Lead

[Rifleman1776]

To seperate the alloys you need to get it near or past the temp where lead vaporises. NOT GOOD. :idunno: :idunno:

Thanks. I guess I'll just stick with the fingernail test for softness. If it passes I'm happy.

 

[Rifleman1776]

Old car batteries,Nasty work but its lead.

Car batteries is a NO-NO. :nono: Just too much "nasty" stuff for safety. :shake:

 

[jtmattison]

That is a great source that I'd never thought about. Guess who I'm gonna go talk to next time the fair is in town? Thank you.

X2!!

:thumbsup:

HD

 

[mooman76]

I did a car battery years ago before I knew better. There is allot less lead in them than you would think. Not worth the effort anyway.

 

[Adui]

I did a car battery years ago before I knew better. There is allot less lead in them than you would think. Not worth the effort anyway.

+1 here. Never again, was messy and not worth it at all.

I have experience handling the chemicals in the battery, (and caustic chemicals / acids in general)so I knew what I was doing and did it safely, but it was DEFINITELY not worth the trouble.

 

[Bob E]

This is the Holy Grail of bullet casting! Once lead is alloyed with another metal it is impossible to un-alloy the mixture. The addition of tin, zinc, linotype etc makes the metal harder than pure lead and melting the mixture and hoping that the lighter metals will rise to the top of the pot wont happen. Brass is a mixture of copper and Zinc. Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin. Melt either of them and the base metals will not seperate, they remain brass and bronze. Sadly, the same fate for hard lead. Fluxing molten lead will remove impurities (dirt) that arent alloys but will never remove the harder metal.
Hard lead is (in my opinion), OK for smoothbores and perhaps workable in patched round ball guns. Most of my shooting is in Minnie-Ball rifles and soft lead is critical for any sort of accuracy. Bob E

 

[mattybock]

i use lead for lead :grin:
anytime I see a tire, weight, an old fishing wieght, some spare bullet left over - i pocket it.
a good friend once found a block (6x6x4) of lead in a a garage and had no use for it. :v

for me, lead is a catch as catch can affair.