American
01-17-2008, 02:36 PM
Hello all. While this is my first post, I'm not new to CastBoolits and have been gathering wisdom here for a few months off and on as time permits. So, the first thing I'd like to do is express my gratitude and appreciation to all those who share info here with the likes of me.
Thanks much - I do sincerely appreciate it.
I bought about 100# of WW from a scrap yard, to get started, because I've got the bug to start casting and didn’t find any for free right off. Guess I paid about what they cost on ebay delivered… I'll try to better that in the future.
Also got a heavy old stainless steel pressure cooker bottom pot, about 8" across, a slotted spoon, and a couple non-stick muffin tins, all either free, on sale, or at local thrift stores for a buck here and there.
Today I fired up the propane camp stove, melted about 20# of WW, starting with the big, soft ones I figured were lead for sure (and sorting out stick-ons and obvious non-lead ones with riveted clips). I tried to keep the temp down so I could spot floating zincs before they could melt - but saw none…
I've seen two conflicting views on this, best illustrated as so:
Goatlips says in his "Black powder Tips" http://goatlipstips.cas-town.com/index.html :
"Here is where the dreaded Zinc weights are supposed to float up also (higher melting temperature) but I've never found any."
Never found any, in years of sucessful casting?!?!
OTOH, in the the thread here "Smelting without a thermometer" it is stated:
"If you are doing it right, you will get the zinc ones before they have a chance to melt. There ARE zinc ones.....unmarked ones at that!"
Goatlips seems to have much experience and little trouble - the boolits he casts and shows pictures of I would be very happy to cast and shoot, zinc or no zinc.
But then I read how every batch of WW has zincs in it and even a little zinc will ruin a batch of alloy for casting and it must be discarded and all equipment used to process that bad zinc-containing batch must be carefully cleaned.
So, I guess my question is: How can I tell if my alloy ingots now contain zinc or if I was just lucky and didn’t have "unmarked" zincs in my batch of scrap WWs?
Thanks much - I do sincerely appreciate it.
I bought about 100# of WW from a scrap yard, to get started, because I've got the bug to start casting and didn’t find any for free right off. Guess I paid about what they cost on ebay delivered… I'll try to better that in the future.
Also got a heavy old stainless steel pressure cooker bottom pot, about 8" across, a slotted spoon, and a couple non-stick muffin tins, all either free, on sale, or at local thrift stores for a buck here and there.
Today I fired up the propane camp stove, melted about 20# of WW, starting with the big, soft ones I figured were lead for sure (and sorting out stick-ons and obvious non-lead ones with riveted clips). I tried to keep the temp down so I could spot floating zincs before they could melt - but saw none…
I've seen two conflicting views on this, best illustrated as so:
Goatlips says in his "Black powder Tips" http://goatlipstips.cas-town.com/index.html :
"Here is where the dreaded Zinc weights are supposed to float up also (higher melting temperature) but I've never found any."
Never found any, in years of sucessful casting?!?!
OTOH, in the the thread here "Smelting without a thermometer" it is stated:
"If you are doing it right, you will get the zinc ones before they have a chance to melt. There ARE zinc ones.....unmarked ones at that!"
Goatlips seems to have much experience and little trouble - the boolits he casts and shows pictures of I would be very happy to cast and shoot, zinc or no zinc.
But then I read how every batch of WW has zincs in it and even a little zinc will ruin a batch of alloy for casting and it must be discarded and all equipment used to process that bad zinc-containing batch must be carefully cleaned.
So, I guess my question is: How can I tell if my alloy ingots now contain zinc or if I was just lucky and didn’t have "unmarked" zincs in my batch of scrap WWs?