Indoor range lead

[Youngtimer]

Received a call from a indoor range looking to sell range lead. In my area the scrap yards are paying .10 to .15 for WW and .30 to .40 for soft lead. Any ideas on a fair price for range lead??

[William Yanda]

In ingot form, I suspect it would bring $1/lb. How much will it take to get it there?

[lightman]

Price varies from location to location and scrap prices also go up and down. I would call a couple of scrap yards for a price check and offer the range a little over that price. The composition of range scrap can vary depending on the type of shooting that is done.

[jsizemore]

I'd offer the same or a little better then the scrapyard. No zinc or steel with range scrap but still not as clean as soft Pb. You are saving them the time and gas to go to the scrapyard and disposal fees if done in house. I'd see if the scrapyard will buy the jackets after it's melted. If you good at it you should get at least red brass price.

[Rcmaveric]

I would pay him .30 a lb.... personally my scrap yard sells me mixed wheel weights for .60 a lb and I have to sort it. They buy back the steel and zinz I don't use for .10 a lb. The sell me soft lead for a dollar a pound. As long as I get the lead under a dollar a pound I am happy camper.

[Youngtimer]

Anyone using range lead run into any non lead environmentally friendly material mixed in???? I was thinking of offering .25 to .30 a pound. Maybe Ill obtain one or two hundred pounds and see how much effort is required to clean it up.

[dg31872]

Do you have to mine it out? Did they mention bringing a shovel?
That would make a big difference in the price.

[Youngtimer]

It is sitting in drums or barrels at the range. All I need to do is pick it up, but the more I think about it the more concerned I am becoming with frangible bullets or other unknown bullet material mixed in that I may not even be aware of.

[jcren]

Any frangible I am aware of would be made from something lighter and with a higher melting temp than lead. Start with melted lead and add the unknown gradually in layers, skimming off what doesn't melt.

[jsizemore]

Folks don't generally practice with frangible bullets. I'd rather shovel from the floor then out of a drum. I was concerned when I went on the range the first time and found live rounds. Fella that minded the range told me he got them up. I checked thoroughly before smelting and never found one. I do smelt with a lid on my wind shield for economy and just in case. No mishaps so far. If your range scrap ends up with small amounts of unexpected elements in your alloy, most of the time it's so small to have little difference or you can cut it with pure or COWW to get where you want to be and stretch out you pure and COWW.

[Rcmaveric]

Most impurities just burn off. I mine what I can. If its an indoor range I doubt anyone is using frangible bullets. Those are specialty bullet for varmint hunters to violent wreck little critters. If its all pistol rounds it isn't nothing but lead. There may be some 22 which is dead soft. If they shoot some shot guns, that can add some arsenic and antimony. They majority of it is undoubtedly jacket lead with just a hint of antimony. If you do get some impurity fluxing will draw most of it. There could be some cast bullets of the indoor range allows it. So that would be were you would get a possible zinc taint. But then I doubt you would even notice. I use range scraps all the time mined from a berm of who knows what. Stuff shoots great. Don't over think it. If you need some peace of mind, just flux it really good and then flux it with some sulfur.

[durango]

Indoor range lead is by far not the best deal. I've bought about 1200 lbs. from 2 different ranges and I won't buy any more. I paid the same price as WW-$.25-the big scrap yards pay $.40.

As I see it, the loss by non-lead material was about 40%, but the hassle of getting rid of the junk negates the positives. The jackets have been copper plated steel and the scrap yards don't want to pay much for them and I got probably 10% weight of an unknown dark gray granular material (maybe frangible, maybe coatings on powder??).

Then there was the live round that went into my pot because some dumba$$ kid swept the whole range and threw the sweepings into the buckets. Luckily, I was far enough away to escape damage but it sure woke me up!!

FWIW, I was watching a TV documentary on the Winchester ammo plant and the Win guy stated that they were using ZINC in their non-lead bullets to satisfy the tree huggers. Sure glad that I left Kalifornia as soon as I could.

Happy Scrounging, Steve

[lightman]

As someone else posted, most non lead stuff will float to the top to be skimmed off. But watch out for live rounds! I found one in my last batch.

