What the heck did I buy????

[BBQJOE]

I found this in the lead dumpster at the junk yard. It's nothing but heavy.
I thought it was pure lead until I went after it with a sawzall. The blade didn't melt through like it should.
I'm guessing the stamp might have said WESTERN.

I tried scratching it with a pure lead ingot. Nothing.
I then tried a WW ingot. Again nothing.
A 70/30 ingot will scratch it.
Any ideas what this puppy is?

I'm thinking maybe I should just sell it back to them if I can't figure out what it's made of.

72747

[Trey45]

Zinc maybe?

[ku4hx]

Sailboat ballast. They fit together in a certain pattern to match the contour of the hull. When mated with its "puzzle pieces" you'd have a completed section intended for the boat's stern.

That or Zinc sacrificial anodes that are to be mounted at the stern of a steel hulled boat..

[BBQJOE]

I guess back it goes.
I paid lead prices for it, they better take it back as such.

[GlocksareGood]

Squirt some hydrochloric acid on it and see if it bubbles. You can buy it at HD or Lowes as brick acid or muratic acid. If it is zinc or has zinc in it you will know. I take an eye dropper bottle full with me when I go to the scrap yard for testing mystery metal.

[Skip62]

Squirt some hydrochloric acid on it and see if it bubbles. You can buy it at HD or Lowes as brick acid or muratic acid. If it is zinc or has zinc in it you will know. I take an eye dropper bottle full with me when I go to the scrap yard for testing mystery metal.

So what does it do different on lead than zinc? Does it do anything on steel?
Thanks

[Norbrat]

That or Zinc sacrificial anodes that are to be mounted at the stern of a steel hulled boat..

Wrong shape for anodes. They are usually streamlined.


So what does it do different on lead than zinc? Does it do anything on steel?
Thanks

Hydrochloric acid won't affect lead, but will cause bubbling on zinc and less so on steel. Steel is easy to check for; use a magnet.

[Skip62]

Thanks Norbrat, good info

[Geppetto]

Joe, I can tell you what it is if you send me a small shaving, PM coming.

[Scharfschuetze]

I had a friend give me five of those ingots a couple of weeks ago. I'll have to try that acid trick on them. Hopefully they are just lead without zinc.

Mine weigh 60 pounds each and are about twice the length of the one above. I've never had to melt down this much lead before. Any tips on reducing these to a usable size?

[MtGun44]

Ternplate is tin plated steel. My guess is tin.

If so you did good.

If it said Western, who knows.

Bill

[mroliver77]

I have lead ingots like that only twice as long with the step on each end. They came from a drawbridge counterweight. I think that is a standard industry ingot design. Mine is just lead. I bet it is good stuff. You can cut with a circular saw, a chainsaw or an axe works good. I use a circular saw with carbide blade and blade is fine for wood after using it.
What is scrap lead price now?
jay

[Scharfschuetze]

I figured that the ingot was a counter weight of some sort, but I never thought about ballast for a boat. No salt or other bilge detritus on 'em so I bet they're from the a fore mentioned draw bridge or some other machine or device.

[ku4hx]

Wrong shape for anodes.

Not if they've been chopped for salvage.

[mold maker]

Buying unknown is either feast or famine. Arm yourself with acid and a magnet before you go. You'll save yourself lots of aggravation and maybe money to.
You can also carry examples of hardness materials to scratch with.
I bought over 33 lbs of high tin solder, in 1/2 lb ingots, for lead prices. You don't have to be an Einstein to take advantage of the scrap yard prices.
Be sure if you take metal to sell, that you remove every screw etc from the copper/aluminum/brass/zinc, you take to sell. Mixed metals pay only the cheapest of the combo. Dicker with the scrappy to buy the same way.

[44man]

Top scrap yards have a tester and they will tell you what is in the metal in a few seconds.

[BBQJOE]

I had a friend give me five of those ingots a couple of weeks ago. I'll have to try that acid trick on them. Hopefully they are just lead without zinc.

Mine weigh 60 pounds each and are about twice the length of the one above. I've never had to melt down this much lead before. Any tips on reducing these to a usable size?
This has been broken in half, so it probably looked like the example above. I found similar pics when searching sail boat ballast. I imagine though it could be weights for anything. maybe even a forklift. I did see one post somewhere stating that these kinds of weights could be any number of alloys. Again, it's harder than wheel weights and softer than superhard.
I may take you up on you offer geppeto.

[earthling121757]

There is a grade of zinc called "Prime Western".

There's a couple things you could try....

Measure all the dimensions and calculate a rough volume then weigh it and calculate it's density.

