Range Mining Technique

[762 shooter]

I know this has been covered somewhere, but I can't find it.

What methods and/or equipment do you use to collect outdoor range lead.

Screen, finger pickin', lead smelling dog, etc? I may have exclusive access to a range and I want to be as efficient as possible.

I need direction to a thread if there is one.

Thanks

762

[btroj]

I use fingers to pick up bullets.

I have used a 2 x 2 foot hardware cloth screen once also.

In my opinion the method needs to fit the soil type. A screen is great with a sandy or fine soil type. It flows easily thru the mesh leaving bullets behind. We have largely clay type soil in eastern NE so a screen doesn't do very well. That is the reason I use my fingers. Much slower but I can't change the soil, I can only use a method that works for me.

I have developed a few thoughts on mining. I don't dig very deep, I find many bullets are close to the surface. Simply dragging my foot along the berm exposes a fair amount of lead. I find hot, dry weather is my friend. It makes the soil much looser and makes bullets easier to find. Pistol berms are great after a match too, the bullets seem to be in small areas on the berm and the ground in pretty chewed up, this makes it quick and easy.

Each berm is unique. I have found certain areas on the ones I mine tend to collect round nose bullets, and they aren't where I would expect them. Look over the berm, learn from experience the best place on it to look. Mining smart reduces the time needed to fill a cup or can.

My goal for this year is to collect more lead than I shoot. I figure that if I go and shoot 200 rounds of 45 ACP with 200 swc I leave about 5 pounds of lead in the berm. I can pretty easily bring home 10 pounds after a trip like that.

[LUCKYDAWG13]

i just use a 20 x 11 sifter box that i made and a snow shovel our berm is like sand
i got over #170 lbs of range lead in about 45 min

[762 shooter]

LuckyDawg,

Is your screen 1/2" hardware cloth?

Btroj,

I have sandy soil, so a screen may work. I guess a gently expanded 38 would catch in a 1/2" screen. I can always do "fingers".

That is my goal also. Get more than I leave to maintain my stash. The problem is that I'm depositing 285 gr. 45 Colts every trigger pull with my new revolver. (4.094 cylinders/pound)

762

[clodhopper]

I hand pick, the berms are made of clay, and gravel, and have lots of clay bird chips in them.
After much use, one bullet goes into the berm and three come to the surface, some roll down to the bottem of the berm, some fly over the berm. Strong wind helps leave the bullets visable on the berm.
Start picking at the bottom of the berm and work your way up.

[btroj]

I would use a 1/4 inch mesh for a sifter in sandy soil. My FIL, another guy, and I once filled 8 5 gallon buckets with bullets in under 2 hours that way. Man I love a sand berm!

The pistol berm I pick have a sheer wall above the sloped area. I find many RN bullets from handguns skip off the face of the slope and are found up against the sheer wall. Not where I would expect them at all. I found over 20 45 RN cast in an area smaller than a coffee can one day. Tells me where to look in the future!

Wole key is to learn you berm. Where do bullets seem to end up. Where are the hot spots or weak spots. When is best time to look. How does rain affect things.

[40Super]

I did a little berm digging last fall,our soil is a mix of clay,rocks and packy black dirt.I used a small garden digger to turn over the soil and hand picked the bullets that came up.No screen would work here because of the rocks,clay pidgeon chunks,and other junk would fill it up and youd still have to spend a bunch of time hand picking.I now have an indoor source with no sand or junk in it,just pure bullet chunks.

[SlippShodd]

Screen, finger pickin', lead smelling dog, etc? I may have exclusive access to a range and I want to be as efficient as possible.


I've really tried to convince my dogs to sniff out brass and bullets, but the closest we can get is my year old pup's uncanny ability to step and stand on the case or bullet I was about to pick up. :rolleyes:
Last week, I decided to shoot a bit of rimfire with a new friend I met in the desert brassratting, and thought the pup was hiding under the truck with my old dog. Nope. Eventually found him a mile and a half away, sitting in a stretch of tall grass, lost and footsore, and very happy to be found (me too). Walking out with him, we stumbled on an out of place patch of .308, .45, and 9mm brass ripe for the picking. :D
+1 for finding the odd hotspots where bullets go to die, and just handpicking off the surface. There's one berm I take a collapsable rake with me to scratch the surface a bit and the chunks either magically surface, or roll down to my feet.
It's been raining here for days... late the first sunny day next week should be a bonanza strike for me in the desert.

mike

[edler7]

Lead seems to be attracted to my old dog, but it's in the end opposite of his nose. :?

