re-claimed shot

[Floydster]

Hi all,
Our range is harvesting the shot from the skeet and trap range.
I would like input on what is the best way to turn the shot into ingots for casting boolits.
Thanks all for any info.

Smokeyloads

[imashooter2]

Large pot. Lots of heat. Many molds.

No worry of any contamination so blast it with as much fire as you can find.

[Larry Gibson]

Adding to flux well to reove any dirt or debri........

Larry Gibson

[Shiloh]

It's good hard lead.
How did you gather it??

Shiloh

[leadman]

Having melted a bunch of this I can state to put it in small amounts in your pot. The corrosion and graphite on the pellets makes it hard to get it to melt. Put enogh in the pot to cover the bottom about an inch. Have a heavy spoon or other object to squish the pellets against the side of the pot to release the lead. Flux this and remove the dross and add some more shot and repeat.
If you load up the pot when starting it takes a long time to get it to melt and then to seperate the dross from the lead.

[fcvan]

I say the effort will be futile. Just box it up and ship it my way. I'll figure out how to dispose of the problem for you :)

[Junior1942]

A few years ago I bought around 500 lbs of reclaimed shot from the local scrapyard. They bought it from a circus. Its hardness, measured with my Lee guage, is harder than lead and slightly softer than wheelweight alloy. I don't remember the actual numbers. It makes fine bullets.

At first I made ingots from some of it but now I simply fill my Lee pots with it. Yes, it gives lots of dross, but so what? The dross also tends to cling to the inside of the pot, but, again, so what? It's easy to scrape off. I just stir and scrape, with the edge of a Lee dipper, until the dross is all or mostly gone. And I use NO flux, as I've said before.

I paid 30¢ a lb for it and should have bought more. But what's left + two 5-gallon buckets of wheelweights will last me the rest of my life.

[MT Gianni]

Junior, I think the only problem with melting it in your pour pot would be an increased drip. If you flux and skim all the dross off before you pour none should get under the valve seat.

[runfiverun]

if you flux properly all the oxides will return to the alloy.
you'll have some dirt and graphite to deal with by skimming.

i'd use my smelting set-up with a little flammable liquid in there to help things along.

[mtgrs737]

After WW's it would be my next choice of a boolit alloy source. Add a little tin and your in for nice cast boolits.

[leadman]

Reclaimed shot versus new shot is entirely different to deal with. The amount of dross is many times greater than with new shot and I don't recommend melting it in your pot.

[Junior1942]

A few years ago I bought around 500 lbs of reclaimed shot from the local scrapyard. They bought it from a circus. Its hardness, measured with my Lee guage, is harder than lead and slightly softer than wheelweight alloy. I don't remember the actual numbers. It makes fine bullets.

At first I made ingots from some of it but now I simply fill my Lee pots with it. Yes, it gives lots of dross, but so what? The dross also tends to cling to the inside of the pot, but, again, so what? It's easy to scrape off. I just stir and scrape, with the edge of a Lee dipper, until the dross is all or mostly gone. And I use NO flux, as I've said before.

I paid 30¢ a lb for it and should have bought more. But what's left + two 5-gallon buckets of wheelweights will last me the rest of my life.Some of you missed a couple of points so I made them bold. Why should I flux when not fluxing works just great? Why should I not use my huge stash of reclaimed shot for making bullets when the bullets cast fine and work well?

[felix]

You shouldn't! A waste of time is just that. ... felix

[W.R.Buchanan]

The only problem I see here is why are you not tumble washing it, reapplying the graphite and reloading shot shells with it. A cement mixer and a hose and maybe some dawn would be the way to go.

I buy reclaimed shot for loading my shot shells. Haven't bought any lately but paid $25/ a bag or $1 /LB a couple of years ago.

When you have a resource like that you need to maximize it's usage. I personally think relaoding shotshells with it is a better use than melting it and making boolits. But I have 400+ lbs of wheel weight ingots sitting in my driveway too.

However your club could make a bunch of money by reselling the shot to it's members, and depending on how much shot there actually is it could be a real windfall. People who reload shotshells would gladly pay $20 + a 25lb bag.

I'm really surprised they are not headed in that direction in the first place as I know the reclaimers are not doing it for free.

Randy

[Junior1942]

Randy, my reclaimed shot impacted a steel backing. Every pellet is flat on one side. However, I did load some in my muzzleloader shotgun and it worked fine.