I'm glad you folks sound receptive to trying this mold. I'm sure you will love the bullet. Few major improvements are so easy and inexpensive. Sieger can tell you why overall length is so important to reliable functioning, and this is the best way to get it.
But I'd add a note of caution (below) on use of Lee aluminum molds. For years, all I used were iron molds from Lyman and RCBS. They are more forgiving of your casting technique. Now these are either too expensive for me or completely unavailable in the types I want; I just had to scour the entire U.S. to locate a new-old-stock Lyman mold for a 50-grain .25 ACP bullet. So my only choice here, 9mm, was aluminum.
During casting, you do have to pay closer attention to how you close the mold halves. Be sure the tops are aligned to show a flat surface and only a hairline joint. With the Lee molds, if you don't watch this, it is possible to get a lot of bad bullets, most evident from misaligned bullet bases and problems cutting off the sprue. That translates to inaccuracy and other difficulties. Before closing the sprue cutter, you may have to gently tap the blocks with your hardwood sprue cutting piece, to be sure the blocks are aligned. And with aluminum, the word is
gently. But simply having such a nice bullet design available compensates for having to be a bit more careful in making it.