My range doesn't want berm mining, so I hand pick. A lot is available on the surface, and even more after a good rain. I can pick up somewhere over 5 pounds in 15-20 minutes, depending on the berm and my effort level.

[BulletFactory]

Get a 5 gallon bucket, and one of those "cherry pie crust" steel speaker grilles for a 12" subwoofer. Cut the bucket in half, and zip tie the speaker cover over the mouth of the bucket. Attatch the handle to the bucket for ease of handling. You now have a multi purpose strainer that can be used for sifting range lead. Sand will go right through, some types of dirt may require some assistance with a hose.

This is also good for seperating the media from casings, as well as a half dozen other uses. The cut off half of the bucket makes a handy little bin or trash can.


ETA : I did the same thing with a smaller garbage can using an 8" speaker grille. I use it for smaller or lighter work. Mostly to get the water dropped bullets out of my drop bucket, and then once the bullets are finished, I drop them in and then use a hot water spray to remove the excess bullet lube.

[Down South]

I use a minnow trap. Shovel the dirt in, close it up and shake. Not much problems with rocks here so it works well.

[beagle]

Got an old AK ammo box with 1/4" hardware mesh on the bottom. It works pretty well but I do get a lot of small gravel. Ought to be a law against using anything but sand on a backstop./beagle

[cf_coder]

Yeah, don't think that is gonna work out here in AZ. All we really have out here is sand, rock and clay. And you get a less than judicious mix of the three in any berm that's made. Usually its the sand that gets the short end of the stick. Rock and clay... :-)

[btroj]

I brought home about 20 pounds yesterday. Got to shoot, spend time doing something I enjoy, and bring home more lead than I took.

Yep, my idea of a good day.

[fredj338]

A 12x24 box madfrom 2x4 & covered w/ 1/4" screen makes a good sieve. It catches all the 22lr & then yo ucan pluck out the bullets or dmp it all into a bucket for sorting later. I saw a great one the other day; 5gal bucket w/ the bottom cut out & covered w/ 1/4" mesh., put a couple handles on the side & just sift & pour into another bucket.

[evan price]

I carry in some 2 gallon buckets formerly holding Quickrete concrete patch. Go across the berm by hand pickin' starting at bottom and edges. Best a couple sunny days after a hard rain to wash the loose dirt away. Soil here is solid clay so no screens for me, unless I can figure a way to rig a water trammel sort of deal like in gold mining. And the berm owners would not like that!

5-gallon bucket full of berm lead is darn near too heavy to lift, so more small buckets is better.

[buyobuyo]

The berms at the local range are dirt and rock primarily. I made a couple of sifters using empty 7.62x54R spam cans. One has 1/2" holes and the other is 1/4" holes.

My method is to pick by hand until I find a soft area with a good concentration. Then I scoop with the 1/2" can and hold the 1/4" can underneath and shake. The big lead pieces and rocks stay in the 1/2" on top. The 1/4" catches smaller lead pieces and the small rocks. Do that a couple 2-3 times in a spot and move on.

[bld451]

7.62, here's a thread with some pics of my homemade sifter. Works like a champ in sand or loose clods, but finger picking is viable , too if you're in a clay area, or if there are a lot of mixed rocks.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=134800

[zxcvbob]

I get most of my lead at the indoor range now, but outdoors I go to the pistol range lane with the metal "falling plate" targets. Just scoop the lead up off the ground (right under the targets) with a pointing trowel. It only takes a minute to get 15 to 20 pounds of scrap.

I carry the trowel and a gallon ZipLock freezer bag in my range bag and try to go when I'm likely to be the only one there.

[winchester85]

i have used the screen and shake method and doing so i have accumulated quite a bit of bullets quickly. i think i did 240 pounds in about 45 minutes. i started to build a trommel, but my design/fabrication skills are a little lacking. has anyone built a trommel for separating bullets from dirt? i would like to be able to screen faster and easier than a shaker box.
i dont even cast bullets, but i have been collecting/ melting lead since i was a kid. but with range scrap ingots at about $1 per pound. there might be some money in it if i can screen bullets in volume. the local range is ripe for mining, i have never seen anyone collecting lead, and the surface of the ground is covered with bullets. with the volume of shooters on the weekends, i figure there are several thousand pounds of lead deposited there every year.

