lead maybe mixed with some zinc

[Greywolf]

I have been casting for almost a year now and learned 95% of it from this forum..
Had collected about 2300 # of lead and sorted most of it by hand. It all was stored in my barn next to a couple aluminum mag wheels.

Well the barn burned to ground and melted everything except the clips. The lead has run on top the ground and possibly mixed with the mag wheels and some zinc weights.

My question is , if I heat to 625-675 deg will the zinc and aluminum seperate and float to top to skim off ?

Thanks for any help and ideas..

[docone31]

At least 2% of the zinc will remain in solution. Same with aluminum, and magnesium.
Were it me, I would melt it, then combine it and repour it. At this point, I would remelt the ingots useing a lower temperature. Metals not in alloy, will seperate to a point. If you stir it, the excess metals should collect in the center. These can be scooped off.
From there, I would mix with alloy of known content. It will make an harder casting.
However, when I cast for paper patching, I intentionally cast zinc into the alloy. Rather than haveing zinc added to the alloy, I add lead to the alloy. I can hyper load the zinc that way.
Makes a good, dense cast load for paper patching.
I load smokeless paper patched loads, not BP.
I forgot to say, it sucks to have your barn burn down.
You had a really bad day.
My sympathies to you.

[ghh3rd]

Regarding the Zinc removal - this post may be beneficial to you. Don't know if it helps with magnesium also.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=63082

[DLCTEX]

Were the zinc weights on the wheels or did you have a separate stash of zinc? If only on the wheels there isn't enough zinc to worry about. Otherwise do a search for removing zinc from alloy. I don't know about aluminum and magnesium.

[Greywolf]

Thank you Gentlemen, all good info. I hated the thought of the loss of this lead with everything else. It will be a couple of months before I can cast again. I have to build another barn...This forum is a great source of info with fine people..

[ghh3rd]

Perhaps you'll have stumbled on a super strain of cast boolit alloy...:roll: