Dogueman
10-24-2011, 02:44 PM
New caster here with no real experience. I read a ton of posts here before trying my first melt that has left me with several challenging questions.
The melt was composed of about 20 pounds of reclaimed range lead, about 10 pounds of some sort of lead roofing sheet, and about 4 pounds of some sort of solder wire. Everything was purchase from a local scrap yard. Everything was melted in a 5 quart dutch oven that was placed on a gas grill running at the 650-700 degree zone. I tried to keep the melt under 700 degrees and fluxed a few times with candle wax before pouring into muffin pans.
During the melting process I noticed the melt would solidify rather quickly and often had a grainy frosty look if the temp was not maintained above approximately 650 degrees. When I would use my slotted steel spoon to scoop dross out of my melt the lead on the spoon would clump and harden within a half second. With the lead in a molten form I was able to pour about a dozen or so muffins with varied degrees of success due to rapid solidification. Upon inspecting the cooled muffins I noticed they had a light silvery frosty color with a sponge like surface that almost had a speckled glitter look, the tops of the muffins looks okay. Pouring ingots at a temperature lower than 650-700 degrees would result in a clumpy pour.
I did a test batch casting of some fishing sinkers and noticed the melt would not fill the mold cleanly. I later increased my furnace temperature and tried to pour some boolits for practice. I noticed most boolits lacked a sharp edge with periodic voids along the surface where the lead appeared to be folding in as it poured (700 degrees pot temp.). All bullets were returned to the pot, melted, and poured out into marked ingots to isolate the batch.
One thing I noticed during the boolit casting was that as soon as the sprue lost it's shine and I went to cut it, the sprue plate was very tough to cut (hard).
My thoughts. Do I have an excessive amount of tin in my melt? What could that unknown roofing sheet I assumed was lead really be made from. Was that solder wire mixed with something other than tin? Why is the batch of lead I smelted so hard? Why won't the mix flow smoothly and give me clean sharp edges when casting?
And now for the most important question. How do I clean out my bottom pour melting pot so what's left in the pot does not contaminate future melts.
:killingpc
The melt was composed of about 20 pounds of reclaimed range lead, about 10 pounds of some sort of lead roofing sheet, and about 4 pounds of some sort of solder wire. Everything was purchase from a local scrap yard. Everything was melted in a 5 quart dutch oven that was placed on a gas grill running at the 650-700 degree zone. I tried to keep the melt under 700 degrees and fluxed a few times with candle wax before pouring into muffin pans.
During the melting process I noticed the melt would solidify rather quickly and often had a grainy frosty look if the temp was not maintained above approximately 650 degrees. When I would use my slotted steel spoon to scoop dross out of my melt the lead on the spoon would clump and harden within a half second. With the lead in a molten form I was able to pour about a dozen or so muffins with varied degrees of success due to rapid solidification. Upon inspecting the cooled muffins I noticed they had a light silvery frosty color with a sponge like surface that almost had a speckled glitter look, the tops of the muffins looks okay. Pouring ingots at a temperature lower than 650-700 degrees would result in a clumpy pour.
I did a test batch casting of some fishing sinkers and noticed the melt would not fill the mold cleanly. I later increased my furnace temperature and tried to pour some boolits for practice. I noticed most boolits lacked a sharp edge with periodic voids along the surface where the lead appeared to be folding in as it poured (700 degrees pot temp.). All bullets were returned to the pot, melted, and poured out into marked ingots to isolate the batch.
One thing I noticed during the boolit casting was that as soon as the sprue lost it's shine and I went to cut it, the sprue plate was very tough to cut (hard).
My thoughts. Do I have an excessive amount of tin in my melt? What could that unknown roofing sheet I assumed was lead really be made from. Was that solder wire mixed with something other than tin? Why is the batch of lead I smelted so hard? Why won't the mix flow smoothly and give me clean sharp edges when casting?
And now for the most important question. How do I clean out my bottom pour melting pot so what's left in the pot does not contaminate future melts.
:killingpc