Casting lead

[Old Syko]

[quote=Jack Ryan;166450]Any good way to clean out that pot after it starts getting dirt or what ever stuck to it?
quote]

Not really. On occasion I dump my pots and clean them out with some light sandpaper and refill them. I have a small pot that I have carefully sandblasted a couple times but that seems to leave a rather rough finish that contaminates stick to even better until I polish it up a bit. Like I said earlier, I prefer to dip and air pour and in doing so it becomes less of an issue, but I wouldn't suggest anyone change from a bottom pour to dipping. It's just hard to teach old dogs new tricks.

If you have something swimming around the bottom of your pot you definetly want to get it out of there. Could be a lump of tungston as that is one of the alloys that is more dense than lead and can be very abrasive to a good bore if not encapsulated in a softer cover. Antimony is also abrasive and can clump if not fluxed often enough.

[Dewidmt]

I use an old Lyman pot but I dip also instead of using the bottom pour spout. I use a pinch off an alox bar for fluxing....

You either need to stay under 1000 FPS with lead bullets of the hardness you get by home casting, or use a gas check of some kind to prevent a lot of barrel leading.

[hornadylnl]

I have an old turkey fryer that I was planning on using to smelt my wheel weights down for ingots. I don't really want to buy a big pot and have my aluminum that I'll probably never use for turkey again. Is there any reason why I can't use an aluminum pot for smelting? Is it that hard to get lead to 600 + degree with a turkey fryer base? I bought a ladle, skimmer and some muffin pans today. All I really need now is a pot (hopefully I can use the one I have) and some flux. Sportsman's Warehouse didn't have any beeswax or alox. Could I use Lee's liquid Alox? I don't want to have a fortune tied up in just making ingots. Thanks for any advice.

[straight-shooter]

No problem at all using a turkey fryer base to melt lead. That's what I use and it works fantastic. For fluxing you can even use chunks of a candle or get some paraffin at the grocery store. As for the aluminum pot I'm not gonna commit to that one cause I've never tried it. I use a 7 quart cast iron dutch oven pot.

Edit: I just now researched your question on other forum threads and they say NOT to use aluminum. There are reports of catastrophic failures where people have been burned when the pot failed to contain the molten lead.

[hornadylnl]

Thanks for the info. Getting burnt isn't worth saving a few bucks. I didn't know if it would work or not. Thanks

[Sailor]

How much does a 5 gallon bucket of lead wheel weights weigh? What on average will a shop ask you to pay?

Cheaper than just buying ingots on Ebay?

[straight-shooter]

Originally Posted by Sailor

How much does a 5 gallon bucket of lead wheel weights weigh? What on average will a shop ask you to pay?

Cheaper than just buying ingots on Ebay?

Ebayers are asking $1.00 a pound and sometimes more. Not worth it in my opinion. The few shops that will sell to me around here are asking $30 to $50 a bucket. That equats to .30 to .50 cents a pound.

If the bucket is topped up then it will weigh about 120 pounds and minus clips you'll have about 100 pounds of lead.

[Dewidmt]

I buy wheelweights from a farm and tractor tire store. They want $30 for a 5 gallon bucket of them. Wal-Mart used to give them away free before they started recycling....The 5 gallon buckets I've weighed have all come in around 130-140 pounds.

[parson]

I've read that aluminum can give way as the melting point of lead is hot enough to adversely effect it. This site has a wealth of good info on casting
Cast Boolits - Dedicated To The World Of Cast Bullets!

parson

[parson]

Sorry, some how the link didn't come out right. it's castboolits.gunloads.com
parson