OOPS mixed WW and range lead ingots

[Trez Hensley]

Got a question. I was real careful during my smelting to seperate my WW from my range scrap. Then when I was all done and the ingots were cool, I forgot to keep them seperated. I know that the range lead is in the first two small buckets but does anyone have any ideas on how to easily tell the difference?

Right now I'm just collecting lead and reading and have not cast that first bullet yet. When I do, I'd like to know about what alloy hardness I have. So far I have not gotten the tools I need to do this (the casting or hardness tester).

Any thoughts? Do they sound different when hit and how do I know what they are supposed to sound like? Press a nail into them?? Melt them down into little chunks and smash them with a bigger hammer?[smilie=1: see which ones go flat:mrgreen:

So many questions...........

[Sundogg1911]

easiest way is a hardness tester. Another way to "Cheat" is to mix small amounts of unknown allow with large amounts of know alloy (If you have large amounts of known alloy :roll: ) This uses up the unknown allow a little at a time without really affecting the hardness of the known alloy. Same way soybean goes into my McLunch without ruining the taste of beef (too much) [smilie=1:

[Lloyd Smale]

mix it all together and remelt it. Theres probably not alot of difference in the hardness anyway.

[MT Gianni]

Next time take a screwdriver and scribe a W on the bottom of the WW, RL or S for scrap on the others. Gianni

[Trapshooter]

A quick way to tell which is the harder stuff is to take one ingot of each, and a ball bearing. Stick the bearing between the two ingots, and put them in a vise. Tighten it a little, and see which ingot has the bigger dent. The big dent is the soft one.

Trapshooter

[ANeat]

The bad part is you dont know what hardness the range scrap is. If there are a majority of commercial bullet shooters it may be something along the lines of Lyman #2 alloy.

There may not be a lot of difference but if you take a couple of ingots that you know if they are range scrap or WW doing Trapshooters test will give you a better idea of which is harder.

Sound is a good way to tell pure lead from WW or something harder but it gets more difficult if the alloys are a little closer in hardness.

[crowbeaner]

The best way to solve the problem is to arrange your ingots into 4 stacks and take 1 from each stack and make another stack. Melt this stack and pour back into ingots. Do another pot and repeat until all your alloy is the same. Then get a hardness test done. If you figure 1 lb. of tin to 19 lbs. of alloy you will have some pretty good stuff to work with. You could spend the money for one of the hardness testers, but I use my thumbnail. I've made tons of usable alloy from unknown lead sources this way. Enjoy. CB.

[Trez Hensley]

Thanks for the thoughts.