(Highly sarcastic & grossly exaggerated) My pot has gotten to the point where it's splattering everything, including me, with lead sparkles as it builds a stalagmite in the drip pan. I could basically just keep filling the mold blocks from the never ending stream of lead pouring from the pot without actually operating the valve handle. To clean out the pour spout I just dump a handful of nuts and bolts into the pot and let them pass through the spout. OK, so it's not that bad: but it's annoying, and I've already rebuilt the pot several times. I did learn something extra from this thread. I'll remove the rod assembly and cap off the spout on this old pot. Then I'll use it as a mule for melting and cleaning up scrap lead to make into ingots.