View Full Version : Fair price for 60/40 solder drippings?
I found a radiator place that has a lot of solder drippings, the guy said hes willing to sell as much as I want but hes not sure what a fair price is. The solder he uses is 60/40 and the market price of tin is about $10/lb according to the exchange. What do you guys figure is a reasonable price to offer him?
Offer a buck a pound and see what he says.
AndyC
03-08-2012, 08:20 PM
Case of beer
Im going to pick up a 5gal bucket and melt it down. This may be a stupid question, is 60/40 solder percentage based upon volume or weight? I figure if it looks like pretty much pure metal, $1/lb wouldnt be unreasonable.
felix
03-08-2012, 08:56 PM
Expect 50 percent waste. ... felix
Jailer
03-08-2012, 10:03 PM
Expect 50 percent waste. ... felix
Yup. Lots of dirt and garbage mixed in but it's worth it if you can get it cheap.
I got a half of a 5 gallon bucket of 60/40 from a local guy for $20 and ended up with 22lbs of ingots.
bumpo628
03-08-2012, 10:56 PM
Im going to pick up a 5gal bucket and melt it down. This may be a stupid question, is 60/40 solder percentage based upon volume or weight? I figure if it looks like pretty much pure metal, $1/lb wouldnt be unreasonable.
By weight
Ok so I got a 5gal bucket today for $40, it weighed about 90lbs. Ended up with 30lbs of **** and 60lbs of metal. There were some battery clamps but mostly it was drippings. I have no idea what the percentage of actual tin is in it. Is there any way to get an idea what percentage I have in my final product? It was obvious that this metal is way runnier than straight lead, it poured like water and is also noticeably lighter.
southpaw
03-11-2012, 02:52 AM
Is there any way to get an idea what percentage I have in my final product?
You could try a specific gravity test. Cast a few boolits out of it. Here is a link that should be usefull. http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=124483&highlight=gravity
Here is how to do the specific gravity test. Remember this only works with lead tin mixes.
SW= sample weight
DW= dry weight
WW= wet weight
Weigh one of your boolits. This is your SW. Suspend this boolit from a piece of string and weigh it. This is you DW. Bring a cup of room temp water up under the boolit and just submerge it. This is your WW.
The formula is as follows:
SW / (DW-WW) = SG
The SG of pure tin is 7.318
for 50/50 SN/PB it is 8.882
for pure pb it is 11.34
If you get a number that is less than 7.3 or higher than 11.34 there is a math or measuring error. Check your work.
To find the percentage of tin that you have use the following formula.
2049.06 / SG - 180.69= % tin
Of course this only works if there are only PB and SN in the mix.
Hope this helps some.
Jerry Jr.
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