Benafits of silver in casting alloy?

[bbwhais]

Tonight I added 1oz silver foil to my pot of 3 to 1 alloy of pure to lino. Tue boolits came out very shiny. Other than a shiny apperience what other if any benafits will the silver provide? The silver foil came from an order i had placed with a chemical supply company for pyrotechnics.

[orisolo]

Silver would make it"white" look.

Harden your metal, check bhn and let us know

Provide corrosion protection (not that lead corrod much)

Should kill vampires on Friday's. ;)

Mainly not used due to high cost.

Might kill zombies too, community please provide feedback ;)

I was playing with the idea of 0.5-1% to see if I can get hard metal with good flow. But never got to that plus antimony is cheaper.

[Taylor3006]

Thought silver was for killing werewolves? Seriously though, kinda pricey to be shooting silver down range, think its around $21 an oz.

[Sensai]

The Lone Ranger liked 'em! :bigsmyl2:

[waksupi]

Waste of money.

[bangerjim]

In the "olde days" you could just throw a half dollar in there as they were almost pure silver.....and only worth 50 cents!!!!!!!

At market rates for silver, it would be foolish to add it to lead slugs. Leave the silver to silver soldering where high tensile strengths are required.....and you only use a dab of it.

There are other things to add that are far less costly. Look at antimony or bismuth in small ratios. I can add ~0.5 oz of Bi to a pound of pure lead and get a 15+bnh out of it.

Rotometals.com is a good source of any exotic alloy you will ever need.

bangerjim

[runfiverun]

silver is an excellent hardening agent to lead alloy's.
it doesn't add the brittleness that most other hardeners do, it act's similar to tin only on the harder scale.

[el34]

In the "olde days" you could just throw a half dollar in there as they were almost pure silver.....and only worth 50 cents!!!!!!!

At market rates for silver, it would be foolish to add it to lead slugs.
bangerjim

Foolish yes, but for shins and grits I might toss in a merc dime next time, just to see if it dissolves.

[bangerjim]

Foolish yes, but for shins and grits I might toss in a merc dime next time, just to see if it dissolves.

It's your dime........pun intended!!!!!!! [smilie=p:

But precious metal mongers sell olde silver coins as almost pure market price for silver. I save every one I fine.....haven't seen one in over 10 years! And mercury dimes and all silver coins are valuable today. My boolits are NOT worth melting down my silver hord just to gain a bit of hardness when I can do it with other much less costly alloy metals.

Let us know what your dime gets you.....a cup of coffee?.......NOT!

good luck!

banger

[el34]

It's worth the $1.70 or so for the experiment! :shock:

[dtknowles]

I have been using silver bearing lead free solder, 96% tin, 4% Silver to add tin to my alloy. I have not noticed or tested for benefits or harm. I kind of like thinking that my boolits have some silver in them. The solder was about $20 a pound when I bought it, did not seem like a bad price for the tin.

Tim

[orisolo]

If you know any soldering business near you ask for their scrap solder dross, if it's civilian soldering it will be 3-4% silver in the tin. If it's mill specs it will be tin/lead since military is excluded from "going green"and lead get you better welding.

[capt.hollis]

Doesn't a quarter have a tad bit of silver in it ?

[capt.hollis]

84756

[el34]

There are 0.715 ounces (troy) of silver in a face value dollar of '64 and earlier dimes, quarters, halves. A half and 5 dimes or any combination that adds up to a dollar.

Silver is around $22/oz, so one face value dollar in those coins has $15.70 worth of silver in them. So a dime currently has $1.57 worth, a quarter is worth $3.93 in silver.

[gandydancer]

The Lone Ranger liked 'em! :bigsmyl2:

And I bet he used up a strong box of molds getting them silver boolits made. and Tonto had to do the casting? HOT. HOT. HOT.

[el34]

And I bet he used up a strong box of molds getting them silver boolits made. and Tonto had to do the casting? HOT. HOT. HOT.

Really hot. Silver melts at 1761F.

[bangerjim]

Sn, Sb, and Bi are the most economically ways to add hardness to you boolits. I, too have use silver-bearing solder at times and notice absolutely NO difference in hardness and shoot-ability.

Only bragging rights at the range claiming I have "the Lone Ranger's 45's in my gun!".

But let us know what you get from your $1.57 investment! I will keep my four 50# bags of silver dimes in the bank vault! :drinks:

banger

[el34]

I will keep my four 50# bags of silver dimes in the bank vault! :drinks:

banger

Nice stack.

If I did the math right a junk dime in a 15lb pot of lead would give it 0.035% silver. Hard to brag about that. I just want to see if it dissolves.

[jim147]

I have several old rolls of Staybrite8 solder around here from refrigeration. When I'm doing my hunting loads I drop a couple feet in the pot. It my not help much but they sure are shiny and fill out great.

jim

[bangerjim]

I use StayBrite all the time for soldering things that need a moderate tensile strength hold. It is good stuff. I will have to dig out the roll and read what % silver is actually in there. Can't be much.

I find a lot of extra tin sure keeps lead shiny, but now that I am ES gun powder coating everything, I do not care if they are shiny or not. In fact I cast many frosty for an even better grip by the powder!

banger