Lead supply question

[Nate1778]

Hello I am fairly new to reloading and am already thinking about casting my own bullets. I am a roofing contractor by trade and have access to a fairly large amount of lead plumbing vent flashings as we replace them when we redo a roof. As a matter of fact if I thought about how many tons of lead flashing I have simply tossed you guys may shriek. My question is are these a good source for lead. If so what is there composition, they flex very easily so I am guessing they are very close to pure lead. We also use Solder for tin work so I have the tin portion out of the way as well. One last issue to this is most shingles now a days use zinc and copper embedded in the shingle to fight algae growth, will the possible wash over zinc be an issue or would the amount be so minuscule it won't matter. Obviously by the time we replace a roof the chemicals are long gone. Any good recipies for this kind of lead source?

PS if anybody in the Louisville Ky area is making shot I have lead, would be willing to trade for shot.

[Gerry N.]

Flashings are for all practical purposes, pure lead. Any factory soldered joints use some weird alloys and will make your bullet metal so hard it rings so trim solder joints away carefully, Same goes for telephone cable shielding and lead plumbing vents. As for alloy recipes, I've already found more here than I can possibly use, just in an hour or two of surfing.

Gerry N.

[cabezaverde]

Hello I am fairly new to reloading and am already thinking about casting my own bullets. I am a roofing contractor by trade and have access to a fairly large amount of lead plumbing vent flashings as we replace them when we redo a roof. As a matter of fact if I thought about how many tons of lead flashing I have simply tossed you guys may shriek. My question is are these a good source for lead. If so what is there composition, they flex very easily so I am guessing they are very close to pure lead. We also use Solder for tin work so I have the tin portion out of the way as well. One last issue to this is most shingles now a days use zinc and copper embedded in the shingle to fight algae growth, will the possible wash over zinc be an issue or would the amount be so minuscule it won't matter. Obviously by the time we replace a roof the chemicals are long gone. Any good recipies for this kind of lead source?

PS if anybody in the Louisville Ky area is making shot I have lead, would be willing to trade for shot.

Hi Nate, welcome to the board.

Congratulations on having such a great source. I hate you.

[jnovotny]

Welcome aboard Nate, if you have too much of those roof jacks you can always send em to me. No really, you can probably trade some for some wheel weights here on this site.

[Nate1778]

Thanks for the welcome. :drinks: Wish I had started collecting earlier. Thanks for the tip on the factory solder, maybe I can use small segments of it to harden the pure lead.

For the record as a roofing contractor, if someone called me looking for these flashings I would hang on to them for someone. May be as good a source as tire weights at a tire store. I would guess there is roughly 4 pounds per lead. Just a thought for those looking for lead.

[Leadforbrains]

:drinks: Welcome aboard Nate! You are my new best friend!:mrgreen:

[454PB]

I've never used roof vent flashing, but I have used cable sheathing. On cable sheathing, the joints are soldered, so all they contain is tin and lead. Tin does little to harden lead, but it sure makes it cast nicely.

[warriorsociologist]

Welcome aboard!


Now, I don't suppose you live/work in WI....do you?

[smilie=1:

:drinks:

[docone31]

A shop keep next to us is a full time Roofing Contractor. I finally found that out. His crew usually tosses them but now that he knows I am interested, he drops them off behind my shop. I fix his broken jewelery in exchange.
I usually get several asphalt covered vent pipes each weeked. Not too many, but enough to keep casting.
That lead is what I call sweet lead. If there is any tin in it, it is slight. I mix it with my wheel weights and get real nice castings.
Wheel weights have dried up here. They are mostly zinc now.
The vents are a welcome addition to my dwindling supply.

[Down South]

Welcome aboard.......The roof flashings will work well mixed with WW for low to medium loads, even some higher velosity loads.

[Nate1778]

We use a Lead/Tin solder I believe it is in the 55/45% stuff. This should work for my supply of tin correct. Thanks for all the advice and the welcome. Look forward to learning from you guys....

[FN in MT]

Save it ALL Nate! The writing is on the wall; we are going to be SAVED by the well meaning politico's. LEAD in WW's , ammo, everything..... may become a thing of the past.

Welcome to the Forum. And...I hate You as well!! You Lucky bastard.

FN in MT

The last sentence was an attempt at HUMOR.

[Green Frog]

Nate, before my father retired from the commercial roofing company (of which he was vice president) he kept a 5 gallon bucket in the shop for lead flashing trimmings. He's been retired for almost 20 years and I've got some of that lead I haven't even put into pigs yet. This is my MAIN source of pure lead, which, when mixed with pure tin or bar solder of known alloy, is the only thing I have used for years to make my 25-1 lead-tin alloy for all of my BPCS and Schuetzen bullets. This is in my opinion the best commonly available source of good lead in abundant quantities. Enjoy your bounty!!

