Debating whether to make a batch of "Mystery Metal"

[Alan in Vermont]

I've been accumulating odds & ends of lead. Some of it I can can sort of identify, some is a sure thing(scrap roof flashings), there are a few ingots that were test batches that didn't cast all that great, a little bit of everything. Probably pretty well to 200 lbs if I get real brutal about what I decide to clean out.

I'm thinking seriously about melting it all together then either having a sample analyzed or test casting and add what I think it's lacking by how it casts. I'm thinking, based on what I can come up with by "tink" testing it with a hammer, that it will likely be fairly soft nd with the addition of a little tin would probably work great for 45 and 38 target level loads.

Not the least of the considerations behind doing this is that I can have everything in one pile instead of taking up several chunks of increasingly scarce shelf space.

[Dusty Bannister]

The tink test might show similar hardness alloys, but this is where the hardness test equipment will really be helpful.
All in all, your soft ball alloy idea does have merit, and would be one way to use up a lot of unknown material. But I would
hate to mix in too much soft lead. I will also do the acid test to check for zinc. I know I have had some, but might have lost
track of the pot bottom ingot. That is why I would use some caution on your test batch that did not cast too great. Good luck and
this is certainly the time of year to be smelting. Dusty

[Alan in Vermont]

No worry about zinc in any of this. Several of the big chunks were cast in soda cans and have eyebolts set in them, they are probably WW as that's all I had when I poured them to use a anchors on long-line waterfowl decoy rigs and they were done back in the late 80s, before a zinc wheelweight was even a gleam in the eye of an enviro-nazi. Some of the rest is in small ingots from WW I smelted last year and those were checked for zinc before I smelted them. The batch that didn't cast good was range lead and foundry type, too much antimony and I didn't have any pure to add to it at that time. There's even about 20 lbs of 2-1 range scrap/lino.

I'm not in the least concerned about it having too much lead in it. At 45 and 38 target velocity I could run pure at 20-1 with tin and it would be fine.

I figure if I get it all mixed together and it doesn't cast good I can have it analyed, even if I have to get raped by Rotometals to have it done, and then add whatever it needs to make it into some that will cast and there will be enough to cast a bunch of boolits.

[fryboy]

i add a bit of the mystery lead to my low velocity alloys every time i make them ( i make fake ww alloy and then split it into 1-2-or 3 to 1 Pb/ww ) the 3 to 1 is my lowest velocity alloy ,works great for 45 acp hp's and 38 wc's and if i make sure some of the lead is small shot it also quenches to #2 BHN easy enough ( lino BHN in the oven ) 10 #'s of mystery per 100# batch isnt a big deal in such situations
umm , once you make your magical mystery alloy i would test it or have a friend with a tester test it for hardness at least , the pencil test would do if nothing else , the more lead the more you'd have to turn up the heat when casting ( may of been part of the problem with that one batch [shrugz] )

[lwknight]

Your wheel weights from the 80s are probably high antimony (6% or more) and would not cast well for lack of tin.
I don't like small piles of this and that either so I melted all the similar stuff into 25 pound bricks and tried to keep pure lead separate.

I would suggest blending in small batches in case there is something weird to show up so it would not ruin a sizable batch.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

Alan,
My first instinct is...If I was real sure about What was What, as you seem to be. I'd keep the stuff separate til you know exactly what you want as a end result, then either buy a hardness tester or send samples to a friend like me to test the samples with my Lee tester, then you can mix the less mysterious alloys together to get close to a desired result.

BUT, I know you have some experience in mixing alloys and you must have the ability to use an alloy calculator, SO, if you can blend an near equal amount of the Soft alloy with the alloy with an equal amount of the higher antimony alloy, then add to that your popcan WW's,
You'll probably have a alloy near WW's.
AND if you have a few pieces of totally unknown and mix that in with 200 lbs of alloy that's near WW, it probably won't change the end result enough to notice.

BTW, I got 3 heavy boxes on saturday. The cardboard of two of them were in tough shape, but nothing from the inside leaked out :) I haven''t opened them up yet...I have a large wood splitting project I started saturday and hope to finish today...so maybe I'll get to opening them tomorrow.
Jon

[badgeredd]

Alan in Vermont,

I personally would go ahead and mix it all since you're relatively sure it is free of contamination. I have found that pistol bullets are not all that picky about alloy as long as it isn't too high in SB. I personally prefer to have ONE alloy that is consistent rather than a lot of odd lots. A friend recently mixed up his odd stuff and ended up with a batch of about 400 pounds of a mistery alloy and has found it to be a great (though un-repeatable) alloy for pistol bullets. In the end it is up to you but for the sake of convenience, I'd get er dun.

Edd

[WILCO]

I personally would go ahead and mix it all since you're relatively sure it is free of contamination.

I've been sure of quite a few things. Imagine my surprise when things went wrong.
You're better off having a lead hardness tester and mixing in small batches. Just my 2 cents.

[williamwaco]

I have been doing that for 50 years.

Get it all melted and blended then add pure if it is too hard and harden if it is too soft, then if it doesn't cast good, add 1% tin, then blend it again.

You will now have 200 pounds of good, consistent alloy that will make good bullets and you will have no idea what the composition is, and - after you shoot a few of them, you will not care.

