What do I do about zinc in lead??

[NinnJinn]

2 months ago While waiting for my reloading equipment to arrive. I purchased some lead off eBay (wheel weights). When I picked it up. The guy had a good amount that he hadn't listed yet so I bought 125lbs more for less than on eBay. I haven't used any of it yet. But received an email from the guy ( spam folder) stating that part of the lead he sold me had zinc in it.

I have already mixed the 250lbs of lead ingots by stacking them together in a box.

I have heard zinc in cast bullets is a no no. Yet the guy I bought them from said I can either skim it off the top or crank up the heat and use them.

What do/can I do?? I really don't want to waste over $150 worth of product.

 

[BE Mike]

Is asking for your money back an option?

 

[G_Stines]

Wheel weight alloy should melt under or right around 600. Zinc won't liquefy until the High 700s, 787 and change of I remember right. Just keep the pot at abou 620-650 and the solid zinc will float up. Skim it off, and wait for any more to appear. Repeat a couple of times and as long as you get it you will be ok.

 

[straight-shooter]

What G_Stines said.... I'm picking up 1,000 pounds of wheel weights this weekend and guaranteed it has some zinc weights in it. I'll just monitor my temps and skim the floating zinc weights off the top.

 

[NinnJinn]

Is asking for your money back an option?

The eBay lead he claims was clean. In his email he said the lead I bought as a private sale he grabbed as he put it "the dirty lead on accident and wanted to make it right". But I don't know what lead is what since it is all stacked together.

 

[NinnJinn]

Straight shooter: PM sent. Thanks

 

[NinnJinn]

Wheel weight alloy should melt under or right around 600. Zinc won't liquefy until the High 700s, 787 and change of I remember right. Just keep the pot at abou 620-650 and the solid zinc will float up. Skim it off, and wait for any more to appear. Repeat a couple of times and as long as you get it you will be ok.

Rep sent. Thank you!!

 

[straight-shooter]

Straight shooter: PM sent. Thanks

Replied ...

 

[45-70]

The bad thing about zinc is that once alloyed in with lead and tin and antimony it is quite difficult to remove. Go to castboolits.com and look at this thread for more info on the subject HERE

 

[Jarel]

I won't trust zinc floating to the top or not melting at low temps. I don't care how long I spend sorting before I melt. I give every weight a squeeze with side cuts. A lead weight I can leave a mark on. A zinc weight I can not and I kick it out. Slow, yes. But I never have zinc in my bullet alloy. I have done over 2 tons like this.

 

[CountryBoy19]

Wheel weight alloy should melt under or right around 600. Zinc won't liquefy until the High 700s, 787 and change of I remember right. Just keep the pot at abou 620-650 and the solid zinc will float up. Skim it off, and wait for any more to appear. Repeat a couple of times and as long as you get it you will be ok.

That's not the way it works. Once the zinc is alloyed with the lead it becomes one mix of metal that has it's own unique melting temperature. The little molecules of lead won't automatically separate themselves out and float to the top as solid while the lead molecules remain liquid.

That being said, castboolits is going to be the source to figure this problem out. IIRC, zinc contaminated lead looks "frothy" when melted. You can remove some of the zinc with certain procedures but you're never going to get it all without chemical processes.

 

[45pro]

I won't trust zinc floating to the top or not melting at low temps. I don't care how long I spend sorting before I melt. I give every weight a squeeze with side cuts. A lead weight I can leave a mark on. A zinc weight I can not and I kick it out. Slow, yes. But I never have zinc in my bullet alloy. I have done over 2 tons like this.

This is exactly how i do it. Side cuts. Works great, i'm not getting to the point where i can pick one up and tell if its lead or not. you can also hit them across something hard. A Ting-Ting means zinc or steel, a thud-thud is lead. I've melted about 100 lbs so far this way(just starting out) and have not had any zinc or steel in my smelt yet.

 

[jtb]

A small drop of hydrochloric acid will fizzel on ingots containing zinc. Nasty stuff, use protection but a sure way to separate the contaminated ingots.

jim

 

[Slim400]

zink in bullet lead

I will have to agree with most of the other posters the best way to scandal stank off just melts at low heat and just picked them out the ones that won't melt the good news is in less your wheel weights run different mime I only get about three or 4% zinc wheel weights 150 pounds of lead were weights per bucket the time I smelt it gets melts off right at between 112 and 115 actual weight of lead what I'm getting at is presented to the sink is very low and as long as you're casting for you and not selling I don't think it would hurt a thing you can go to cast boolits.com there are some threads there that will tell you how to remove the zink from your lead Hope this helps you in some way

 

[Fishersjohn48]

I will have to agree with most of the other posters the best way to scandal stank off just melts at low heat and just picked them out the ones that won't melt the good news is in less your wheel weights run different mime I only get about three or 4% zinc wheel weights 150 pounds of lead were weights per bucket the time I smelt it gets melts off right at between 112 and 115 actual weight of lead what I'm getting at is presented to the sink is very low and as long as you're casting for you and not selling I don't think it would hurt a thing you can go to cast boolits.com there are some threads there that will tell you how to remove the zink from your lead Hope this helps you in some way

Wait......What?

 

[45pro]

I will have to agree with most of the other posters the best way to scandal stank off just melts at low heat and just picked them out the ones that won't melt the good news is in less your wheel weights run different mime I only get about three or 4% zinc wheel weights 150 pounds of lead were weights per bucket the time I smelt it gets melts off right at between 112 and 115 actual weight of lead what I'm getting at is presented to the sink is very low and as long as you're casting for you and not selling I don't think it would hurt a thing you can go to cast boolits.com there are some threads there that will tell you how to remove the zink from your lead Hope this helps you in some way

Holy run-on sentence batman!