This guy must be a politician...

[selmerfan]

So I was off making visits around the countryside today and I stopped into to fill the tank. I noticed the shop had a small repair shop, so I stopped in to ask if they sold their used wheelweights. He said they don't, they have them contracted out. He asked what I was going to use them for. I told him "fishing sinkers and bullets". His response? "These are too hard for bullets, unless you're stupid enough to try using them in a pistol or rifle. I've been there, done that, it's a waste of time. And the wheelweights have too much tin in them to be of any good, you would have to heat the lead up real hot and keep skimming to get the tin and antimony out of it before you could cast fishing sinkers with them." I told him I've run thousands of cast bullets through my pistols and rifles and killed more than a couple deer with them. He looked at me (and I'm in my pastor gear, collar and all) and said, "Bull***t! I tried them in a pistol once and they just filled my bore after a couple of shots and I couldn't hit anything with them." I just looked at him and said, "You must have some real funny wheelweights here, good thing you have a buyer for them." He said to check with a guy down the block might have some, but he uses the same supplier and all they are good for is weighting cars for the racers. I love the fact that he decided to tell me what was good for me. Maybe he'll make a plate that tells me what I should run through my guns... On the upside, I also stopped in at the local antique shop, found a 6 1/2" Wagner cast iron skillet for $12, a set of 8 heavy muffin cups to use for ingot molds for $2, and 15 lb. lead weight for $5. The old guy said that weight has been there as long as they've been in business (24 years) and can't believe someone bought it! I didn't tell him what would happen to it.... :)

[MT Gianni]

Google that Wagner skillet. Some of the older ones get the collectors out. Check e-bay for starters.

[selmerfan]

I already did. It's a nice little skillet, but it's from a 100th anniversary run they did back in 1991. Not much value, worth about what I paid for it, maybe a bit more, but I don't have a 6 1/2" skillet either - now I do! NOTHING cooks better than cast iron, period.

[Mk42gunner]

I've found that it is almost impossible to change peoples minds about using lead for boolits. "Everybody knows" that you have to wrap that nasty lead in copper, or it will just flat ruin your gun. And if you dare to cast boolits, you need speacial lead to do it, you cannot use wheel weights.

I'd rather the guy be honest and tell me he trades them in to his supplier for credit, than try to tell me something wrong.

Sad really, it hasn't been that long since jacketed pistol bullets became readily available.

Robert

[Mavrick]

Must be the same guy that was running the shop when I first started racing.
I'm a drag racer, so my car is supposed to not only look good, but have lightweight running gear, so we use mag wheels.
We'd go to a tire shop to have tires mounted and balanced, both the front and the slicks.
"Just last week, we were mounting a set of tires on a mag, and the wheel exploded and killed my employee!!!"
We'd go to two or three more shops that day and get exactly the same story...Must have been a VERY bad week! We finally went home and didn't go to another store for at least a year. We marked up a few wheels, but none exploded.
If they had told me they didn't want to risk marking my wheels, I'd have accepted it and gone on my way. Just don't lie to me!
Oh, yeah...my "mags" are one-piece aluminum.
I'll see ya down by the ol' fishin' hole with our 'special' sinkers.
Gene

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

there is so much science and art to casting boolits,
it's not that surprising to me that there are
plenty of people who refuse to get "educated"
except to have tried casting once or twice and have failed,
Now they know <sarcasm> !!!
Jon

PS, I only wish I had a clue at what else I need to learn.

[selmerfan]

Well, today was redemptive. I had to go about two hours for a hospital visit and the trip took me right past the truck shop about 4 miles from one of the churches I serve. I stopped in there about a month ago and inquired about what they did with wheelweights. "We just toss them in the trash." I offered to leave a bucket and they had no problem with it. I stopped in today with a dozen donuts and asked about my bucket. They brought it out about 3/4 full with wheelweights! :drinks: I asked if they wanted anything for them, they didn't, so I traded out buckets and asked what their beverage of choice was (keep in mind I'm decked out in clerical garb, collar included). I'll be returning with a twelve-pack of brew in about a month. The funny thing is, 3/4 of the wheelweights are stickies BIG stickies - some pushing a pound or more! The clip-ons are huge too, and there was virtually zero trash in the bucket, no stems, a couple of valve caps and a hose clamp, that was it, and zero zinc or steel. It was a good day!

[bhn22]

I usually just tell people that they're for my brother, who's building a sailboat, and needs ballast. Sometimes I'll say they're for my brother, who casts lead soldiers. Nobody ever looks twice.

[nvbirdman]

I can't help myself.
Somebody up above must like you.

[giz189]

Well, I have to relate this too. Good friend who is a rifle shooter, just j words ,long range, don't even touch the rifle to shoot at target told one of his buddies who went in with me to buy lead and ww's to mould bullets for his 9mm and .40 S&W that he was going "to ruin his barrels" with the cast boolits. Go figure. Jump ahead 2 weeks another friend who 20 or 25 yrs ago shot and made a lot of his own boolits, but has quit shooting and sold most of his guns,has about 6-700 lbs of linotype. Got it free from local newspaper when they went to the printing format. Asked about buying 100 or so pounds of the stuff. He said, "I used to mix my alloy half ww's and half linotype for my 44 mags." I said I mixed my alloy half ww's and half pure lead. His jaw hit the ground. What do you do with all the lead? I asked what lead he was talking about, he replied the lead in your barrel. He informed me there was now way I could shoot that alloy and not lead my barrels in 41 mag or 45-70 with a plain base boolit. He said he had to keep two lewis lead remover kits to keep his revolver bbls cleaned out using 1/2 ww and 1/2 lino and a gas checked boolit. I said well I have not had any leading yet. He turned and walked to his car and never said another word. So, I left to. Don't know if I will ever get any lino from him though. As my daughters used to tell me "Whatever"

[Lizard333]

When asking about the WW's at tire shops, I get people looking at me funny if I tell them it's for boolits, so lately I have been saying fishing sinkers. They usually don't have a problem just giving them to me at that point. Been pretty lucky lately. Went into a tire shop the other day and and asked them what they did with them and he said " they sit on the floor over there until a the day my dreams come true and a caster walks in and takes the whole pile!" To which i promptly replied, "Looks like to dreams were answered today then!" A twelve pack and a couple of buckets, so he wouldn't throw them on the floor any more, and I got over 400 pounds of WW's!
He told me that if anyone else asked about them, he would tell them that they were taken. Not a bad day at all.....