how many pounds in a 5gal bucket?

[62chevy]

I Got 115 lbs from one 5 gal bucket cost 25$Attachment 101703

How much does the ingots from the Walmart stainless cups weight? I'm thinking a little over a pound . Counted 107 ingots. The reason I ask is I'm going to use the same thing for ingots.

[Walstr]

I Got 115 lbs from one 5 gal bucket cost 25$Attachment 101703

How did you get a bucket of sorted WW's? I don't see any dross, etc.?

[Walstr]

My last partial bucket of WW's yielded 62% of 66# unsorted CWW's & 89% of 11.125# SWW's & 30+# of dross, clips, junk; so the bucket weighed about 110#. I pay this tire store manager $25/bucket. I always bring 2 buckets, one for his use & 2 for me to handle 50# each. It's a long lift to the tailgate!

Including the cost of propane, I figure this romantic process is costing me $.58/# of usable product. After reading these blogs & re-assessing my process, I'm calling our major scrapper (50 miles round trip) to see what they have to offer. It may be worth $8 in fuel to get culled lead alloy WW's. Don't know how they would do it in volume, but it's worth asking.

I also see that the current price for Zinc is $.94/# !! & Lead is $.96/#. So why am I tossing the Mn-Zn labeled WW's? Saving time I suppose, but now it may pay to take a little longer, eh.

[imashooter2]

How did you get a bucket of sorted WW's? I don't see any dross, etc.?

The dross and waste is on the ground behind the pot.

[Wizzap]

I can only find one shop that will sell it to me for 30$ a 5 gallon bucket After sorting it i had 1 gallon of steel/zinc about 12lbs of Stick on rest was clip on lead ...............I can also get WW for 50 cents a pound at scrap yard but last time i did that out of 1 gallon over half was zinc/steel going to see if they will let me sort it next time

[juan916]

Score 2 5 gallon buckets with lead only clip on and stick on for $57.00

[michiganmike]

How many? Way to many lbs. for me to carry up from my basement shop. I have a 5 gallon bucket almost full. I will have to carry them upstairs about a 1/4 of a bucket at a time. Luckily, I have two buckets! Waiting to get a torn meniscus in my right knee fixed.

[mold maker]

Back Dr's and chiropractors make a living off greedy people with five gallon buckets of lead.
Thats from personal experience.

[RogerDat]

Eventually I get about 900 lbs. from a 5 gallon bucket it just takes lots of time, work and Advil. Helps to have more than one bucket too. Plus a total of $8 for the steel clips from the scrap yard, that about pays for the Advil.

[lakeparkv8]

I got a 3 gallon size bucket today for 35 dollars. They weighed in the bucket at 107 pounds. When I got them melted down into ingots I had 22.5 pounds of scrap and junk. net weight of ingots 84.5 pounds. Sounds like .41 cents per pound. Not as good as free but not 2.00 a pound either. Guess I'm HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY!

[benellinut]

I picked up 5, five gallon buckets that were about 3/4 full for $20 during a trip to the scrap yard during a clean out of my shop and the guys loaded them for me. Actually I walked away with the WW and $102 for the scrap I took, it was a good day! I've been sorting the last few days, first two buckets were almost all lead, the third was about 50%, I'll have them all sorted in a few days.

I have a lot of spine problems in my lower back and neck so I have to find ways to move things without hurting myself, when I got home with the buckets I set an empty bucket on the ground at the rear bumper of my Jeep, I just tipped the buckets and let the WW fall into the empty bucket, then I wheeled the buckets around with a hand truck. When I got ready to start sorting I just tipped them over then use a flat shovel to scoop some up and dump them on the sorting table.

They are full of dirt, crud, tire lube and who knows what else, don't want to smelt them like that so I decided to just wash them all. I took a couple 3 gal buckets, put 3/4 gallon of Purple Power cleaner I had left in one and dumped enough WW's to just cover letting them soak for ten min or so. I use my media separator (the one below) to separate the WW and drain the cleaner into the other bucket for the next round, a good hosing gets the vast majority of the crud off. To dry them I swept a clean area on the shop floor and spread the WW out in one layer with the shovel and let them dry overnight. Then I use the shovel again to put the sorted and clean WW in a nice clean bucket!

As a bonus I'll never need to look for valve stem caps anymore. I even found one nice valve stem tool, that will replace the one I lost when I twisted wrenches for a living, heck maybe it's the one I lost LoL. One note of caution, I also found six razor blades, I'm damn lucky I didn't cut the hell out of myself!

[Chris C]

I got a full 5 gal bucket of WW today. After careful sorting, I'd say it was 60/40 in volume, with the 40% being lead and clips. Turned out to be 43#, so I'm not complaining. I'm gonna try and hit some Big Rig shops tomorrow, looking for the larger weights.

[Chris C]

I didn't do well getting any of the Big Rig shops to be willing to let me have any WW. They all have contracts with people to take the weights away. So I went to the local metal recycling place and they let me sort through and pick up 38# of pure lead stick-ons for $.70 a pound............not cheap, in my opinion, but not the $1.50 a pound I recently paid for pure lead sheeting. Sooner or later I'll get enough for my inventory. Gettin' there, slowly but surely.

