mixing Monotype. HELP!!

[buck1]

Ok well I now am fairly certain I have about a total of about 500 LBS of monotype. When I melt it down I get a sludge on top of the melt.
I mixed a little type 50/50 with WW and got BHN 19-20. But I still get the sludge.
How do you guys handle this sludge? Just skim it off?? What could it be? over sat of tin/ antimony?

Help ! I'm kinda at a loss of how to stabilize this alloy.
Each time I melt it I get more of this sludge out of it. When skimmed off the boolits gain wt.
ANY advice would be great!!! .....Buck

[Bullshop]

Ok well I now am fairly certain I have about a total of about 500 LBS of monotype. When I melt it down I get a sludge on top of the melt.
I mixed a little type 50/50 with WW and got BHN 19-20. But I still get the sludge.
How do you guys handle this sludge? Just skim it off?? What could it be? over sat of tin/ antimony?

Help ! I'm kinda at a loss of how to stabilize this alloy.
Each time I melt it I get more of this sludge out of it. When skimmed off the boolits gain wt.
ANY advice would be great!!! .....Buck

Buck
If what you have is mono type then the sludg is oxidised tin and antimony. You have to flux it back into the melt. I use bee comb rich in wax and bee parts. It will work at lower temp but about700 to 800 works best. other waxes like parifin will work but burn off too fast to get the metals to remix. You need a flux that will burn hot and produce lots of carbon. Bee wax with fine hardwood saw dust will work. Stir the pot well and put the flux on the sludg and light it. While its burning stir gently and cut it with your spoon like you were diceing onions. After the flux is burned off there should bee no metal left on the surface just black dust, carbon light in weight. Skim off the black dust and you will have a smooth shiney surface. You need the increased heat at the surface to get the chemicle reaction to take place. The oxygen has to release from the metal and bond with the carbon and go by by to leave behind nice shiny metal. Hope this helps, have fun!
BIC/BS

[buck1]

THANKS!!
I fluxed it with a parifin flux and as you said it did little to the sludge, burning off quickly. But by chance I have some comb! I will give it and the saw dust a go. I never thought about the extra heat needed! Thanks again ...Buck

[Bass Ackward]

Help ! I'm kinda at a loss of how to stabilize this alloy.
Each time I melt it I get more of this sludge out of it. When skimmed off the boolits gain wt.
ANY advice would be great!!! .....Buck


Buck,

The next time you want to mold bullets, make sure that you have on a pair of claudhoppers before you do this. Steel toes are not necessary.

When it melts, close your eyes. Stand up on your tippy toes and click your heels together three times and repeat this phrase. Mix, flux, mold. If that don't work, .... you might have to load everything up in your truck and head for Kansas.

If that fails, I got bad news. You were meant to be a WW caster.

Mix, flux, mold.

[Bullshop]

Buck1
I forgot to mention that the 50/50 mix you are using is prolly a bit rich in monotype. I make up monotype from pure tin and antimony and W/W. My favorite alloy is a 6WW/1mono blend that will test at about BHN-15 air cooled and BHN-24 quenched. I have used the air cooled to 2500 fps with good results. Of course no normal human can do this without the magic of BS Speed Green lube. The 6/1 mix will cast easily with good fill out and clean sharp edges. This info came straight from the wizzard of OZ himself. Have fun and watch out for them falling houses.
BIC/BS

[BlueMoon]

I bought 50lbs of linotype from the state below mine, Louisiana, and it came in a box of pcs of type, sheet metal looking pcs that I was told were spacers etc.

I was tempted to just add the pcs to my Lee bottom pour pot and mix ww's in but was warned that I better cast into ingots and clean it up some. I did, and was surpprised how much crud came up. I was worried about scimming off some tin or antimony but after fluxing and mixing, I finally had to clean the crud off the top of the melt.

I cast a few flat nosed bullets to use in my Saeco hardness tester and it showed to be BHN 27-28 or monotype. The hard cast bullets that I had been using tested out at about 17 1/2 BHN so I had to mix a bunch of ww's and lead into the mono to get the most out of it. I just wish I had a better source of ww's as the stock car racers tend to buy it up around here.

Bill

[9.3X62AL]

Blue Moon--welcome to the Board, sir.

I had some of this same effect when I blended foundry type with WW's in the past. The flux used largely allowed the foamy crud to alloy all right, but it took several attempts to reach success. At the time, I just figured it to be part of the alchemy associated with cast boolit metallurgy, and accepted it as the unbanked learning curve part of the deal. Thanks to all the above for the explanations of what was going on, and how to refine the process. I'll be doing some more of the same in the near future.

This place is so cool.

[buck1]

Of course it rained today ! So I will have to try it on friday.I guess I was just not fluxing enugh . I thought a coupple of times with a dime sized bit of wax would do it! Now I know better!!!!!!!!!!!
OK , mix flux mold, mix flux mold, mix flux mold, Some of us just need to beat over the head with a stick before we get it !!! LOL I will do it right this time.Thanks again!!! Buck ;)
PS
Just a passing thought.. I bet shavings from a pencil sharpener would do well as a flux?? LOTS OF CARBON anyway.
Endeavoring to persevere!! And crawl my way up the learning curve. Now if I could just find that dog! Toto here boy.........buck

[David R]

Would the corncob I use in the tumbler be a decent flux instead of sawdust?

I don't have sawdust. Wood and I don't get a long. I am more of a metal man. In fact, they call me lightning with a hammer cause I never strike the same place twice.

I find this interesting because I use a pice of a sledge hammer handle to cut the sprues. When I dump them back in the lead, it smells good from the small wood chips.

