Darned, I though you were talking about SMELTING!
You know get a big dip net, go to Lake Huron, out on the pier and go fishing.
That's SMELTING,
You're doing SMELTERING, had me going for a minute!

 

I'm gonna' be watching for input from those folks that do this as I have a bunch of wheelweights I want to make into ingots. What size (dimentions) would you have on the ingot to get approximately one pound?

 

Approximetly 2.5 cubic inches per Lb. of Lead. Pure lead weighs (nominally) 0.4096 pound per cubic inch. That's 0.4096 × 7,000 = 2,867.2 grains.
The odds of being able to smelter down to 100% lead in your own home foundry isn't likely, But you can get very close. Possibly as close as 99.9%. Just keep skimming off the slag on the top till there is none left.

 

Approximetly 2.5 cubic inches per Lb. of Lead. Pure lead weighs (nominally) 0.4096 pound per cubic inch. That's 0.4096 × 7,000 = 2,867.2 grains.
The odds of being able to smelter down to 100% lead in your own home foundry isn't likely, But you can get very close. Possibly as close as 99.9%. Just keep skimming off the slag on the top till there is none left.

Thanks, that helps. Now I've got to get out the calculator...........

 

Greg, sounds like you have the mix too hot. Here are some tips I learned from the guys here:

Make sure you separate the zinc ones, you can use a pair of cutters to test them or scrap them on a piece of concrete. Once you find a zinc one you will know it right away, it is much harder than the lead. After the wax melts stir it in, don't flux too much because you will remove some of the beneficial stuff in there. You can use saw dust or any carbon based stuff for fluxing. Using a wood stick is also a good idea. The stick on types are almost always pure lead and are to soft to cast with, seperate them and melt them with an equal amount of tin. Then add 9 lbs. of clip on wheel weights to one pound of the stick ons and tin. That will give the Lyman #2 alloy or very close to it.

If you keep the temperature below 700 degrees the zinc ones won't melt if you accidentally miss one.

Charlie, just pick up an ingot mold. Midway has the Lee mold on sale for around 9 bucks. it has 2 half pound and 2 pound cavities.

 

You guys want to learn even more ? check out http://www.cast boolits .com bobw

 

oops. misunderstanding.
I was using a thermometer and had it at 650 whol time.
i threw some zinc in to test theory that zinc would float, which it did. even dunked it a few times and it came back up.

then i took it out of my lead.

so the lead is good to go.

 

Yeah! After I do a big WW melt, I feel like I'm owner of the Galena City Foundry! :lol:

My next big smelting project is to melt down and ingot a big roll of thin lead X-ray shielding from a dental office that recently got torn down.

I need another thermometer - anyone found an outfit selling bargain-price ones lately?

xtm

 

Well, 2nd weekend of smelting.
Took 2-3 hours each morning and got some clip ons melted down. About 100lbs.

2 quart cast iron on a coleman stove is a slow process.

Still have about 3-4 gallons to finsh off next time.

The onto a couple hundred pounds of linotype i scavenged. Atleast no stupid steel clips on those.

 

Greg where in the hell did you find the Linotype at?

 

Greg where in the hell did you find the Linotype at?

Old neighbor. He retired from a paper plant here in Salem. Shortly after retirement, he was able to scavenge a bunch of stuff when they shut down the plant.

He has a printing press with cases and cases of type in his garage.

Also a bunch of linotype and monotype he can't use. Been behind his shop for over a decade. All i got to do is dig it out from under the cedars. The wood boxes it was in fell apart so it will be digging. But worth it.

Did offer to find a buyer for most of it or pay for what i needed. But he refused. A Very good guy.

 

Greg you are one Lucky man. Get all that you can get your hands on.

 

gtivan;
Using a Coleman stove for smelting can get you into serious problems. The grille is not heavy enough gauge to support a heavy pot of lead when heated. The grille will get red hot and become about as supportive as spaghetti.

A safer set up for smelting is to get a turkey/fish Fryer and a minimum six quart pot (I use a cast iron Harbor Freight model). Cast iron works well but will NOT take well to beating on it when hot (it can crack it). Treated properly, the set up will work VERY well. I have smelted as much as 650 lbs in a half day.

Here is a picture of some of my ingot moulds.

This shows my brother, who was helping me, the day we smelted 650 lbs. The fryer cost less than $30.00 (Bass Pro sale) and the HF pot cost about $20.00 on sale:

If financial considerations presently are keeping you from investing in a Fish Fryer, then I suggest you reinforce the grille on your Coleman Stove. Mine collapsed, dumping a pot of molten metal EVERYWHERE. I was lucky and did not get burned.

FWIW
Dale53

 

Nice smelting set-up, Dale!

650# of bullet alloy would last me a looong time.

xtm

 

No worries on the coleman. I didn't like the original support either. So i took some flat strap and spread it across to help distribute the weight. I also didn't fill it to the brim. at most it was 2/3. which was what took so long in the production. even then i was keeping a close eye on it.

Right now, with 100 lbs, i am good for a year or 2 probably. If i do big lots again it will to be mix my ww with either tin or lino and fine tune my alloy for specific purpose. Otherwise i will do my casting in a old saeco smelting pot.

Maybe changing out to something bigger though. It takes forever with a 2 quart pot.......
If i do for a bigger burner, i already have a small propane tank standing by to cut in half for the melting pot.


Hey dale. Didn't i see those pics over at castboolits.com? Nice set up.


Wish i had enough ww to do 650lbs. But i hear metals are going down so i may get some more to stockpile for future.....

