I bought an ingot of tin. How do I get 200 grains from it?

[F_L]

I use a propane torch to drip my pewter into the pan of my powder scale. Once it tips at 500 grains, I empty it and refill. I have a ziplock full of 500 grain chunks of pewter.

[RogerDat]

One thing that I think is important is making darn sure the form of your pewter or solder is distinctive. For example I wouldn't use a Lee ingot mold unless I used it to make thin 1/8 deep ingots. You don't want to accidentally be throwing in 1# ingots you thought were lead that turn out to be pewter or solder. Can't get that tin back out of the alloy after it melts. I would spend the few bucks to have a mold you know is distinctive for tin, bet that duck decoy weight, coins, drips, thin ingots, or a bullet mold you don't reload for. Would stink to realize you just loaded 200 45 ACP with 100% pewter bullets, stink even more if you realized it after sending a bunch of them down range.

[RCE1]

Instead of trying to precisely measure the tin, I would always start with the tin and figure out how much lead I needed to add to hit my ratio. Seemed easier that way, since the amounts of lead are so much more than the tin. I would buy it in big ingots from a guy I used to know, then I'd melt them down and cast partial ingots in my own moulds. Some were heavy and some lighter. I worked for me, having a variety of weights I could combine to get close to what I wanted.

Seems two pounds of alloy is a pretty small amount, unless you just wanted a little bit to test something...

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

The first batch of Tin I acquired (from a member here), was lead-free solder (99.xx % tin), I melted the large ingots into my cleaned out casting pot, and poured some 250gr Lee REAL boolits, I also kept all the sprues, and I tried to pour different size sprues, so I had a varied batch of sizes.

Since then, I have used regular ingot molds and pour very thin ingots that are easily cut-able.

[Grmps]

YMMV depending on the weight of your pewter.
I smelted/fluxed/cast different boolits with pewter until I got close to .003 grns of 1/2 oz





1 batch easy alloy boolits

[Mr_Sheesh]

If you're drilling & want to keep the chips under control, try a plastic bowl or tupperware (translucent is best), cut a hole thru the bottom, then drill away. You can see what you're doing & it keeps the results pretty well under control. Beats the older way I did it with a {clean LOL} toilet paper roll :P

[Steppapajon]

I made a mold that cast a 1.6 oz ingot. just about right for 5 lbs.

[Skooterr]

Nice. How did you make the mold for them?

[Steppapajon]

I used a 5/8" ball nose end mill bit to cut a slot in a 1"x1" piece of aluminum. Did the math to determine the length. Tapped a hole in the end and screwed a handle on it.

SPJ

[bangerjim]

I use the small cavities in the standard LEE mold. I fill them 1/2 full and then just hold them with pliers and melt what I need into the casting pot. Melt only the amount I want off and save the rest for another batch.

Don't get hung up on the EXACT % Sn content. This whole thing is just a hobby and we use a lot of guesstimates. I use the amount of Sn that gives me good cast boolits. I have no idea on what the exact % is.......probably around 1% I guess. They all cast beautifully!

[parkerhale1200]

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...3-sand-casting

[parkerhale1200]

I had the same problem, but i just take a different pan, and melted a 50 pound bar of pewter.
I put beer cans upside down in a box, and i had perfect 0,2 pound round pewter medallions.

[lightman]

[QUOTE=bangerjim;4272972]I use the small cavities in the standard LEE mold. I fill them 1/2 full and then just hold them with pliers and melt what I need into the casting pot. Melt only the amount I want off and save the rest for another batch.

This is what I did the last time that I melted a bunch of odd solder rolls.

[kycrawler]

I work in a shop that does radiator repair. When I first started working there. I got 11 5 gal buckets of solder drippings. I smelled it all down and cast it in fishing sinker molds I then cut the eye off the sinkers so I wouldn't end up using them fishing. Now I ended up getting an egg sinker mold and I just cast them without the center rod. So there's no hole in the middle

[mazo kid]

I used a 5/8" ball nose end mill bit to cut a slot in a 1"x1" piece of aluminum. Did the math to determine the length. Tapped a hole in the end and screwed a handle on it.

SPJ

You could use that same method to form a trough in a piece of scrap hardwood. Lining the trough with aluminum foil might make it easier to get the ingot out.