[nvbirdman]

I finger pick. Our club owns our range and we have been told not to walk on the berm because it collapses the berm and then the club has to spend money to repair the damage. I walk along the bottom of the berm and take what I can reach, but it breaks my heart sometimes to see a lot of boolits just out of reach.

[Jal5]

I do the same as NVBIRDMAN and it doesn't take long to fill up a plastic coffee container full just picking them up off the berm :)

[Bomber]

I use a 3 prong gizmo normally used for gardening. scrape off the surface dirt and see whats under. Like others have said, depending on the soil type, I often find bullets laying on the surface of the berm. The only time I don't mine is during the winter when the ground is frozen. I then hand pick up the bullets and drop them in an old plastic milk jug. Collect until the jug is about ready to collapse from weight. My back is about worn out by then. These are pistol berms, so the bullets are a mix of jacketed and cast.

[gbrown]

After reading all the posts and opinions here, last Tuesday, 3/27, I took a 5 gallon bucket with me to the range. Went to 2 ranges where no one was and just picked by hand. Piddling around, no hurry, no one there. Looked for boolits, not jacketed. Picked up about 8 # of lead in about an hour and a half. Just playing, not working. Still got about a pound of jackets. Smelted down and it came in at about 8.7 with my Lee hardness tester. More than I had before, is all I can say. Soil down here is mostly clay, so shakers won't really work.

[btroj]

I can get 25 pounds or so in less than an hour. I go to the range and shoot some, pick some.i get a couple handsful of lead each time down to check targets, put out more clays, or whatever. If I can fill a 5 gal bucket each ear then I should be bringing home more lead than I shoot. I can live with that.

[RP]

OK guys this is a new trick I learned the last time I mined a berm and got 2400 lbs of bullets. So now I got your attention I use a cement mixer with the drum changed out to a barrel with holes in it. That lets the dirt out and keeps the lead in. But the Trick I learned that will work for just about all of us is a leaf blower. Yep thats right a leaf blower. At the bottom of the berm dig you a pit or trap. Use the dirt out of the pit to form a funnel to it, Then take the blower and blow the dirt up the berm it will expose the bullets that will roll into the bit to be picked or shoveled out. With this new trick I learned it really helped me fill my buckets alot faster and easier. Try it out works good in the soil i have.

[Oreo]

Cat litter scoop, bucket, dry stinkin hot summer day. Brought home 200lbs in an hour from clay soil berm. I try not to get hung up on worrying about rocks, mulch or other stuff captured in the scoop with the bullets. Its much more time efficient to smelt it all & let that stuff sort itself out. Of my initial 200lbs I got 150lbs of clean ingots but that was roughly 50% by volume of what I took from the berm.

[zomby woof]

I made a 14X14 shaker box with 1/4 inch screen. I was able to recover 160 pounds tonight in about 40 minutes. i hit a honey hole, the boolits were all stacked up. it's made up of mostly cast pistol boolits. Should be a nice alloy.

http://www.hunt101.com/data/500/PART_1333148032804.jpg

[Oreo]

Something else to consider... when smelting bermine ore you skim off the jackets first, and then you're (I am, at least) left with a bunch of dirt covering the melt. Skim off the dirt but save it! There's probably a good bit of fine lead particles in there. They can be salvaged by rinsing in a bucket of water. Think, panning for gold (lead). You don't have to wash it perfect but just get the easy dirt out. Whats left can be resmelted. I saved 15lbs of a 200lb smelt this way this past weekend.

[zxcvbob]

You can do better than that if your smelter has a lid and you can get it really hot -- stir a little used motor oil or cooking grease into that heavy black dirt and ash that you saved from several batches, and then cook the devil out of it with the lid on. About half of it will turn back into lead. (this truly is smelting, not just melting or rendering like we usually do.)

[Oreo]

I get about half the dirt to turn back to lead. I don't think heat is the key, at least for what I get. I think the lead fines get suspended in so much dirt that they can't join into larger lead drops that will flow down into the melt. The lead fines just get suspended in the dirt & stuck there.