A little ww help is asked for

[reloaders4you]

I have just got into casting and have a source for ww's. After picking up my first 125 pounds, i noticed 3 different types. A stick on, a almost iron feeling ww and a regular looking(lead) ww. So my question is, should i throw them all into the pot and melt away or what. Any info would be great.

[docone31]

Were it me, I would melt the wheel weights at about 680*. Give or take. Any zinc wheel weights will be very slow melting. Put them aside.
The stick ons, I would melt seperately. They make good blending additions, or if you are a front stuffer, good prime castings.
If, you end up with a batch with zinc in it. You can remelt at a lower temp, and skim off a lot of zinc. I have some zinc in my batches. That doesn't bother me much. Too much zinc, and the bottom pours clog, lousey fill out, light weight castings.

[xr650]

I seperate in three piles. Stick on, Clip on and trash. Any thing not lead is trash.
I melt the COWW and SOWW in different batches. If I want a softer boolit I will add SOWW in with COWW
Welcome to the board and happy casting.

[GabbyM]

the hard ones you notices may be zinc. Just throw them in with the rest. If they are zinc they won't melt along with the lead WW. Higher melt temp up over 700 deg. F. They'll just get skimmed off with the clips. I like to use a shovel to add WW to the molten lead so I can stand way back. Plus it's just easier on my hands. I've head the zink ww's are marked Zn but I've never bothered to look.

[snaggdit]

In my heart I'm still hesitant to just dump WW in the pot without looking, but my mind agrees it should be fine. The melting temp difference allows you to see them floating with the clips and skim before they melt. I still look through teh WW before melting and you begin to be able to spot the bad-uns pretty quickly. The iron ones are almost always marked FE but they aren't a worry. You will not be getting hot enough to melt steel. The zinc ones are sometimes marked Zn but not always. If you drop them on concrete they ring while lead makes a duller thud. Some of the stick ons lately have been marked Zn. If I can't twist them with my fingers, I try them with a wire cutters. Same with questionable clip ons, I try the wire cutters. More time consuming, but them I'm sure.

[Tom Herman]

The clip on WW's have metals like Antimony in them that help to harden the metal.
The stick on's (of course, the ones that aren't zink or iron or some other trash) are nearly pure lead and much softer.
I sort out the trash as I go, then I melt the COWW separately from the SOWW.
I use the SOWW material as essentially pure lead when I later alloy the harder wheel weight material.
The alloy of choice here for everyday handgun use is is 50/50 WW to scrap lead, with 2% Tin added for good mold fillout.
Zink melts at something like 781 degrees Fahrenheit.
I start my melt out with clip ons that are known to be wheel weight material. I keep adding wheel weights, and this keeps the melt just above melting temperature (MUCH lower than the Zink melt temp), and so any Zinkies will not melt and actually float on the surface along with any Iron wheel weights.
You'll get the "hang" of it soon enough: Anything that floats and doesn't melt in a timely manner (30 seconds), is not lead, and should be skimmed off immediately.

Happy Shootin'! -Tom

[WHITETAIL]

Reloader4you, Welcome to the forum!:redneck:

[WHITETAIL]

The Boys and Girls here will give you great advice.
For what it is worth I would say put them all in
a pot ( not alum.) castiron if you have.
And melt them all at 650-700 degrees.
Skim all what floats to the top.
Then add some wax about the size of a wallnut.
Then stirr in and scrape the bottom and sides
of the pot.[smilie=w:
If you want you can set the smoke on fire
by throwing in a lit match.
after all the shoke and flames are gone then
pour the lead in to your inget moulds.

[Daves1]

:groner:My last batch of W.W. Five 6 gallon buckets contained almost 20 lbs. of zinc and Fe weights! I sifted through all of them. and still had some make it through to the pot. After reading past post here kept my temp low enough to let them float and skimmed them off. Very few of the zinc weights were marked. I tested the suspisious ones with wire cutter.

[reloaders4you]

Thanks for the info:-D