Collecting Everyday Items For Casting And Reloading...

[ArrowJ]

Note: Also posted on the Ammosmith forum.

Greetings,

I thought it might be interesting and beneficial to put together a list of items that can be recycled, reused, or repurposed for reloading, casting, or other aspects of the shooting sports. One obvious item would be scrap lead, but I saw a thread somewhere about saving certain aluminum cans to make gas checks from. I do not know if that is actually something people do, but it gives an idea of what I mean. I also collect pill bottles, ice cream tubs, etc. for storage. What would you add to the list?

Scrap Lead
Storage Containers
Gas Check Material (not sure what qualifies here)
Honey Comb (can this be used for flux?)
Various items that might be fun to shoot i.e. an aluminum heat sink from a computer

[Jal5]

Discarded coffee maker to heat the lubes- just missed getting one at work yesterday. already pitched in the dumpster before I thought of this idea.

[PS Paul]

What a great idea for a thread! Lots of terrific and inventive ideas from our forum members I'll wager.

I got nothin' groundbreaking, but I'm gonna chew on this for a bit and think about some of the more cockamamey, err, "inventive" things I've done out of necessity and cheapness over the past few decades. ha-ha!!

[ShootNSteel]

Discarded coffee maker to heat the lubes- just missed getting one at work yesterday. already pitched in the dumpster before I thought of this idea.

You gotta dive in there and get it!

I save pie and cookie pans or any pans for that matter. All the tooling from my work comes in great hard plastic containers that I save.
Also the tooling comes covered in a hard cosmoline that makes great flux or fire starters in the winter when mixed with sawdust.
I use old silverware, particularly ice tea mixers as a dross scrapers. Just don't use the silver plated ones, lead sticks to them.

Any small motor or gear reducer unit that's getting thrown away at work comes home with me. I saved some great little motors and gearboxes to build a case feeder and rotary tumbler this winter.

[Idaho Sharpshooter]

Any cast iron muffin or biscuit tins.

Rich
Sua Sponte

[45fan]

I took an old stainless steel bowl I used as the dogs water bowl. Drilled a hole in the base added a wooden handle, cut an opening in the side of it for my mold handles to stick out and use it as lid to cover my molds while they sit on my hot plate. Makes the hot plate more like a little oven heating the aluminum mold and steel sprue plate a little more evenly.

[Jack Stanley]

My beloved broke the ceramic crock part of our crock pot/deep fryer . I salvaged the deep fryer part to use as a double boiler heater for blending lubes .

Jack

[Silverboolit]

Folgers coffee cans, plastic ones, great for storing boolits in and they stack,..Also, when I go to the range, I go dumpster diving for empty cartridge boxes and the sticky 'pasters' that come on the newer shoot n c targets. Cheap paper plates and pasters make for alright targets.
Just my way of recycling and saving the planet.

[Jal5]

I too am a big fan of coffee containers for storing bullets, brass, etc.
I look for discarded ammo boxes at the range too.

I went back for that discarded MR. Coffee maker but the dumpster had already been emptied!

[zuke]

I go to the dollar store for their big soup spoon's/ladle's.
The "holy" one is great for skipping out the WW clip's and ****, the ladle I use to pour ingot's.

[turmech]

I re purposed an electric candle warmer I had not seen the wife use in years. I use a small glass candle jar on it for warming LLA for dip lubbing. When done put the lid on the candle jar and keep LLA in it for the next session. Kind of like a smaller scale version of the crock pot dip lube method requiring less LLA.

[canyon-ghost]

Yessir, 3# coffee cans and teaspoons with 1/4" holes drilled in them, rags (especially tee shirts), candles, Prego jars with the resealable lid (for mineral spirits- I use just enough in the jar to cover the brush or jag), pencils with erasers (cleaning mold cavities), sharpie laundry markers for drawing targets (a quarter makes a black focal point visable out at 100 meters), grocery sacks (paper sacks for drawing targets) and 1/3 sheet or odd size plywood for target boards.

[ArrowJ]

I always keep paper grocery bags in the garage for all kinds of things. I buy them from Aldi for 6¢ each.

[kmag]

Friend of mine came up with this tip. He keeps all his junk mail that is printed on one side of full sheets of paper. Uses the clean side and a magic marker to make targets. At least doing that you get some return for opening all the junk mail.

[0verkill]

Folgers coffee cans, plastic ones, great for storing boolits in and they stack,..Also, when I go to the range, I go dumpster diving for empty cartridge boxes and the sticky 'pasters' that come on the newer shoot n c targets. Cheap paper plates and pasters make for alright targets.
Just my way of recycling and saving the planet.

At least I'm not the only one that saves pasters.

Never throw away jeans with a good leg. Cut it off and sew up the ends for sandbags.

[0verkill]

Friend of mine came up with this tip. He keeps all his junk mail that is printed on one side of full sheets of paper. Uses the clean side and a magic marker to make targets. At least doing that you get some return for opening all the junk mail.

Also don't forget to send a reply in the post paid envelope asking for donations.

[adrians]

I re purposed an electric candle warmer I had not seen the wife use in years. I use a small glass candle jar on it for warming LLA for dip lubbing. When done put the lid on the candle jar and keep LLA in it for the next session. Kind of like a smaller scale version of the crock pot dip lube method requiring less LLA.

Hey, i have one of those somewhere and never thought of using it for LLA,
but i will now THX .

Don't forget that stuffed animal your dog chewed all to pieces , it,s guts makes good filler .

[Sasquatch-1]

Yessir, pencils with erasers (cleaning mold cavities),

The other end of those pencils are good for stirring the pot when casting.

I also save the empty 1lb propane bottles for targets when visiting a friend. We did not have any explosion and do place the a good distance away.

Now this isn't repurposing but I do print out pictures of "Barney" to use as targets. I get lots of comments on these at the range.

Big Lots sells a cream cheese storage box that is a nice rectangle shape that is just big enough to hold 100 240 grn .429 cal bullets.

[NSP64]

Never throw away jeans with a good leg. Cut it off and sew up the ends for sandbags.

Last time the kids bought jeans they didn't have any good legs on them to start with. lol

Guess I could cut mine off the ones that don't fit anymore.

[dickttx]

"Custom Made Press Cover" and "Scale Cover"
But none of my large stash of Folgers cans. I use all three sizes.
Oh, and crochet hoops. Great for corralling brass, bullets, small parts, etc.