NO wheel weights BUT...

[GLL]

I spent most of the day driving around southern California searching for wheel weights. A good day produces a couple buckets full. Today I collected only 25 pounds ( at least they were free) !

BUT..

I did come up with 900 pounds of lead flashing, plumbers lead, and some strange coils of extruded round and it was cheap ! Can anyone tell me what these coils of lead "wire" were used for? Electrical ?

The plumber's lead and coils were covered in oily debris from a large abrasive cutoff saw and looked terrible. A little cleaning showed it to be pure?? lead though. A little hardness testing is in order after I cast a couple ingots to confirm what I bought.

Jerry

[shooter575]

I think the Corbin bullet swager uses pure extruded lead wire to fill the jackets on their condoms.Maybe their site has somthing. You sure it aint some industral solder?

[454PB]

Could those coils of lead be for swaging boolits? The lead wire I use for making jacketed bullets comes in 3 foot lengths, but not rolled like that.

The other thing that came to mind is the old lead covered heat tapes we used to use, but they have an obvious resistant wire in the center. I've got a chunk of pure lead from those old heat tapes that weighs about 70 pounds. We were burning insulation off of scrap wire, and put all the heat tapes in one of those big 130 pound metal grease cans. We just kept piling it in and pulling the center wire out of the barrel as the lead melted off. I ended up with a big chunk of soldified pure lead when everything cooled down.

[Catshooter]

Jerry,

It looks like it could old lead wire that plumbers used to use with cast iron pipe?

Good score, regardless.


Cat

[lovedogs]

Long time ago I saw some lead "rope-like" material like that which was used to caulk old cast sewer pipe joints. They pounded it in place with a punch to fill the joint.

[Tom Myers]

Those rolls of lead look exactly like what I used to get from Herters of Waseca, MN to use with their 9ton swaging press to make half and three quarter jacketed bullets. In fact, I still have about a half of a roll of wire for 44 caliber bullets. Those rolls were of pure lead.

"Good stuff Maynard. You did good"

Tom Myers

[D.Mack]

GLL Yes, those are pure lead wire, used for cutting the cores, for use in 1/2 and 3/4 jackets, the wire cutter, was a bench mounted handle with a couplle of holes in the base, so you could run the wire with one hand, and use the other to pull on the handle to cut the wire. There was a set screw to control the length of the cut so you could get consistent core wieghts. DM

[MT Gianni]

I've poured a few lead joints in cast iron but nothing since the early 80's. I don't remember a ""lead wire" being used, just oakum for the base of the joint and an asbestos rope to cotain the pour. I also don't think the rolls were to be used as solder as bar solder was what I remember used on lead shower pans but not having done any thing with them in over 25 years I am not 100 % sure. Gianni.

[jhalcott]

we used a lead wire product to repack fuel oil pumps in the steel mill. It came in cans about 5 pounds in weight.It could also be used for NON potable pipe joints. It was stringy lead with a grease /oil lubricant.I did cast a few sinkers with some of it.

[GLL]

Well the old Cabine Tree tester indicates the coils, flashing, and plumber's lead is all "pure" stuff ! (at least it is dead soft)

It might be a shame to melt all of those coils down for casting if they could be used to "smash" bullets instead !

Since I am having a very difficult time finding wheel weights around here I may have to make my own alloy brew out of lead, linotype, and solder drippings from the radiator shop ! Almost all of the tire shops seem to sell weights back to their supplier even though I am willing to pay more ! ($25/5gallon bucket load)

Anyone else in southern California having similar trouble ?

Jerry

[Jeffreytooker]

I did come up with 900 pounds of lead flashing, plumbers lead, and some strange coils of extruded round and it was cheap ! Can anyone tell me what these coils of lead "wire" were used for? Electrical ?


The only electrical use of lead I know of would be for splicing old lead sheathed cable. The lead wire you have appears a bit big for that.

Jeffrey

[GLL]

Jeffrey:

I was thinking more along the line of battery terminals or connectors.

