where to get lead

[bigbear]

I'm new to this. I live on the west coast of canada,so I doubt my scrounging will impact any of you. Where do you look for lead? I have one small garage collecting wheel weight for me,for free.Just bought a bucket of wheelweights from a bigger shop. Cost me $10 for about 30lbs of wheelweights, the guy looked like he had just done well, I felt I got taken. Is it better just to buy some? Other sources you would suggest? Thanks!

[45nut]

Wow, I think you are right on shop #2 ,, that guy is a #2.
Sometimes the bigger the shop, the more false value they have in the ww's.

Any scrap yards or junkyards around? You might take a few and see whats in the yellow pages...

[redbear705]

Well if I cant get it for cheap....I will buy on Ebay or any auction place that sells it.

If figure if I can get w/w's alraedy cleaned and in ingots for a dollar or less a pound including shipping I am way ahead of the game as I dont have to invest time and energy (gas or electric) to get clean lead for casting and I still come out ahead of the store bought projectiles!

JR

[Bass Ackward]

When the economy goes into recession the next time, is the time to stock up. Guys will get laid off, cut back on shooting and so the shops will be calling YOU to come pick up the stuff. So a big mistake people make is buying more than they have to get by.

After thinking back, I probably get close to 50% of my lead from other casters that have accumulated it over the years and just not used it for what ever reason. Sometimes it comes in the form of shot too, though not for a year or so.

So it can pay to network.

Lately, it's coming in the form of "pure". Didn't think there were that many BP guys around.

[imashooter2]

Indoor ranges generate a lot of scrap.

[Andy_P]

Tire Shops. Visit every shop within 30 miles and offer to pay for their used wheelweights. Used to be, you'd ask if you can have any, then agree to pay when asked, now it's offer to pay up-front. Price-wise, $20-$30 for a full 5 gal pail seems to be the going price. I have two shops I visit every month (went yesterday), so I am the "some guy who already comes by every month and buys them" that you will hear about. Ask how much he pays and go $10 higher. Once you have a source, you need to visit on schedule, or some other guy will displace you - the shop will not like overflowig buckets and will find other ways to sell them if you're not on your toes.

[Adam10mm]

Tire shops, garages, recycling centers. Average I've seen on the Net is $25USD for a 5gal bucket, which is about 140-150 pounds.

[targetshootr]

Not sure how many tires shops on the west side of Canada but that's where to look. I think small/mid-size towns are better to search. This morning I had nothing to do so I drove 30 miles and brought back 4 buckets by lunchtime. The first stop charged $20 for three buckets but I had to pick them out of a barrel of trash. Three more stops made a full bucket but they didn't charge anything.

[Namerifrats]

$10 for 30 lbs is a little on the steep side in my opinion. I get mine at one place for $20 for a 5 gal bucket full, and another for $15 per bucket full. Had one clown let me have a half bucket (I offered to pay but he refused) free, I went back a month later and he said he couldn't give them away but he would sell them. I offered him $25 for the bucket and he said he wanted $2.40 per lb for them ( and claimed that was the going rate the recycler paid him, the sorry turd must have thought I didn't know any better). I told him I was sorry but I wasn't going to pay $360 for a bucket.

[dakotashooter2]

offered him $25 for the bucket and he said he wanted $2.40 per lb for them

Sounds like he went online to see what the "market" was for lead and figured that is what he should get not knowing (or caring) that he would be lucky to get.20 a lb from a srcap dealer.

[Old Ironsights]

If/since you are on the Coast, find a boatyard that scraps boats and get Keel Pigs if you can. Should be pure lead. Then you can harden it up with other stuff ordered online...

[Typecaster]

The posted rate my favorite scrapyard PAYS is only 8 cents/lb. I don't know how much they deduct for all the crap that's usually included; whenever I take metal in, they're quick to degrade the quality if there is any contamination--e.g., a screw or something.

I've given up on tire shops completely.

[cohutt]

I pick up around 3 lbs a week while i;m out running. Carrying a plastic sandwich bag helps keep the little ones from slipping out. Got 3 full lbs on a single run Wednesday including an 8 ouncer that was as big as a hot dog.

3 - 4 lbs per week doesn't seem like a lot but i think of it as a free bucket or more per year

[snowman]

AM I missing out on something?

I call the scrap yard ahead of time, tell them I'm from a tire shop and have 500 lbs to offload...this gives me my price and sometimes determines if I'm even going out.

Last time it was .45/lb. I bought one bucket, and I gave him scrap yard price.

Scrap yard is giving .20/lb if you have small quantity, once you've got 500 lbs or more, you start getting good rates. THey are selling it for .65/lb. Market right now is HIGH.