Lets see, that is around 8,000 .38 Special bullets.

[fredj338]

For handgun bullets, too many people over think the alloy content. I shoot a lot of range scrap, it varies quite a bit in composition. Melt it down, check the ingots or a cast bullet for BHN, blend & cast accordingly.

[williamwaco]

For handgun bullets, too many people over think the alloy content. I shoot a lot of range scrap, it varies quite a bit in composition. Melt it down, check the ingots or a cast bullet for BHN, blend & cast accordingly.



Me too. It is very soft, usually around 8 to 10 BNH and makes excellent bullets.

Only occasionally is it necessary to add a couple of ounces of tin.

[GLL]

Keep the "for sure" Pb such as roof flashing separate and mix the mystery stuff together !
I have an "etc." barrel for mystery alloy (no zinc) that does include dross. When it gets to 100 pounds I cast it into ingots and determine its hardness. That is used for thousands of "plinking" bullets after adjusting its composition to a reasonable hardness. :)

Jerry

[el34]

I treat everything I smelt as mystery metal because it came with no specs. Sometimes the pot has coww, soww, battery terminals, folded lead sheets, and the occasional soupcan sinkers I get. I blend whatever I score, make ingots, then measure the final hardness.

Now I got a number to work with.

I maintain a supply of antimony and tin in the form of lino and mono and solder and a recently acquired batch of pewter. In the past I used Roto's Superhard and virgin tin.

I use a spreadsheet to calculate how much antimony source and tin source is needed to get me 12BHN and 2% tin, then melt and blend "casting alloy". Mono and lino both contribute antimony and tin but in different ratios so I use whichever satisfies the BHN and tin content the best.

Even though I have buckets of ingots all the same, when it's casting day I pull a few ingots from several different batches to mix in the 20lb pot. Talk about anal...

[Alan in Vermont]

Well, it's done, I have no idea just what is in it or in what amounts but there is a bit over 250 pounds and it's all the same. If it cast decent that's 7,600, 230 gr. 45 cal TCs or 12,500, 140 gr. 38 SWCs. And now it will all be in one stack instead of a half dozen scattered clusters of odd shaped ingots that didn't stack for beans.

I started by hammer testing everything. Thuds went in one pile, tinks in another. Then I weighted the two piles and seperated each one into two of equal, or nearly so, weight. One pile of thuds and one of tinks went into the pot. Each pot was split into two piles of ingots then half of batch one was mixed with half of batch two and repeated for the remaining ingots. There should not be much difference in the two final batches.

Ingots melt down really quick when they have only cooled enough to tip them out of the mold. Welding gloves are not really up to the task of handling them in that condition. I'm going to look into foundry gloves, some of which have some pretty amazing working limits and resulting scary prices.

I suspect it will cast fairly well but won't know until I try it.

I have an offer from a member here to analyze it, I will be getting samples off to him shortly.

It may not be anything usable without further alloying but that will be easy now that it's all the same.

[el34]

It may not be anything usable without further alloying but that will be easy now that it's all the same.

I agree with how you did it. About all you need is a hardness tester and the math to know what to add to get exactly what you want to get.

[williamwaco]

Well, it's done, I have no idea just what is in it or in what amounts but there is a bit over 250 pounds and it's all the same. If it cast decent that's 7,600, 230 gr. 45 cal TCs or 12,500, 140 gr. 38 SWCs. And now it will all be in one stack instead of a half dozen scattered clusters of odd shaped ingots that didn't stack for beans.

I started by hammer testing everything. Thuds went in one pile, tinks in another. Then I weighted the two piles and seperated each one into two of equal, or nearly so, weight. One pile of thuds and one of tinks went into the pot. Each pot was split into two piles of ingots then half of batch one was mixed with half of batch two and repeated for the remaining ingots. There should not be much difference in the two final batches.

Ingots melt down really quick when they have only cooled enough to tip them out of the mold. Welding gloves are not really up to the task of handling them in that condition. I'm going to look into foundry gloves, some of which have some pretty amazing working limits and resulting scary prices.

I suspect it will cast fairly well but won't know until I try it.

I have an offer from a member here to analyze it, I will be getting samples off to him shortly.

It may not be anything usable without further alloying but that will be easy now that it's all the same.


If you can scratch it with your thumbnail, it is very soft. 5 to 8
If you can scratch it easily with a screwdriver blade, it is medium soft. 10-15
If you can barely scratch it with a screw driver blade, it is hard 18+

[lwknight]

Don't forget that fresh poured ingots are softer than aged ingots/bullets.
Give it at least 2 to 3 weeks before you judge the hardness.

[RoGrrr]

I don't care what it is, I cast it.
I don't have to know the hardness. It's all going to shoot better than me and if there's leading, God invented this thing called a bronze brush that cleans out my barrel.

It's all a HOBBY, anyway....

[357maximum]

I have made a few large batches (400+ pounds) of MYSTERY METAL......After it is all made into ingots I find out what I actually have and then find a use for it, if after thourough testing it excels in what I think it should I do a few marathon casting sessions that will leave me enough boolits for that application for several decades.....tadaa.

Alot of my 1600 to 2300 fps general range use loads are shot with a whatzit alloy. I save my "known" alloys for making big brown antler bearing things into vaccum packed packages for the freezer.