Boy...pickins' are gettin' slim!

[3006guns]

Dropped off my wife's car today at a "Big Name" tire store for a couple new tires. I nonchalantly asked the manager if I could scrounge some tire weights and to my suprise he said "Sure, there's a couple of buckets back there. You can have whatever you can use". Wow! Two full buckets for free!

First disappointment: they were little one gallon buckets.
Second disappointment: a good 70% were steel weights. (I'm in California)

I promised to return the buckets and any weights I didn't want, loaded them in my pickup and spent about 40 minutes picking through them with a magnet. Suprisingly, I managed to get 1 1/2 large coffee cans of lead. Any marked "Zn" went back in the return pile, although I'm sure a few got into the keep pile. I'll find out when I start smelting.

Two things I learned though......the steel weights look remarkably like the old lead ones, and I've got a freindly tire store right in my own back yard. At least I topped off my 5 gallon bucket, replacing some of what I've shot in the last month or so!

On another note, I've discovered that NO ONE at our local range bothers to "mine" the backstops. Since I'm usually by myself, every time I check or change a target, I can count on picking up several handfuls of pistol bullets...then cover my tracks. It would appear that the backstops haven't been "dressed" in years. I think I'll talk to the club secretary and see if I can stake a "claim".

[lwknight]

Thars gold in em ar hills.

[white eagle]

scored 162 # of lead bricks today (6)
making my total 8
not ww but lead

[Moondawg]

You live in California and are picking lead!!! I thought that lead in Calif. was a substance worse than enhanced plutonium. People in Calif can come down with mysterious maladies just by looking at a piece of lead. I bought a new water faucet the other day and it had a whole bunch of warnings about the terrible things it would do to people in The State Of California. Are you not afraid that you will turn green, with purple poka dots from handling lead, fall to the ground foam at the mouth and maybe start speaking strange languages? Thankfully we folks in Texas don't have to worry so much about lead as those folks in Calif. We can even touch a water faucet banned in California. Ain't guvment great?

[canyon-ghost]

No California bashing here. I always look around for lead bullets on the berms. It's just one of my walking around routines. If it isn't for sunshine and fresh air, then half a coffee cup of free lead is interesting. I've been know to show them to the younger guys I work with and dispel a few myths about bullets in the process.

After it rains and the lead turns light gray, oh yeah!

Ron

[Moondawg]

I agree about the berm pickins being good after a rain. I have about given up on berm pickin, we have not had more than a few drops of rain the whole year. Things are mighty dry. Everyone was hoping tropical storm Don would bring a little rain. Not so, I got maybe 16 drops on my driveway. Someone must be getting rain somewhere, but it sure hasn't been Texas.

[aaalaska]

Well I haven't hit the tire shops in a while, but did by some lead today about 140 lbs in a home made pot & about 10 lbs in raw WW and another 220 in 1lb ingots all WW lead. Cost me $240. Didn't think I got taken.
Alex

[Gtek]

06- Just a thought. Speak of this no more, Stealth man, work them hills for a while and tell no one. I have seen to many times a wonderful thing go ugly. 1-Someone else will decide what a great idea.
2- Prof mined, they get lead and money. Low and slow- Gtek

[7of7]

You live in California and are picking lead!!! I thought that lead in Calif. was a substance worse than enhanced plutonium. People in Calif can come down with mysterious maladies just by looking at a piece of lead. I bought a new water faucet the other day and it had a whole bunch of warnings about the terrible things it would do to people in The State Of California. Are you not afraid that you will turn green, with purple poka dots from handling lead, fall to the ground foam at the mouth and maybe start speaking strange languages? Thankfully we folks in Texas don't have to worry so much about lead as those folks in Calif. We can even touch a water faucet banned in California. Ain't guvment great?

I think you got California mixed up with Washington State.. Wheel weights get into the ground water... So, to prevent this, I pick up any I see on the roads..

[mongo]

My local supply dried up also. They said the policy is to send them out with the old batterys to be recycled. Heck, I was recycling them lol. The good folks at my range are happy as they can be now that I an cleaning up all the nasty lead from the backstop. Works for me... If its free its for me.

[Oreo]

In the 100* heat, bone-dry is better then wet x1000.

Take a claw-hammer with a nice straight claw that can be used like a small pick-ax to break compacted berm. Use a standard issue cat-litter scoop to sift right there on the berm. Work in small clumps at a time so as to not overload the litter scoop. Dry dirt is loose like powder & will sift easily unlike mud. Litter scoop is the perfect size sieve. Anything small enough to pass isn't worth the time. Anything else is either a bullet or a rock big enough to pick out & there ain't too many of those 'cause they've all been shot to bits. Not to mention, the range is usually all yours on 100* days. Luckly it won't take you very long to make it worth while. I gathered 150lb in 1/2hr one day at an undisclosed location.