[Willbird]

I have used clean corncob......but you will learn of a new kind of stink.....the stuff smells like burning bandaids hehe


Bill

[David R]

Bill,

Have you ever used salvaged lead pipes? The ones for stuff going OUT of the house? Another fine smell :)

I will try the corncob in the garage with the door open.

[buck1]

Buck1
I forgot to mention that the 50/50 mix you are using is prolly a bit rich in monotype. I make up monotype from pure tin and antimony and W/W. My favorite alloy is a 6WW/1mono blend that will test at about BHN-15 air cooled and BHN-24 quenched. I have used the air cooled to 2500 fps with good results. Of course no normal human can do this without the magic of BS Speed Green lube. The 6/1 mix will cast easily with good fill out and clean sharp edges. This info came straight from the wizzard of OZ himself. Have fun and watch out for them falling houses.
BIC/BS
Bullshop, That was the ticket!! I loaded on the wood dust and wax, then a match. Now thats a fire!! the sludge went back in to the melt. Then the 11QT. BHN 24 alloyed batch went in to ingots!! and then the 8qt. BHN 16 batch went in to ingots. I'm beat! its 106F outside! I'm headed for the shower!!!!! Thanks again everybody!!!!!!!!!! ....buck

[Bullshop]

Bullshop, That was the ticket!! I loaded on the wood dust and wax, then a match. Now thats a fire!! the sludge went back in to the melt. Then the 11QT. BHN 24 alloyed batch went in to ingots!! and then the 8qt. BHN 16 batch went in to ingots. I'm beat! its 106F outside! I'm headed for the shower!!!!! Thanks again everybody!!!!!!!!!! ....buck

Buck1
So glad to hear of your success for your sake and mine. For you it will just make things work better, and for me well its kind of a credibility thing. But realy this is the only way to keep consistant weight and hardness from batch to batch. So the learning curve continues and each new thuth discovered builds on to perfection for us all. Aint this sight great!
BIC/BS

[David R]

I have been casting for almost 20 years and didn't know about the sawdust. I always used a birthday candle, or some lube. I usually add some boolit lube and stir. I scrape off what ever is on top and keep casting. Yesterday I took that stuff I skimmed off and put it back in the pot with some corncob out of the tumbler and boolit lube. I only had 1/2 of what I had thrown back in. The rest had gone back into the melt.

Thanks Bullshop

[buck1]

I had tryed sawdust before but I didnt do it right. I had gave up on it . But I "get it " now!! And yes this place is a casters deram!!!! ......Buck

[StarMetal]

Another flux neglected to be mentioned is solder flux that you use when soldering copper wire or such. The kind of flux that comes in a can. Expensive, but it does work and you don't use much.

Joe

[waksupi]

I had tryed sawdust before but I didnt do it right. I had gave up on it . But I "get it " now!! And yes this place is a casters deram!!!! ......Buck

Buck, deram is what you have to do to Carpetman every once in awhile!

[buck1]

Someday, I -will- learn to type!! LOL!

[carpetman]

buck1---Pencil sharpener shavings would probably work. Just be careful it's pencil shavings. If it were the one they used to circumcise Howdy Doody it might stink.

[BABore]

I'm very new to casting. Actually I've only made ingots from my scavaged WW. So far I've melted down and casted 300 lbs in 3 seperate runs. Being a newbie I've tried lots of different fluxing agents to see what each would do. I'm melting in a 4 qt dutch oven over a turkey burner. Here's what I found;

Candle Wax (3/4" dia x 3/4" long)
Ignites easily but hard to see if you get it mixed in well. Seemed to clean up the WW's well. Very little to skim off.

Marvelux (1 tsp)
Fluxed pretty well. No smoke.Black greasy scum was hard to skim off. Residue left on tools will collect moisture. No explosions yet but am limiting use.

Sawdust (handful)
Decent fluxing. Wouldn't self combust. Didn't try to light it up. Takes a bit to skim off when burnt up.

Crushed Charcoal (handful)
Very good fluxing. Longer wait time. Hard to skim.

Sawdust (handful) + Candle Wax (3/4" dia x 3/4" long)
Awesome fluxing properties. The wax causes self ingition for a good long burn. Easy to mix in well. Skimming same as just sawdust.

Sawdust + Olive Oil
Yet to try, but heard it works even better.

In all fluxes used, I never really had to skim anything off other than the fluxing agent. I'm still in the learning stages, but figure it doesn't hurt to experiment.

[David R]

I tried the marvelux, and my dipper got coated with this stuff. When I dipped it next time, It boiled and made a bunch of caos. It seemed to have a coating on it that held moisture. Never used it again.

[HTRN]

Since we're on about flux and such, I thought I should throw my two cents in...

First a little story about last weekend - after coming home from the Valley Forge gunshow, and having a couple of hours to kill before going barhopping, a buddy and I decided to reduce my wheel weight pile some by casting ingots. After skimming the damn clips out(anybody here ever try a magnet? I'm gonna make a gizmo for doing this) I realized I didn't get any flux handy so off to the kitchen for some cooking oil. Well, it did a fine job of fluxing BUT it made such a blackened oily mess that I would only do it again in an emergency.

Wesson is not your friend folks! :-x Next time it's candle stubs... We'll see how that works out.

Some info: Commercial smelters all use sawdust because it's CHEAP. They can buy it for next to nothing from sawmills. I would try it, but I have no ready source for it. I'm thinking about using ground up walnut shells that they sell in pet stores for birds(I think).

Here's a thought: Fluxes for Lead are organic, that's why most of the seemingly unconnected materials us Pb shooters use for flux work. Virtually any kind of organic residue would probably work, some better than others.


HTRN