Take a drill and drill out some shavings and put in a test tube, or shot glass or whatever. Add a few drops of battery acid. If bubbles start to form it's probably zinc. I think even vinegar might work for this test too, but is very slow.

If it's zinc, depending on how much it weighs, contact shadygrady and trade him for lead.

[shadygrady]

thats right do no take it to the junk yard send it to me for lead

[BBQJOE]

Take a drill and drill out some shavings and put in a test tube, or shot glass or whatever. Add a few drops of battery acid. If bubbles start to form it's probably zinc. I think even vinegar might work for this test too, but is very slow.

If it's zinc, depending on how much it weighs, contact shadygrady and trade him for lead.
If you look at the original pic, it looks as if someone may have done that already.

I don't have a scale available at the time, I could probably weigh it in a few days though. I'm willing to bet it's every bit of 30 lbs.
The ups guy would hate me.
The post office even more, but I guess they say if it fits it ships, right?

[Teddy (punchie)]

I had some pure zinc it will look like the galvanize on a bucket if you chip it. Zinc takes a huge amount of heat I tried to cut it is hard , I end up breaking it. Was used for boat anker. One good snag bad rope was lost.

[BBQJOE]

There is a grade of zinc called "Prime Western".

There's a couple things you could try....


Take a drill and drill out some shavings and put in a test tube, or shot glass or whatever. Add a few drops of battery acid. If bubbles start to form it's probably zinc.
I just tried that. No bubbles.

[garym1a2]

Maybe its Babbit, take a small peice and see if it melts at a lower temp than lead. Babbit and high tin base alloys tend to melt at lower temps than lead.

[BBQJOE]

Maybe its Babbit, take a small peice and see if it melts at a lower temp than lead. Babbit and high tin base alloys tend to melt at lower temps than lead.
How would you suggest this test? All I have is a propane torch, a lee pot, and a thermometer.
It sure would be sweet if it had a mess of tin in it.

[BBQJOE]

I cut a few chunks off it with a screw driver and hammer. It just looks like lead to me. It will write on paper if that means anything.

72830

[Wayne Smith]

Melt some in your Lee pot, measure the melt temp with your thermometer. Let us know the melt temp., or go to the LASCUS site and look it up yourself. If it is babbit or tin rich you will want to cast it into boolit sized ingots anyway!

[BBQJOE]

72844 72845

Ok, curiosity having the better of me, I hacked a chunk off and did a quick pour using just a ladle over heat.
It made a pretty good looking bullet. Nicely filled out I think.
As soon as it was totally cool, I took my saeco BHN tester to it. It hit the 10 mark, giving it a bhn around 21.
As you can see by the second pic, it can be scratched with a finger nail. I've never poured anything this hard. Is it too hard for handgun?

[garandsrus]

It looks like you may have some type metal which is good stuff...

[Dale in Louisiana]

'tern plate' is actually 'terne plate'. it was a tin-lead plating commonly used on the insides of steel gas tanks, particularly in the marine world. Those old steel five an six-gallon tanks for outboards? Tern-plate on the inside so they wouldn't corrode from moisture in the fuel. Galvanizing wouldn't work because of acids in the moisture that would eat the zinc.

The bar? Somebody had to do the tern-plating. Maybe you got a chunk from that process. Should be some alloy of lead and tin, usually 80 lead, 20 tin.

dale in Louisiana

[BBQJOE]

My mentor says bhn 21, and scratching it with a finger nail don't exist in the same universe.
Maybe this saeco tester is a ***.

[mroliver77]

It is good stuff joe. Too good to use straight for pistol. I would cut 50/50 with pure lead if you have it. Maybe even 2/1.
Geppeto offered to analyze it for you. You would know then what you have and how best to alloy with it. Tin and antimony are too precious to waste!
J

[MtGun44]

+1 on mroliver77.

Bill

[outdoorfan]

My mentor says bhn 21, and scratching it with a finger nail don't exist in the same universe.
Maybe this saeco tester is a ***.

Agreed

[earthling121757]

My mentor says bhn 21, and scratching it with a finger nail don't exist in the same universe.
Maybe this saeco tester is a ***.

I noticed the bullet in the right hand pic has a dent in the top. Is this where you tested the hardness?

I've never used a Saeco tester (I have a Lee) but usually the hardness is tested on a flat spot. You might want to take a file to the end of the bullet and make a nice flat, at least twice as big as the indentation and try testing it again. I too was surprised when you said it tested 21 Bhn but you could scratch it with your fingernail.

[mdi]

[QUOTE=Norbrat;2249046]Wrong shape for anodes. They are usually streamlined.

Anodes come in all shapes and sizes. Some are used on the metal parts outside the hull, and some are used inside as engine anodes. My 30' sailboat used 6 anodes; on the prop shaft, on the rudder, and in the engine cooling system, all different shapes. I believe the "acid test" will give you the best info....

