Are WWs still worth the effort??

[Gunslinger]

I just picked up 400lbs of WWs today. Or should I say - I wished it was 400lbs of WWs. Last time it was the same story...

The amount of #### and junk I found in the buckets is just alarming:

Valve stems, nuts, bolts, snotrags, empty oil cans, cigarettes, old gloves, broken screwdrivers, tape and all other imaginable kinds of garbage!! Oh, and it was soaked in sewage and oil :twisted:

I have a nice new car with leather interior. And now my trunk is filled with 400lbs of stinking #### :confused:

If I'm lucky I'll end up with what... 200lbs of usefull WWs... IF I'm lucky. I paid $40 for it. The guy who owns the scrapyard is a friend of mine he told me that next time the price would be 5 times as high! Then I'm calling the quits on the weights. I have and endless supply of rang lead that I'm the only one who bothers digging out. And when I get my hands on lino... I don't need the WWs anymore.

Have I just been unlucky or does this happen to you guys as well??

[Willbird]

I think you should just sell me all the WW you can get for .10 per lb, you are right they are very troublesome and not for the faint of heart ;-), I will put them with the (2) 55 gallon drums full I already have.

Lino has not been used in what 30 years ??

Bill

[imashooter2]

Sounds like they aren't worth it to you. I doubt that you'll find a lot of folks here that will feel the same way.

I'm curious though... If you're getting these from a scrap yard, why did you buy all the trash? You should have done the sort on premises and only bought lead.

[Gunslinger]

Here I think it's more like 10-15 years since they switched to digital. I know a guy ho has close to 2000lbs of lino.... and he only casts like a 1000 boolits a year. Gotta find a way to get af few hundred lbs away from him!


Sounds like they aren't worth it to you. I doubt that you'll find a lot of folks here that will feel the same way.

I'm curious though... If you're getting these from a scrap yard, why did you buy all the trash? You should have done the sort on premises and only bought lead.

I quess I could have done that. I picked it up in my lunch brake. And it probably would have taken me 2 hrs to sort everything out. And it's not like the trash weighs anythin...

Now don't get me wrong... I have nothing against sorting the zinc and steel weights from the lead ones. It just bothers me when filthy mechanics use the WWs bucket as a trash can and a toilet!

[mtgrs737]

I am lucky, my WW's only come with valve stems, nuts, a few pop cans, nails, wire, tire lables, and patch plastic in them. I get a lot of brass valve stems that a friend cleans of steel nuts, valve cores and takes to the salvage metal buyer. I am going to stop by today to pick up more ww's from my best supplier, I get about a 5 gallon bucket a month! They are glad to see me as they don't have to haul them and I am happy to get the weights! I find that WW's are almost the perfect alloy for the type of casting and loading I do. After the change over to zinc and steel life will not be so good! I suppect that we will have to start buying more casting alloy at a much higher price! Better stock up while you can. Good luck!

[DLCTEX]

I'm the lucky one. My WW come from friends who have tire shops, and I'm on good terms with the employees, so I only get clean WW, free. They even sort out the zinc and iron now that they know what to look for. Reminds me, I need to go by tomorrow and buy a round of fountain drinks.

[mpmarty]

Y'all sure know how to hurt a guy.
I pay $50.00 a five gallon bucket for clean used WWs. The tire shops claim that's what the battery manufacturers pay for it. On the other hand, since the management of the tire shops know the battery company won't take zinc or steel weights I don't have to sort them out. I don't know for sure but I think the heaping five gallon bucket weighs well over a hundred pounds.

[mooman76]

I usually get 90% lead after getting rid of all the trash.

[bbs70]

When I buy lead from a scrap yard its usually in big cardboard boxes and its easy to see whats in it.
From tire or car dealers, I have been using a 50 lb hand held spring scale.
So I have to dump some of their bucket of weights into a bucket I bring along so as not to go over the scales limit.
That way if I see any trash I can pick it out.
So far I have been pretty lucky.
But I just bought a 330 lb platform scale so I don't have to go through the routine of doing 50 lbs at a time, maybe that was a mistake.:???:

[boommer]

Wheel weights are going for 10cents a pound now this is what a buddy of mine is paying for them he has two scrap yards here and tried to get some soft lead off of him couple weeks ago and he said nothing has been coming in since the price has crashed, but then he calls me Wednesday and tells me to go to this other scrap yard they have what you want and I go talk to the owner, its set up. so I get there went into office and told who I was, says lets go in back, the skid has 15 #lead blocks dead soft and 57 bars of kester e bar 35/63.2, 6 full bags of shot , he said 40 cents a pound SOLD!!! 1320# 528$ NO SMELTING (GOD LOVES ME) at least today.
The kicker of it is 700# pounds of it I got for my buddy who wants to start casting I think I'm
spoiling him right off the bat!

[Shiloh]

There is some un-pleasantness associated with the acquisition and processing of raw materials into a finished product. The pay-off is the finished product. How else would we shoot without wheel weights??

Shiloh

[orygun_native]

The guy who owns the scrapyard is a friend of mine he told me that next time the price would be 5 times as high! Then I'm calling the quits on the weights. I have and endless supply of rang lead that I'm the only one who bothers digging out. And when I get my hands on lino... I don't need the WWs anymore.

Have I just been unlucky or does this happen to you guys as well??

Sounds like the scrappy is trying to price himself out of business. You may want to inform him that in case he's been living in a cave that lead prices have gone down. Either way it sounds like he's being a pain in the ass. If it were me I'd find another supplier.

[Leadforbrains]

I don't know about everyone else, but I am so happy to get a bucket of wheelweights that sorting them from the trash, zinc and iron is a labor of love for me.
The end justifies the means:

[FN in MT]

It seems that I will have two or three negative WW situation.....then a REALLY nice one comes along that raises you up and everything is OK again. After three seperate days of wasting my time going to tire shops and our scrap yard I finally fell into 550#'s of CLEAN WW's for $55. Layed them out on the garage floor and I didn't have enough stems or garbage to fill a 6 oz coffee cup!!

I can surely understand getting tired of dealing with buckets full of everything from cigarette butts and chew (SPIT!) to more tire stems than WW's. Then throw in ZINC wt's and it CAN get disgruntling.

Still the best alloy option I can find though.

FN in MT

[HeavyMetal]

I think you need to speak to your "scrap" guy!

If I go to may local scarp yard I can get lead and only lead and it won't have trash in it cause I won't take it like that and a good yard shouldn't sell it that way!

If I go to a tire shop I know, and expect, some trash in the bucket's. These guys are mounting and balencing tires trying to make a living and any hady bucket is a trash can!

As far as cost going up? You ned to wake this guy up! Scrap guys here in LA are paying a nickle a pound for the stuff if you can get them to take it!

Point in fact I've seen three yards this last week close because of the drop in metal prices!

I'd find someone else to deal with if this guy insists on continuing to offer "junk" to you!

[Gunslinger]

Yeah, I think I will look for other sources. I don't have to be quite so desperate anymore. I know someone who has about 200lbs of clean lead ww. Him I will definately give a call.

I just found a scrapyard chain and called their main storage facility. They have 10 tons lying around. Don't really need that much. But then again, if those 10 tons goes out of the country we are left in a poor shape. That chain covers 20% of the country.