Can you test my lead ?

[fourdollarbill]

I melted about 400 lbs of lead pipe into ingots today and the last pot full I added a piece of what I thought was a sheet of lead roofing. Well the mixed really changed and it looks zinc'ish but I really don't know. I quarantined the ingots and they do look different.

When I was stirring, the surface of the lead had weird looking little puddles. Kind of like diesel fuel floating on water.
When pouring into the mold the pour had long skins of lead .

What do you think?
Can anybody test it? I hate to waste, I have about 45 lbs of it.

[Jim_Fleming]

Lee Precision makes a very nice Boolit Hardness testing kit. Midway USA sells it... I suggest you buy your own and in the future, you'll have it available for other testing. :-)

Sent from my Droid

[williamwaco]

I melted about 400 lbs of lead pipe into ingots today and the last pot full I added a piece of what I thought was a sheet of lead roofing. Well the mixed really changed and it looks zinc'ish but I really don't know. I quarantined the ingots and they do look different.

When I was stirring, the surface of the lead had weird looking little puddles. Kind of like diesel fuel floating on water.
When pouring into the mold the pour had long skins of lead .

What do you think?
Can anybody test it? I hate to waste, I have about 45 lbs of it.


Try this, Melt a batch of it and let it set - melted - for about 20 minutes. When I get contaminated alloys, this treatment will cause a very thick mealy scum to form on the top. This is NOT the normal slag and carbon and ash that forms on top of good lead. This is often described as looking like oatmeal. To me, it looks more like silver whipped cream. No amount of stiring or skimming will get rid of it. If you skim it off and let the pot set, it will just reform if you keep skimming, you will soon have an empty pot.

Another test is the citric acid test. It is said that a drop of citric acid ( on the surface of a cooled ingot ) will cause small bright silver bubbles to form in the drop of acid if zinc is present. If you don't make your own beer, you can get some citric acid from your wife's cabinet. Fruit Fresh is mostly citric acid, as is lemon juice.

( Now the bad news. I have no confidence in this test. I played around with it a few months ago when I had the same problem you are having. The problem was that tiny silver bubbles appeared with every sample I tested including straight linotype. )

I was able to slightly improve it by fluxing several times with sawdust ( do not skim between fluxings. You will end up with lots of burned sawdust before you skim.) ( Normal fluxing waxes and oils will not do anything.)

Now:

Google this phrase "Bullet zinc contamination"

You will be overwhelmed with advice.

And one last thing: DO NOT ATTEMPT TO DILUTE IT WITH GOOD LEAD TO MAKE IT BETTER.



Now the good news.

I had about 20 pounds of this rotten alloy. I segregated it carefully and cast it in to about 800 perfectly good 158 grain SWCs for my .38 Special.

I also scrubbed my pot with a bronze brush on my electric drill before putting good metal back in it,

[scb]

There's this: http://www.rotometals.com/Metals-Analysis-XRF-Testing-s/59.htm. I couldn't justify expense for 45#

[fourdollarbill]

Nice advice folks, thank you.
I'm going to cast them into 600 fps semi wad cutters for my 38SW and see how it works.
Maybe some tin will help...
Thanks again, $4

[fecmech]

Bill--I posted a while back about screwing up and zincafying 2 batches of lead (40 lbs each). I did skim some of the "oatmeal" from mine and tried a ladle casting from the pot at that point. Bullets looked decent so I added about 2% tin and went for it. I kept that batch separate and cast some 358429 and they shot just fine so I used up the 40 lbs. on other bullets and they all cast and shot well with no problems at all. I have the ingots from the first batch laying next to the garage for a cleanup attempt in the future. Give it a try, may work out just fine.

[idahoron]

I melted some WW and it came out looking the the "oatmeal" stuff. I made that batch into sturgeon sinkers.
I could test the hardness for you on your batch. I am not sure that will help but I can do it if you want it done. Ron

[blackbike]

Don`t get you`r melt over 675 degrees and you don`t need a test to tell where the zink is. i know its to late now ,but next time.