[BBQJOE]

Just got the test results back from a very helpful member here.
Element Weight Percent
Lead 90.38
Antimony 8.58
Tin 1.03

I suppose this might need a little lead added, or is it about perfect?

[MtGun44]

Pretty darned good for rifle boolits, harder and more Sb that needed for pistol. I'd
probably cut it 50-50 with Pb and at a touch of tin if it needs it for good fill out.

Bill

[BBQJOE]

I cut it up with a sawzall and got it smelted into ingots, and found a surprise or two inside. The picture does it zero justice. The clumps didn't want to melt and floated to the top. When cooled I whacked one with a hammer, it cracked and the inside is real fine grained and very sparkly. Pretty heavy too.

76228

[MtGun44]

Tungsten chunks? Very weird stuff.

Bill

[MaryB]

Looks kind of like a picture I saw of antimony, remembered where I saw the picture, over on rotometals

http://a248.e.akamai.net/origin-cdn.volusion.com/tfqy4.mpkx6/v/vspfiles/photos/ANTIMONY-1.jpg?1370172295

[Doc1]

I hate to break this to you, but you have acquired a sample of the deadly TERN isotope. First isolated in the Manhatten Project to produce America's first atomic bomb, TERN is an acronym for "Terminal Exposure - Radiation Nuclear". Anyone coming within 500 miles of this stuff is guaranteed to die...at some future point in time. I'm sorry to report that there is no cure for this exposure and the results are invariably 100% fatal! Thousands of boolet casters have succumbed to this horrible threat over the decades...and thousands more will in the future. Needless to say, the government has covered this up for years.

I suggest that you begin to get your affairs in order and donate all of your firearms and casting supplies to board members here. As I was the first to clear up the mystery and tried to put your mind at ease, may I humbly suggest that I be considered as the first beneficiary of your bequest?

Oh...by the way, don't send the TERN.

Best regards
Doc

[Geppetto]

Well if curiosity gets the best of you, I could always run an EDS on that mystery chunk and figure out what that is too.

The picture of antimony looks pretty close. And I'd suppose if this was just an ingot for further production or some type of ballast weight, they probably didn't care too much about homogeneity and inclusions. Could be some slag or refractory also. Although you mentioned its heavy, which kind of rules out slag.

[fecmech]

That ingot looks just like the ones in the video of lead production back in the 40's that was posted recently. My guess would be that it was an ingot possibly ordered as a specific alloy for some purpose .If you go to the end of the video you will see them pouring and stacking those ingots.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6HhdkkdsvTM

[Randy C]

76286

I have to figure out what this is It is hard, finger nail will barley show a mark and magnet don't stick to it. It come from a gun show.

[mroliver77]

Randy that is from a linotype ingot mold. Weather it is lino is unknown. If it is lino it will break after bending a little.

[Randy C]

Randy that is from a linotype ingot mold. Weather it is lino is unknown. If it is lino it will break after bending a little.

Thank you how do I check it's composition. so I can use it like WW.

[BBQJOE]

76286

I have to figure out what this is It is hard, finger nail will barley show a mark and magnet don't stick to it. It come from a gun show.
You'd better not be banging on that with a hammer on mama's dining room table!

[mroliver77]

I would assume it is linotype. If you search around the net you can find charts to tell the weight difference from ww or other lead alloys. You can also find charts on how to mix it to come up with certain popular alloys.Lots of info over on castpics.
J

[Randy C]

You'd better not be banging on that with a hammer on mama's dining room table!

I'm busted it rings like a bell

[Scharfschuetze]

When my local newspaper was switching from linotype to offset printing, I bought a bunch of those LT ingots and mixed em with COWW for years afterwards. I didn't want to lug them around anymore so on a PCS move I gave the remaining ingots away. Wish I hadn't given them away. They really mix up some good rifle alloy.

[Scharfschuetze]

Gepetto just tested samples from the ballast ingots given to me a few months ago.

Here are his results:

1. Weight 1 is marked: "United":
Lead 97.02%
Antimony 2.70%
Tin 0.28%

2. Weight 2 is marked: "BB & S"
Lead 100%

3. Weight 3 is unmarked.
Lead 98.22%
Antimony 1.48%
Tin 0.30% - Note: I am not 100% on the tin content in this sample, there may not be much, if any, tin. If not, the balance would go to lead, yielding 98.52% Pb and 1.48% Sb.

You can see that these ballast weights have the potential to produce some great alloy for just about any type of cast bullet shooting.

Many thanks to Gepetto, a true friend of all here, for his generosity with his time and skill!