How Much Lead

[686]

if you know how much lead you have you do not have enugh. most places say the battery people pick it up. where can we reach those people and would they sell it to an ind. ? charles

[shooter575]

We have had this thread question a few times before.You got to beat the bushes for lead.Some times it is not easy,but it is a fact of scrounging.
BTW here is a link to June prices for non ferrous scrap prices.
http://demolitionscrapmetalnews.com/?page_id=17
If you can find the little guy that feeds the big operators you can usualy work out a deal.

[1Papalote]

My podna works for a national battery distributor. They pick up all the WWs from their accounts. They in turn sell it as scrap. I understand the battery distributor hauls it off for free. I also checked with a major discount tire retailer regarding the purchase of WW and was told their used WWs are shipped back to the company warehouse. It is certainly getting harder to obtain WWs, so you keep looking for a supply and be prepared for that supply to dry up. I have picked up many pounds of WW by walking city streets, searching the curbs. Not easy but there is certainlya supply there. And I get a little exercise.!!

1Papalote

[686]

SHOOTER575 the horse i was talhing about has not been beeten to death . it was how to get lead from the battery co that pick it up and the hummer of if you know how much lead you have , you do not have enugh. i know how much i have so i do not have enugh. charles

[ron brooks]

I would ask at the tire store for contact information for the battery company, then offer to buy some of the wheel weights off of them. If you could find out what they are paying the tire store you could make it say a nickle a pound more and then pick them up so that they don't have to haul them to the recyclers, should be worth their trouble.

[Hunter]

I have had much better luck with the smaller stores than the larger chains. I have approached many and most are helpful.

[crabo]

I started my hunt today.(I live in a Dallas suburb) The big chain shops have a deal with their battery companies to take the weights.

I paid 10 bucks for a 2 1/2 gal pail just to prime my pump at a little local shop.

I got a 1/2 gal for free at another shop.

I left my card and told them I would buy them at several more shops.

A lot of shops reuse them, one of them throws them in the trash.

I called the scrap yards and they pay 30-35 cents a pound. They sell them for 50 to 75 cents a pound. The guesstimate seems to be that a 5 gal bucket weighs between 80-100 pounds. Maybe some of more experienced scavengers will have a better idea. I guess the thing to do is to always carry an extra 5 gallon pail in the truck and start collecting.

I have decided that I will spend some time collecting the weights before I start buying casting equipment. If I can find a decent supply then I will try to get a lot ad start casting. I figure 15-20 dollars for a 5 gal bucket is a decent buy.

I also made the mistake of not having much cash in my pocket when I started the hunt. You cannot tell by the outside of the shop, what kind of luck you will have inside.

Crabo

[crabo]

Say it ain't so.... I think I read somewhere that the tape on weights are not to be used? I have some, not a lot, in the lead that I bought.

Thanks,

Crabo

[454PB]

Crabo, the tape-on weights are usually dead soft or nearly pure lead. They work fine in the proper application, and can even be mixed with regular WW if the proportion is small enough to avoid diluting the hardness you desire.

[zipdog]

The guesstimate seems to be that a 5 gal bucket weighs between 80-100 pounds.

I bought a 5 gallon bucketful at one place, and after sorting out the valve stems and stick-ons, I had about 1/2 bucket. This weighed 83#, including the bucket. The valve stems and stickons weighed 32#. At another place I bought a smaller bucket (2.5-3 gal) of almost 100% ww and ended up with 106# of ww including the weight of 2 buckets. I figure the wws netted around 100#. Based on my experience, a 5 gal bucket of 100% ww is going to weigh in the neighborhood of 160-170#.

Rusty

[armoredman]

You might find this funny, but a coworker said he used to cast fishing sinkers from dental lead. This was lead sheets in the x-ray film, that the dentist stripped off, and threw in a box for his wife. Not a HUGE amount of lead, but a differant way of coming up with it.

[454PB]

You might find this funny, but a coworker said he used to cast fishing sinkers from dental lead. This was lead sheets in the x-ray film, that the dentist stripped off, and threw in a box for his wife. Not a HUGE amount of lead, but a differant way of coming up with it.

Yeah, my daughter works as a dental assistant and has been saving those little lead foil shields for me. I get a few pounds each month. It takes a LOT of them to make a pound!