[Bodean98]

Proverbs 21, 5 "Steady plodding brings prosperity"
I have been collecting for a bit over a year now and am well over 2000# of stash material. For wheel weights I have found the big shops and box stores to be as you have found. They are under contract to someone they pay to dispose of them. My job requires a lot of travel and I have the occasion to stop in the small town mom & pop tire shops and those are the best bet. Last bucket I acquired weighed 176#! After sorting I had 3# of steel no zinc and less than 2# of trash. I paid $25 for the bucket! Good Score.

[benellinut]

I didn't do well getting any of the Big Rig shops to be willing to let me have any WW. They all have contracts with people to take the weights away. So I went to the local metal recycling place and they let me sort through and pick up 38# of pure lead stick-ons for $.70 a pound............not cheap, in my opinion, but not the $1.50 a pound I recently paid for pure lead sheeting. Sooner or later I'll get enough for my inventory. Gettin' there, slowly but surely.

Ah the hunt, can be fun and sometimes not so much. I spent weeks hitting places without much luck, when I figured in how much I was spending on gas I would have better off mail ordering..... Then a couple months later I was cleaning out the garage, had a pile of scrap metal to get rid of and headed to the closest scrap yard. While there I asked if they had any lead or WW, the guy said he had seven buckets but it there wasn't much lead, said he was sick of working around the buckets and didn't want to sort them and let me have them for $25 which yielded four buckets of good weights. I sorted the zinc and steel, took those, more buckets and a box of Popsicles over on a hot day. I gave them the steel and zinc back, thanked them for helping me with my lead search. They appreciated the extra buckets and the Popsicles to help cool off, now they save lead for me and I stop by every couple of months. When you find a source, become their friend!

[Chris C]

Hopefully the yield will not decrease too rapidly... but the push is on to ban lead wheel weights.

WW's are already banned in Europe (since 2005); and being phased out in Japan and Korea. California has SB 757, which the Senate passed, that makes lead wheel weights illegal next year. I obtained this information from a blog that is tracking the progress of this bill: http://www.changecalifornia.org/2009...elweights.html

So, scoop up all you can, while you can!

With kind regards to all,

~ Kathie

Kathie, I'm a newbie at this. I'm only scrounging for my personal use and haven't been doing it but for about a month now, I think. But I've already figured out that in my area, I get about a 25% load of lead COWW and SOWW out of a 5 gallon bucket. Since it's not a business for me, I'm still willing to go through the separating process, but it is disappointing to carry a bucket to the truck I can barely pick up and only get to use a quarter of it. A lot of the guys changing the tires are telling me they are seldom installing lead. The only lead I'm getting is stuff they are pulling off customers wheels when they do work on them.

[RP]

WWs are starting to fade out in my area I was looking so hard for zinc I thought I was just not finding them two years ago but did find alot of steel, One of my sons works at a dealership and he called asking if I wanted some WWs which was crazy I did lol. They were on a pallet three buckets some boxes and just laying on the pallet I paid for them and he loaded them in the truck with a forklift. After sorting I got one really nice plastic HD pallet Two full buckets of zinc and steal and half a bucket of stickons two buckets of clip ons not a bad haul for 40 bucks.
My other son has a deal with a fishing supply shop for a new style fishing weight that is the new must have weight I guess they sold them 200 lbs last year and they just called and wanted 200 more for this year. I stopped by the scrape yard to see if I could still buy lead and was told no more sheet lead someone is buying all they get for 60 cents a lb and he check on the WWs thinks they cost me 30 cents a lb but they too are mixed with steel and zinc. Oh they pay 15 cents a lb when buying them so what I can not use I can sell back at half the price I paid.
His partner in this weight making hit a tire shop told them he needed all the WWs they had which turned out to be 6 5 gal buckets and came to the house and dropped them off since I seem to ground zero for anything the kids are doing since i have a shop tools and supplies and give them a hand. I asked what he paid and he told me 40 bucks.
All that being said it looks like his haul is leaning towards 50/50 mix of good material and zinc/steel. I asked the guy at the scrap yard if I could swap him WWs for WWs since they do not seem to care if they are steel zinc or lead and am waiting on a call to see. The mistake I may have made is when i was telling him the zinc and steel was of no use to me for making bullets or weights he told me he did not know it was mixed so that may soon come to a halt, Which may work out to not buying from the tire shops unless they sort them.

[Hardcast416taylor]

I really wonder how many more readers will ask this old question about weight of a 5 gal. pail of weights? The answer is `more than 1 lb. and less than 500 lbs.`Robert

[mold maker]

I lucked out on a (3 ham biscuits) full five gal bucket this morning and like you said, it was more than my rickety old bones could lift.
All sorted now and there is more Fe and Zn than lead.I too intend to sell the Fe to the junk yard when I get a load together. I don't do it for profit, but rather a way to keep the place more presentable.
There are some new to me weights. I had heard talk of aluminum weights but had never seen one till today. Great big (for weight) hunking CO squares that weigh close to nothing.

[Chris C]

I completed my first rendering the other day. I had a 5 gal bucket of COWW and a 5 gal bucket of SOWW The COWW bucket was full + and the SOWW bucket was about 90% filled. The COWW rendered into 183# and the SOWW rendered into 168#.