over a year to resolve. I do wish them the best of luck, and the greatest success though. Perhaps they have it down to 2-3 weeks now. That would be great!
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I notice that Ballisti-Cast still offers the very short full wadcutters that apparently Dean Grennell designed several years ago. For example about 90 grains for a .44 Special/Maggie bullet. Has anyone tried these? Appealing for light recoil and getting a lot of bullets out of a pound of alloy. I would suspect these are more prone than full sized wadcutters to go into non-linear dispersion beyond some critical range.
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The CB group buy took over a year to resolve. I do wish them the best of luck, and the greatest success though. Perhaps they have it down to 2-3 weeks now. That would be great!
Technically, it is still unresolved as several peopled never received Molds and as far as I know we're never reimbursed. Ballisti-Cast was a clusterflop. If I am not mistaken there were several folks owed big ticket casting machines also.
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Ken Campbell, I would like to buy that mold. Sent you a couple of DMs but maybe they did not get to you.
If you will send me your snail mail address, I can send you a check for the mold, the price you quoted is fine with me, likewise I think all of us here know what a mold in good shape looks like, and in general consider the shooting fraternity to be an anachronistic and honest bunch.
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