I did see a 55 gallon drum of lead cable sheathing where I got the coils but some guy bought all of it while I was dickering a price on my stuff !

Jerry

[Duckiller]

I have found 4 shops that will save weights for me. Larger chain shops seem to sell to recyclers. I never get large quantities just regular every 2-4 weeks. Lately I have been finding zinc in the buckets. Lots of small shops reuse their weights or we have a major failure to comunicate. Duckiller

[454PB]

If you have linotype and pure lead, you can make your own "wheelweight" alloy by mixing 60/40 lead to lino. It will actually be a little better than wheelweights because of the extra tin

[floodgate]

I've poured a few lead joints in cast iron but nothing since the early 80's. I don't remember a ""lead wire" being used, just oakum for the base of the joint and an asbestos rope to cotain the pour. I also don't think the rolls were to be used as solder as bar solder was what I remember used on lead shower pans but not having done any thing with them in over 25 years I am not 100 % sure. Gianni.

Going back even a bit further, I remember around 1940 watching my Dad caulk together a bathroom drain line from the belled cast-iron pipe sections. We tamped in a layer of oakum (I guess; it looked like shredded redwood bark, but I have read it was actually made from worn-out manila rope). He then got out a wad of "lead wool" (looked just like a big bundle of steel wool), laid strips of it around in the joint and packed them in tight with a hammer and a blunt chisel, in several layers, until it was set up just as though it had been poured in place. Musta had to do it this way instead of melting and pouring it in, since it was a horizontal run. I have no idea where he learned this - he was a law professor - but it had held up for at least thirty-five years when I last saw the place. Have never seen or heard of lead in this form since that time.

I just remembered another thing he did; he cut up some tinned sheet metal from a one-gallon tin can to make me a barge-type toy boat, and soldered up the seams with the old REAL tinfoil that used to come in cigarette packs, again before WW II (when the "Lucky Strikes" which he smoked came in the green packs; and I still remember the ads: "Lucky Strike Green has gone to War".)

Geez! I'm feeling my 75 years!

floodgate

[454PB]

The "Eco-Nazis" would have a stroke if they thought anything (let alone something as dreadful as a cigarette) was packaged in lead!

[shooter575]

You can still get the lead wool.I had a repair on my BIL old farm house. Had a galvnized drain go into a cast Y.The steel was rotted out and I used pvc to replace that one side.Just slid it in and did the oakum and lead wool.This was in a old michigan basement and a vertical line.That was 10 years ago and it is still OK.

[Lead pot]

I have used lead wool for caulking a lead joint but never lead wire.
I use lead wire like you have and I wish I was close to you I would swap you for that lead wire with lead ingots 99% pure.
I use it for swaging bullets.
That wire is most likely 99.98% pure if you clean off the crud.
The lead flashing I might warn you that it will have a fairly good concentration of arsenic in it so melt it down out side.
Those ingots are pure lead, unless marked. It could be wiping solder 40/60-50/50 tin-lead I used that solder for wiping joints it's good for bullets, just cut it with more lead. If there not marked just drop them on concrete floor and if they have a slight ring it's most likely solder. pure lead will start to melt at around 620 degs. If it melts before 600 degs it is most likely a solder.

Kurt

[GLL]

Kurt:

I tested some small ingots I cast from the coiled wire and the large Plumber's Ingots. Both are dead soft (Brinell=5). The Large Ingots give a good thud on concrete !

Nobody apparently wanted any of the coils or ingots because they were VERY dirty with nasty rusted abrasive cutoff debris ! The coils were not too bad because they were under a sheet of flashing material and somewhat protected. They scrap dealer indicated they had all been under there for decades ! One of the old guys working there remembered it all when I asked about plumber's lead. It took 30 minutes to dig it out.

Jerry

[Lead pot]

Jerry it's there loss and your gain
I dug through a pile in our local yard and found 5 pigs of pure lead (50 lbs a pig) for .27 cents.

Kurt