Striking Caster's Gold, but hard mining the good stuff.

[jeepvet]

Last fall my sister and Daddy were going to visit my uncle. On the way they noticed a door lying on the side of the road. Being the good rednecks that we are, they stopped to check it out. The first thing they noticed was that it was VERY heavy and it had a funny line all the way around the edge.



Normal looking door.






Funny looking line

They went home and got a trailer and after quite a struggle got the door loaded and took it home. When I went home for Christmas my Daddy said that he had something for me and showed me the door. I confirmed that the funny line was a sheet of lead sandwiched between two slabs of wood. My brother, his 16 year old son, my Daddy and I finally got the door loaded and I took it home with me. Before I left we decided to take the wood off and got another surprise. The wood slab was made of a thin wood veneer with a 1 x 2.5" solid board edge all the way around and particle board
core. This was all stuck together with the strongest glue known to man.



Well, I thought that I would use the space between my ears for something besides holding my ears apart. I stripped the veneer off and let the particle board get rained on twice in the next 6 months (a total of about 1/4") and I wet it down numerous times with a water hose. That should be enough to melt any particle board, NOT! So I had to find another way, my wife was getting real tired of looking at the door in the back yard, and I was not going to let a little piece of particle board keep me from the prize. So I took my skill saw and set it just deep enough to cut almost down to the lead and made cuts every 2" or so vertically and horizontally through the particle board. Then I took a nail bar and a hammer and went to work.



Attacking the particle board

As I got the top layer off, the lead pealed up off of the bottom layer pretty easily. Now, why it was so hard to get off of one side and easy on the other I have no idea, but at the time I was not complaining.



Peeling the lead off

Once I got a small area loose, I cut it into a strip about 12 x 24", rolled it up tightly and placed it in my smelting pot, particle board and all. That way I got the lead melted and fluxed at the same time. I ended the smelting session with 114 ingots average weight probably 14 oz. Not too bad for free Caster's Gold.



Yield

Moral of the story: Don't pass anything on the road that might have lead, even an old door.
Second moral: Don't let a piece of particle board defeat you. Always go for the Gold.

Well, for some reason only one picture wants to show up. Anyone know how to fix that?

[lightman]

Nice Score! Sorry, not very good with pictures and I am not able to view the attachments. Lead shielding should be soft lead. Cool story, by the way!

[bangerjim]

None of your pictures came thru except the very last one of the pile of ingots

[Rcmaveric]

Lol right on.

Sent from my SM-G925T using Tapatalk

[ThomR]

Most likely it was an old door from an xray department. I wonder why it would be just laying on the side of a road. It's not likely that it blew out the back of a truck. Good find! Hope you find the rest of the xray department soon.

[bumpo628]

100 lbs is a lot more lead than I thought there would be in there.
Nice find!

[jeepvet]

I finally got all of the pictures to show up. This was very soft lead so probably almost pure. I agree it was most likely from an x-ray room, sure wish the rest of the x-ray equipment had been there with it. It seemed like that door weighed over 300lbs so I was a little disappointed with only 100lbs of lead, but I think that is fantastic for the price. It was a lot of work though but I am very pleased and greatful that my sister and Daddy would go to the trouble to load that heavy thing and give it to me.

[Traffer]

Good Score...and a good job getting it into ingots. I think that you will find that there is antimony in that lead and it is not quite as soft as you think. Just a hunch but xray shielding is usually a little harder than pure lead. Either way though 100lbs of free lead? Good stuff.

[ikarus1]

Note to self: when you find a lead bearing, chainsaw that thing in half and burn it in a barrel, with a hole in the bottom and catch what comes out

[fredj338]

Seems like a ton of work for 100# of alloy. Berm mining is the way to go for free.

[ThomR]

Seems like a ton of work for 100# of alloy. Berm mining is the way to go for free.

That's assuming there is a berm worth mining. I brought home three buckets of dirt from the local police range the other day and got a whopping six pounds of lead. The gun range that is ran by a local gun store is even worse. I'm lucky to get two pounds out of there.

[jeepvet]

Seems like a ton of work for 100# of alloy. Berm mining is the way to go for free.

You're right, but I have more time than money and this was free and berm mining is not easy or fun in Central Texas, especially in the 104 plus heat right now. The easiest lead I got was from a local indoor range. I cleaned the metal backstop area and they gave me the lead for free. All I had to do to it was scoop it into buckets and pour them into a barrel on my trailer. They jumped right up the ramp on my trailer using the hand truck(dollie). A plastic 55 gal barrel full rendered right at 500 lbs of ingots. I still need to take the copper jackets to the scrap yard and see if they will pay for the propane.

[pls1911]

Love it when something good like this happens.
I stumbled on a 55 gallon drum of antique BIG typeset blocks and artwork years ago, mixed with several hundred pounds of newsprint type set castings. I'll keep the art and big print blocks and use the lino only as needed (very, very, rarely)
Last year I managed to get a few trashcans full of roofing lead vent scrap AND four 4"x 6" x 24" rolls of old but unused surplus lead roof flashing delivered to my door... free.

Open eyes and ears, shooting friends in the contracting trades and lady luck all go a long way down the path to lead motherload finds.

[Youngtimer]

For the last 11 years I opened a door exactly like that one about 100 times a shift X-raying piping joints in a concrete booth. Good find.

[fredj338]

That's assuming there is a berm worth mining. I brought home three buckets of dirt from the local police range the other day and got a whopping six pounds of lead. The gun range that is ran by a local gun store is even worse. I'm lucky to get two pounds out of there.

Well true. Any decent shooting hole would have a lot of spent bullets though. Police range, probably little used compared to most club ranges.
I belong to two clubs & the berms are ok to mine as long as you repair them. 15m with a small shovel & wire screen can yield 50# of stuff ready to melt. Since it is all bullets, less waste than ww now days. I would never haul dirt home unless I needed dirt.

[marek313]

Just for comparison I walked around my range last few times when nobody was there picking up surface bullets only. No shovel or screen since range was still open and people could show up any min. Honestly i'm not even sure if we are allowed to mess with berms anyway so I just walked around.
First day I got 10lbs in about 15mins and other time I got 8lbs just picking up what I could see on surface with my hands. I cant even imagine how much lead is really in there.
In my other local sand pit I was getting about 10lbs an hour with shovel and screen. It didnt take long before my back told me it wasnt worth it so I started buying lead from my local scrap yard.

Other interesting thing is that i just took some trash to my local dump and they had about 5 doors laying there that looked exactly like it. I looked because I made a nice work bench years ago from one of those. Thats currently my reloading table. I was considering bringing one home with me but I dont need one right now. I should have checked for lead lining dang it . Maybe next time.

[Shingle]

The last two trips to the local pistol range I got 350 lbs. of scrap bullets that should produce about 150 lbs. of good lead. Im going again this morning. All for the price of a cat litter sifter set up.

[ThomR]

The last two trips to the local pistol range I got 350 lbs. of scrap bullets that should produce about 150 lbs. of good lead. Im going again this morning. All for the price of a cat litter sifter set up.

I'm jealous!

[kevin c]

The last two trips to the local pistol range I got 350 lbs. of scrap bullets that should produce about 150 lbs. of good lead. Im going again this morning. All for the price of a cat litter sifter set up.

good hard work,there.

Your yield is on the low side compared to what I've read here and experienced myself. Is it sand/dirt/clay? Non lead in the bullet construction?

[Jtarm]

Honestly i'm not even sure if we are allowed to mess with berms anyway so I just walked around.

No club I’ve ever belonged to allowed it.