[snowwolfe]

I hit every tire shop I could find in Alaska and still strike out. My son even works at the tire shop at Costco and they will not even give him the wheel weights as they are returned for credit when they reorder more. I end up buying mine off Ebay or ordering it from suppliers and having it shipped to me in the flat rate boxes.
You guys that have a source at local tire shops should thank your lucky stars. Because sooner or later they will find out what they are worth and you will lose your suppliers.

[Typecaster]

Hey Snowman--

I'm glad I'm not in your neck of the woods, but at least the buy/sell ratio is about consistent. Here they buy for 8 cents/lb; sell for 30. That's a little over 300%, about the same as buying for 20 cents, selling for 65.

Maybe I should start buying in quantity and offering it on the buy/sell thread. My favorite scrapyard has WWs in 55-gal. barrels, and a half barrel of Linotype spacers (I'm holding off on those, because I am not absolutely sure it's pure Linotype alloy. Doesn't make sense that it would be anything else, though). Being a shiftless and lazy Irishman, nowadays I don't even want to drive around pointlessly looking for WWs in Southern California.

[Ken O]

Times are a changing. They used to be glad to get rid of them, I always tipped pretty good anyways, I would give them a $10 bill for a full five gallon bucket, and I think they thought I was nuts. The last time I hit the tire store the guy said it would cost me .50 a pound, and look at me like I had been ripping him off all these years. I have only one store left that holds them for me, and I don't expect that to last much longer.
Now I am thinking of building a bullet trap behind a couple of targets in my pistol pit. I have mostly steel targets like bowling pins, siloettes, etc, and there is lots of lead laying on the ground. If there was an easy way to mine it off the soil I would.

[Sundogg1911]

Ranges are a good source of lead. if you belong and help do some maintenance, usually they will let you keep the cleaned out range lead. I also get wheelweights from a few tire shops. One of them is where I get the tires for my Cars, truck, quad, golf cart, etc. Sped lots of $$$ and they'll take care of you. A few of the other shops I buy from. 2 of them give me a few 5 gallon buckes of used filthy WW's for $15 (for both) it's usually full of valve stems, lug nut, and broken studs, but i'm not complainin' I have a friend in the HVAC business who takes care of a foundry. They hook me up with some good prices too and long as i'm buying a ton or more. It's out there, just keep your eyes open, and when you find a source, treat them right!

[trooperdan]

Cohutt, are you responsible for all the out of balance tires in North Georgia? I saw those channel locks sticking out of your running shorts and I suspect your route goes through a Wally World parking lot! :)

[cohutt]

Cohutt, are you responsible for all the out of balance tires in North Georgia? I saw those channel locks sticking out of your running shorts and I suspect your route goes through a Wally World parking lot! :)

Funny, you aren't the first to bring it up.

It was suggested before by Slim Chance, who is a local LEO. I bought him off with some pure ingots and a strip of tin, so the heat is off. :mrgreen:


Seriously, in the gutter & on the sidewalks, there seem to be about as much as i can comfortably carry in one hand while running by the time i hit about 3 miles. I'm 47 so i welcome the "break" that stopping and picking up weights brings as well as the incentive.

Thursday I had a client say they saw me running and asked what i stopped to pickup. I just said "it looked like money", which technically isn't a lie with lead up over $1.30/lb now.

[threett1]

The indoor pistol range I go to was cleaning out their backstop last week. He had a bunch of Mexicans come in to clean it out and the guy in charge was paying the owner .20 a lb for it. I was probably slobbering all over myself looking at a couple tons of projectiles laying there on the floor, some of which I had deposited there. It was a lovely sight to say the least.

[felix]

Back in the Hartford (CT) pistol league years ago, all the goodies from the indoor ranges in the league were off limits to shooters. Why? Because part of our yearly dues went to highly qualified local high school students who were hired to cast and load all of our 38 and 45 rounds from that lead. We just sweeped the brass into the corners of the range. The kids seperated the 22's, 38's and 45's from the dust/dirt/mites/crickets. To shoot, we just grabbed the ammo needed from cut-off, fully stocked, 55 gallon wiskey barrels. Luckily for newcomers, all the guns were tuned by the same team of folks throughout the league to operate with that ammo.

[shotstring]

Where I live there are two competing tire stores which pretty much get all the business for the area. One sells me all of their WWs but it costs me $21 for a 2 1/2 gal bucket filled to the top with what has been good clean WWs. While this isn't cheap, it is in the long run as I don't have to spend gas running around looking for the stuff. The other tire store gives them away for free, but it's a real dog-fight to get their stuff - several sinker casters want the weights.