Lead Crumbling??? (Pic)

[slabbandit]

I was melting wheel weights this evening, fluxed twice, and started pouring large egg sinkers. Everything was fine for a while then I started pouring ingots. I didn't like how long it took for them to harden and then they were dull and crumbling.
I don't have a thermometer yet and I need a new cooker as this one puts out too much yellow flame with the blue.
What do you guys think some of my problems may be? I just shut it all down for the night and came inside to try to get some good advice.



Thanks,
Dave

[gbrown]

I smelted 100# of WW today. As it melted, I added more--, it looked like oatmeal until it got up to temp. I suspect it is your temperature. Clean your burner or get a new one.

[slabbandit]

Yea, I think I got the melt way too hot trying to regulate the fire. I'm going to order a temp. gauge tomorrow and buy a new cooker.
Can these crumbly ingots be remelted and come out right??

[gbrown]

What's funny is that I have 3 high pressure burners (red) but the flame stands 3 or 4 inches from my smelting pot--a cut down AC refrigerant can (100 # capacity). They were not heating the pot up good. I went to an old low pressure burner (blue) that has like an old hot water heater burner, but is only 1 inch from the pot. I have to watch the temp--it gets hot!

[runfiverun]

it will be fine.
if you break open an ingot before it cools it will have a very crystaline look to it.
severely frosted ww alloy will look like galvanized steel.
it get's that way from too much heat in the mold, and a hot alloy make it worse.

[a.squibload]

Had similar problem with too much yellow flame,
burning too rich, need more air, different regulator,
maybe more holes in the burner. Clean soot off
bottom of pot.

[geargnasher]

If you dump the ingots too soon they will crumble like brown sugar. Let them harden fully, sounds like you're dumping them while they're still in the "mush" phase of cooling.

Gear

[Lance Boyle]

it will be fine.
if you break open an ingot before it cools it will have a very crystaline look to it.
severely frosted ww alloy will look like galvanized steel.
it get's that way from too much heat in the mold, and a hot alloy make it worse.

As a newb I can vouch for that, I smelted down my wheel weights into ingots and a couple times I flopped out my ingots too soon. They bent and cracked kind of like failing asphalt.

[dRok]

Take a spray bottle, like you can get in the garden section at walmart and fill it with water. Once the surface of the lead frosts over, spray the bars until it quits making noise/hissing when you squirt it. This will cool the lead fast so you can pour a lot more in a short amount of time. Just be sure there is no water in the mold before you pour more liquid lead in. If you stop at the right time, the lead/mold will still be hot enough to boil any liquid off before you pour again.

As a newb I can vouch for that, I smelted down my wheel weights into ingots and a couple times I flopped out my ingots too soon. They bent and cracked kind of like failing asphalt.

[dmize]

I use an old pie pan with folded up blue jean pant leg soaked with water. Pour the ingot let it set a bit and then set the mould in the pie pan. Same thing Richard Lee sates in his book for cooling off a Lee mold.

[sargenv]

To rapidly cool my ingots, I simply wait for the lead to get to the solid phase then quench them in a water bucket.. the same water bucket I use to quench bullets.. It cools them down nicely enough to handle them right away..

[Springfield]

You guys just need more ingot moulds! I like to do 50 lbs at a time, then while the new batch is melting the ingots cool off enough.

[slabbandit]

Sounds like I'm getting my lead and my Lee mold pans too hot!

[a.squibload]

Any DIYers want to adapt this for mold cooling?

[FLINTNFIRE]

soak a board in water and sit ingot mold on it , pour more ,less time waiting for ingot to harden

[Just Duke]

it looked like oatmeal until it got up to temp.

Did you sort out your zinc?

[runfiverun]

that was the slush stage.
you can turn and flip it over at the oatmeal stage.
i do like springfield.
10 ingot molds and an angle iron mold, i can ladle out over 50 lbs before even dumping the first ingot mold.

[RP]

I am running a large smelting pot a few hundred lbs at a time, What i do is cast my ingots then dump next pour they take longer to cool. So i have a fan I turn on the ingot molds that cools them off fast no water needed.

[slabbandit]

I think I have figured out why my lead ingots crumbled. I let the aluminum LEE molds get way to hot and my lead was also way to hot, 800 degrees. I found out that after 3 or 4 pours I would cool the ingot molds in a pie pan with wet blue jean material and then turn my heat down on my melted lead to 550 to 600 and they poured beautifully.
Egg sinkers poured a lot nicer too. No wrinkles and size #'s showed up real well.

[Danderdude]

If you dump the ingots too soon they will crumble like brown sugar.

I was looking for the perfect analogy and of course Gear hit the nail on the head.
Your crumbling is just the result of dumping the ingots before they're cooled enough.

What you have to watch out for is the ones that are still liquid in the middle when go flopping the ingot mold around. Last week, I filled 3 cavities of a Lee ingot mold, got distracted by something for a second, and came back to fill the last 1lb cavity. A few moments later, I absentmindedly went to dump them and the liquid core broke out of the delayed one, splashing lead everywhere and leaving me an empty mold-shaped husk.