[country gent]

A lot of the "green" ammo is also a non lead bullet., and it is used on indoor ranges. a lot of the lead cores on pistol ammo are pure with very little antimony to aid in swaging the cores easier. Factory lead ammo may be a swaged bullet. cast lead bullets are predominant with handloaders and there is usually a quanity of them in indoor range lead also. The indoor range lead Ive gotten wasn't overly hard as cast but did have enough antimony to water quench to a fairly hard level. Tin was needed to aid casting. As with all recovered range lead you need to smelt it to clean and blend then have it checked to see what it actually is then gor from there. This could mean one time cleaning and casting into ingots to see what you have. Another time melting and alloying to what you want and pouring into ingots. Then casting.

What I did was a large pot 300lbs and cleaned the lead up stamping each 3 lb ingot with the pot number. checked for hardness content. Remlted with X number of ingots from each pot and the required antimony tin to bring it to what I wanted needed. These 3lb ingots were also numbered as to the pot they came from. Then when casting each pot was X number of ingots from each pot in the batch. In this way the lead was blended together once as is. alloyed and blended into each other when alloyed then blended together again when casting. It made for a very consistant large batch of alloy that performed well.

[bayjoe]

I cooked down 2 buckets of range scrap this past weekend and found a live 22 round. Luckily I sort and look the stuff over before I put it in the pot.
I've heard tracer bullets are bad too, but don't know for sure
PS 2 buckets yield 220 lbs of ingots

[Rcmaveric]

I cooked down 2 buckets of range scrap this past weekend and found a live 22 round. Luckily I sort and look the stuff over before I put it in the pot.
I've heard tracer bullets are bad too, but don't know for sure
PS 2 buckets yield 220 lbs of ingots

I look for live rounds as well. But i mine from a berm so i have never had a live round. I get live rounds while picking up brass though. My main concern while cook down Range Scraps are the full metal jackets bullets that don't have openings in the jacket. In my mind i cant see any harm, but i cant help but be mindful of one of those copper jackets full of molten lead popping like pop corn (watch to many Final Destination Movies). So i were PPE like a face shield. If it is a small batch i will make sure i crack all the FMJs. If it as large batch then those will float and you can feel the weight. I just set that one a side to crack and remelt latter.

As far as tracer's are concerned. They are illegal in a few states and pose a serious fire hazard. I doubt you will tracers at commercial ranges to the fire concerns, but what makes them glow will burn off.

Zinc is always a concern, but watching pot temps ensures it doesn't melt. Calcium and other impurities i think would be a more hidden threat but that is easily fluxed out with saw dust. I don't wash my minnings or anything. I have a large sifter i made. I keep a couple totes in the back of my truck. When i go to the range i shoot all day then go to a berm and sift a few bucket fulls. I do this till the totes are full. As long as i bring home more lead and brass than i shoot i will never run out. Once the totes get full i fire up the smelt next to my truck and get to work till the totes are empty.

[kycrawler]

I smelt down about 2000-3000 lb of indoor range Lead per year. I pay .05 per lb. It is down stairs in a basement and I have to clean the traps out and pack it up stairs. I cast up and sell a bunch of 4 6 and 8 oz bank sinkers out of some of it. And sell them during spoonbill snaagging season here in Missouri. The profits from that pay for the lead. And I buy some ww alloy off of the board here to cast my bullets out of.

[Thin Man]

The scrap yards in east TN must all speak with each other. They pay 25 cents per pound for any form of lead, then try to sell it for $1 per pound if you really have to have it. We have only one indoor range near me. They allow any handgun caliber on the line, rifle calibers must be .223 Remington (5.56 mm) or less. This came about because of damage to their deflector plates and the cost of repairs from the larger rifle calibers. I inquired one time about their lead sales. They have one buyer who shows up occasionally to buy all their lead and brass. The shop gets whatever they can (they did not state a specific price) for the lead and gives away (requires him to take it away!) the brass to the lead buyer just to get rid of it. Sigh.

[40-82 hiker]

I used to mine dirt berms, and stopped due to the occasional live round turning up. I found them all, but finally figured it was not worth my worry and danger. I guess people got upset with duds and just threw them over the target frames. Really found more than I thought I would have.

However, range lead is a pretty good source of lead for boolits.

YMMV.

[Youngtimer]

Think I will need to get my hands on a few hundred pounds and give it a try to see what the return is (labor and cost) compared to WW.