scrap lead costs

[ffffg]

Ive just purchased 168 pounds of scrap pure lead at about 50 cents a pound, and was wondering if that was a good price? Im anticipating increased costs over that after this all plays out.. Whats your local scrap costs?.. I feel my prices will probably rise, what is the normal price relationship between scrap and newly manufactured (market value) lead? thanks dave..

 

[Jim-Iowa]

asked my brother inlaw that last Sunday.
He has been collecting scrap for 20 yrs and just retired and is selling it all off.
He said 40-50 cents a pound, so it sounds like you paid current value.

 

[DRC]

I've been paying .40 lb. here. I try to buy the lead pipes I know they are farely pure.

 

[ffffg]

I just found the market value of lead.. It shows in the range of 1.22 to 1.35 depending on how you look at it, and i have no idea what their talking about.. So at any rate,, 50 cents im happy with.. I just dont know if i should go buy another 500 pounds or not.. I guess that would be obsesive impulsive :shake: :shocked2: dave

 

[Blizzard of '93]

I have 200 lb lead pipe out of a paper plant from my welding days, 1 peice is fairly pure the others have some tin, it is actually cast in a mold you know. ingots and sheeting are pure.

 

[Croppy Boy]

I own a pub over here and a lot of my customers work on building sites. They often bring me in 7 to 8 stone of scrap roofing lead which I melt down into ingots.

The cost is three pints of Guinness :grin:

 

[fatboy]

I dont have any lead for ya but ill take three pints guinness

 

[CrackStock]

I have been getting it for .12 cents per pound.
I have the people convinced that it is not worth the cost of shipping elsewhere. Actually, it isn't.

CS

 

[jeepwj992002]

The cost is three pints of Guinness

Now THAT is a deal!!! :haha:

 

[jdstrang]

If anybody wants to follow the lead market, here's a handy Web site:
[url] http://www.kitcometals.com/charts/lead_historical_large.html[/url]

Any relationship between the market price and what you can find is extremely serendipitous... :shocked2:

 

[frou frou]

I have been getting it for .12 cents per pound.
I have the people convinced that it is not worth the cost of shipping elsewhere. Actually, it isn't.

CS

So where does the scrap come from?

 

The $1.22 - $1.35 is a base price for dealers or the factory purchase price. Lead has spiked $0.80 cents per pound since last Septemeber. I just bought 125 lbs of pure lead at 2.01 per lb from a local place and they gave me deal as I used to work for them years ago when I got out of the service. This is not scrap, but pot lead, and is 99.989% pure, only trace amounts of antimony and no tin. Unless it's pot lead or came lead it's going to contain antimony and traces of tin. Most came lead is usually 98 - 99%% pure, but some buyers liked it firmer and have atimony added to it. Pure lead itself, contains trace antimony. The lead pipe you find in the scrap yards will have antimony in it, usually less than 5%. It's needed to help the pipe hold it's shape as lead pipe is made by pressing a lead slug through a form with a hydralic ram. My rule of thumb for scrap is as long as I can sctach it with my thumbnail, it's usually soft enough.

 

[Runner]

I got lucky. My son was on a job where they were moving an x-ray room in a doctors office. The thin lead sheet used in the walls is like handling thick soft cloth. It is pretty high grade. Some of the other stuff is not that way, even if it is soft. Lead drain pipe often has sand in it.
Fill your pot with lead and leave it hot. check it 24 hours later. The multicolored mess on top that has separated out is most of the impurities you need to remove. If there is very little of the multicolored mess, then that batch really doesn't need that step. I do this with any pipe lead I use because it has a lot of crud in it that separates even after being fluxed several times. I then pour it into a muffin tin and write the source on the ingots.

 

[redwing]

I had to pay $1.30 per.pound for dead lead in July. I was getting WWs for free, use them for smooth gun balls. The scrap yard is paying .43Cts. per pound for WWs so that deal is gone.

Any way I heard on the news that China stopped buying lead. They started a no lead process in Mfg. about 18 Mos. ago. They are in trouble now over lead paint in toys. The report said that world lead prices would go way down by 08'. Lets hope so.

 

[Coot]

Thanks to an earlier post on the ML Forum, I now get my lead for free. A local stained glass shop saves their scrap for me & I pick it up every 6 weeks or so. They look on it as free hazardous waste disposal rather than a lost scrap sale. I will take them some Xmas cookies when I see them in Dec.

 

Thanks to an earlier post on the ML Forum, I now get my lead for free. A local stained glass shop saves their scrap for me & I pick it up every 6 weeks or so. They look on it as free hazardous waste disposal rather than a lost scrap sale. I will take them some Xmas cookies when I see them in Dec.

That's some good stuff you have there. Stained glass folks use the Lead Came and it's about 99% pure. Do keep an eye out though as some manufacturers of lead came are going to Zinc. That's also an FYI if you use wheel weights. Europe has already banned lead wheel weights and so has Minnesota and a couple of cities in Michigan. The EPA issued a report in 2005 suggesting the WW go to a zinc base and several manufacturers have already done so. The last report I saw had about 20% of current "clip-on" WW production was Zinc and is expected to rise. The adhesive type WW's are still lead based, but they do have a higher amount of antimony and tin.