Froggie

PS Need lead for muzzle loaders? You've got it! If you want stuff like wheel weights, linotype, etc. for alloy, you can probably do some swapping with the front stuffer community. GF

[Nate1778]

Green Frog I will definitely be interested doing some swapping. I need to acquire a stash as this has just dawned on me. Coarse right now I am looking at 4" of snow so not much roofing is taking place. I will put the word out to my guys as well as a couple other roofing gigs here in town though.

We are a Commercial roofing contractor by trade but do our fair amount of residential and Copper work. If only we could cast from copper, I have more of it than I know what to do with. I would guess the melting temperature of copper would be to high for that though. has anybody ever tried.

As soon as I get a stash I'll PM you, it may be a month or two.........


PS I have no problem with forum banter, I am a forum junkie so kidding around for me is the norm.........

[montana_charlie]

My neighbor is a roofing contractor...and just started shooting a Pedersoli Sharps (that I helped him acquire). When we were talking about casting he mentioned they 'throw away tons' of lead every year. Our 'deal' is he gives me those 'tons' and I cast his bullets.
He's had the rifle for about a month, now, and he's brought me fifty pounds...and fired 15 bullets. This might work out well.

But, Nate, I have a question for you as a roofing contractor. I would ask my neighbor, but he's so dang busy it's hard to get his attention.

You obviously have access to lead through your suppliers...but, do they also carry tin?
If so, what do they charge you for it?

CM

[Nate1778]

You obviously have access to lead through your suppliers...but, do they also carry tin?
If so, what do they charge you for it?

CM



Today's tin used for roofing is an alloy comprised mostly of steel. There is in fact very little tin in tin anymore, compared to yesteryear. What you would look for is solder used by a tinsmith. The solder we use can have up 50% tin in it for soldering panels together. It usually sells buy the lb starting at 50lbs, and it fluctuates with the market. I would have to check to see what I have and would be willing to let some go. You might also get in touch with a roofing distributor in your area and see if they will sell several bars.

[Dean D.]

We are a Commercial roofing contractor by trade but do our fair amount of residential and Copper work. If only we could cast from copper, I have more of it than I know what to do with.

How thick is that copper sheathing? Pat Marlin offers a slick gas checker that uses .010 copper sheet. Just a thought... :mrgreen: :coffee:

[copdills]

Welcome to the forum Nate:drinks:

[Green Frog]

Nate,

Dad brought home the ends of those solder sticks/bars that you could still read the alloy stamp on, but were too small for the guys in the shop to mess with... I got lucky in a swap and got some pure tin also, but those solder drops were a treasure when they were available. I just did a little Algebra and proportions to figure how much of the solder was tin (by weight) and then added enough lead to make my desired alloy. I guess if I were doing one of the multi-metallic alloys with antimony, etc, I could do the same thing. :confused:

BTW, years ago I had a guy on another forum ask how he could get his pure lead to the same alloy as wheel weights. My response to him then was, that was like saying he had a date with Britney Spears and asking how he could make her look like Tammy Faye Baker. I offered to swap him a bunch of WW in clean pigs two for one for pure lead with as much lead as I had already. Remember, you can always alloy the pure stuff, and it's good to know what you are starting with... read some of the threads on this forum about contaminants and how to make something out of an unknown alloy somebody has found. Life is too short to drink cheap beer or try to sort out mystery alloys!! :drinks:

Regards,
Froggie

[montana_charlie]

Today's tin used for roofing is an alloy comprised mostly of steel. There is in fact very little tin in tin anymore, compared to yesteryear. What you would look for is solder used by a tinsmith.
I can tell you are new...
When one of us asks about 'tin', you can bet we're not talking about sheet metal.

If your distributor sells you lead sheet, he may also handle ingots.
If he can supply lead ingots, maybe he stocks tin ingots.

THAT's what I'm asking about. Does 'tin' (Sn) appear in his catalog?
CM

[unstableryan]

A long time ago, my grandma gave me a not very big lead bar with 109 lb and the mine's name cast into it.. I was no where near casting bullets then and I'm not now, but closer... I just thought it was kind of cool to have such a strange heavy object. But I digress...

So from reading this, with 109 pounds of lead, How much tin (and antimony?) do I need to cast nice boolits for my rifle? I have a 1895 Marlin in 45-70 and I find that I like heavy hard cast boolits (400-500gr). I've actually never tried heavy soft cast ones though.

Too bad shipping is based on weight, or it might be worth something eh?


Ryan

[snaggdit]

I checked around town and the local tire shop has 6 5 gallon buckets of WW available for $20 each. I went to my nornal repair shop and he gave me a full 5 gallons for free. just the other day, I stopped by (2 months later) and he had another full 5 gallons. I'm keeping up with the supply... I found an auction on the hated Ebay for 99.9% tin snippets and got them for ~$5 a lb. Same with Antimony. I know it is not popular on this site, but it is a source...