 

Greg;
You caught me.

The day I smelted 650 lbs by having my brother help, it only took a half day. A friend of mine and I did 1000 lbs of scrap lead in a full day. We were lucky to hit a good buy at a local scrap yard. We both shot black powder cartridge rifle and ended up with 500 lbs each. It was some time ago. I doubt that I could do a 1000 lbs of scrap, today.

Typically what I do these days, if working alone, is to do a couple of hundred lbs. That only takes one to two hours.

I mostly shoot handguns, these days, and really go through a lot of bullet metal in a year. I shoot several different calibers but .45 ACP is, by far, my most shot caliber. I'll go through 200 lbs+ of .45 bullets alone, in a year. The .32's go a lot farther, of course, with .38's being kind of in the middle. I also use a goodly number of .44's.

Hey, you have to do something to pass the time when you're retired! :mrgreen:

FWIW
Dale53

 

I use a big cast iron dutch oven on a propane fryer burner, like the turkey fryers. 40 or 50 pounds at a time, keep the temp down to around 600-650 so the bad stuff doesn't melt. I also use a round magnet on a stick, the kind they sell to pick up things on the ground. Slick as a whistle, gets the clips and all you have to do is scrape em off the magnet into your bucket until your done. I don't flux at all at this point just skim a little and ladle into store bought muffin pans. I flux when I cast with wax, my bullets have turned out great using this method. Hope this can be of help to someone.

 

Yeah like Dale53 above, sorry a bunch of posts came in while I was typing mine.

Good info by the way fellas, thank you!!

 

Hey Jack, I do the same thing with a magnet, works great. I smelted 54 lbs. this weekend, just a small batch to try out a new ingot mold. I still have two 5 gal. buckets of WWs all sorted and ready to go and 3 buckets waiting to be sorted. I am hoping to have at least 1000 lbs. by the end of the summer.

 

I use a 40 lb pot when doing mine.I have to add that when you get just one drop of sweat in the melted alloy it like a small atomic explosion .guys I have only done that once and there is still lead splatter on the roof of my porch.
pete

 

The wife was kind of getting after me to clean up the garage a bit, looks something like Dale's in the picture above , and the place she wanted to start was my wheel weights! I said: "Girl, if you will help, I'll get to smelting!" She said it was a good decision and we started out.

Real simple setup:

Click on pictures to watch videos:




Using the thermometer, I never go much above 650*F. With the burner control you can regulate temperature pretty well. Zinc will not melt at that temp and I have never used a pair of side cutters to try to determine what a wheel weight is made from. Chemistry 101, different materials have different melting temperatures.

Anyway, lots of lead into ingots this day. Have several, about 5 or so, more 5 gallon buckets to go.

As for Linotype, I ran into a deal here a while back. I was doing some electrical work at a scrap yard on a huge shredder. It could grind up a car and spit it out in about 3 to 4 seconds! Pretty cool. They had a "retail" area too and had a scrap lead box. When I looked into it there were a bunch of long narrow ingots in it. I tested them with a pair of pliers and found they were pretty hard. They were the foundry bars of Linotype with the open "hooks" on the end. Got them for scrap lead price @ 33 cents a pound. I use ingots from them to harden up bullets that are going to be driven a bit harder than normal!

I was fooling around awhile back and made some 230gr LRN water dropped bullets with a mixture of 80%/20% and in about two days those bullets were so hard you couldn't scratch them with your fingernail! Didn't even mark them! I don't know, maybe, 30BHN or so?

I pushed them as hard as I could out of my Ruger 45 Convertible with the Colt cylinder in it!

FWIW

 

Like Dale53, I am also a member of the Cast Boolits forum. You will not find a more knowlegable source for information on all aspects of boolit casting. We properly refer to projectile we cast ourselves as BOOLITS. Bullets are those copper colored things the great unwashed masses purchase and shoot out of their guns.

Lots of good info already given, I'll just post a few pics of my smelting and casting setups

NOTE!! Those toys in the box were just piled there prior to being thrown out. I would not suggest processing lead anywhere near areas your children play in, etc. And no, some smart a$$ already asked if they were toys from China I was trying to melt down to get the lead out of the paint :lol:

I built a dedicated casting cabinet, and it sure makes things easy

This photo was taken a day after the cabinet was built. The little kiddie chair I had stored under the desk was quickly moved !

Hope to see you on Cast Boolits. The link is
http://castboolits.gunloads.com

 

Patrick, that is a real nice setup you have there. I have accumulated my goal of a half a ton of WWs this summer and smelted down about 200 lbs. I have a lot left to do!!

 

Nice cabinet, Patrick!
I like your idea of adding pre-melted lead to the main casting furnace - saves time waiting for the metal to heat back up. Maybe you should go to Lee with your idea and get some patent royalties?

BTW, your tall smelting rig looks mighty top-heavy... :|

xtm

 

Maybe you should go to Lee with your idea and get some patent royalties?

Problem is I can't take credit for the idea. I stole it from several others on the Cast Boolits site I mentioned in the earlier post. Some of those guys are so smart it's scary.

BTW, your tall smelting rig looks mighty top-heavy...

It may be. It seems pretty solid on concrete, especially with about 50-60 lbs of alloy in it, but I wouldn't want to accidentally bump into it! That's an old plumbers furnace I "borrowed" from my Dad. The way that puppy roars when you light it, it's like smelting on the back side of the space shuttle!

I recently got a turkey fryer, but haven't tried it yet.