What is this? Brassy pellets.

[Simonpie]

113740

So, a hippie friend of mine, in the spirit of "reduce ,reuse, recycle" gives me all the lead he comes across. As a roofer, he does me proud. But, recently he was hired-labor in a cleanout of an old man's garage. Found in some worn and worthless shooting stuff was a small Hoppes #9 jar filled with what looks like brazing rod snipped to 3/16 length with wire cutters.

Any ideas? Maybe that's what it is, but why?
Oh, and the jar was filled full to the brim.

I have a scale and burette, so I could probably get a density, but there are so many brasses and bronzes in the world, I don't know that it would tell me anything. That' a lot of effort for curiosity. I can just chuck it out.

A poor man's lead free shot?

Guesses welcome.

Thanks.

PS, label your stuff. Or when you die you'll drive some hippy crazy.

Nevermind, no labels.

[GRUMPA]

I do something like that but for a different reason. I swage my own (Look in stickys in swaging section) from brass cases, i use those in my tumbler to give the brass cases kinda like a poor mans electroplating to put a very thin coating of copper to give it a copper color. Works so-so when you use Lemi-Shine and the longer it tumbles the better it looks. I did it for an experiment and now I use just a big thick chunk of copper.

[Simonpie]

Grumpa,

So, kind of like the stainless tumbling pins, only brass to add some color?

Could be.

[bangerjim]

Those are either just scraps of cut-off heavy gauge copper wire or spot weld electrodes used in body work to weld on and pull out dents.


The picture resolution is not sharp enough for me to zoom in and see the pieces up close.

bangerjim

[wrench man]

Looks like HEAVY! wire to me, ground wire probably?, the don't look like any spot weld electrodes I've ever seen?, and the "nails" that are used to pull dents are skinny and long like nails, and they are steel so they can be welded to the fenders.

[lylejb]

Those look like pieces snipped off romex copper house wiring to me, slightly discolored.

Think of a penny, just as it starts to turn to brown.

should be easy to measure the dia. with a caliper.

10ga. = .102, 12ga= .081, 14ga= .064, these are the most common sizes, many others exist.

WHY? who knows.

[Nueces]

One useful use would be to place them under set screws to protect the locked part.

That's just the sort of thing my personal archeologists will have to contend with. Sorry. :mrgreen:

[GRUMPA]

Grumpa,

So, kind of like the stainless tumbling pins, only brass to add some color?

Could be.

That's what I did with them, worked well too. Took that brass color and turned the boolits into a copper color in 2hrs. But you have to use citric acid (AKA Lemi-Shine) for electrolysis to work for you...

[Freeloader]

Cathodes for electroless copper plating?
Materials might have been scarce/expensive back in the day, especially during the WWII era, so who knows what value that might have had at one time..
Look at us scrounging for lead these days..

[bangerjim]

Looks like HEAVY! wire to me, ground wire probably?, the don't look like any spot weld electrodes I've ever seen?, and the "nails" that are used to pull dents are skinny and long like nails, and they are steel so they can be welded to the fenders.

The OP should have used a ruler for size reference. If that is a screw-on lid off gun cleaner, those things are not big at all. Ground wire.

I have both a spot welder and a stud welder. Who knows what that old pack-rat hoarder had in mind for these pieces of metal. The small custom electrodes I use in the spot welder for making battery paks "could" be made out of pieces like that. The "nails" as you call them are many times copper plated. I cannot see from the very low res picture what these things really look like.

Still looks like bigger Cu wire scrap ends.

But bottom line, I do believe there is no real value there other than scrap copper of a pound or two? Not really worth messing with. Just because it was in an old gun-related container does not mean it has any gun-related value.

bangerjim

[Simonpie]

Now that people mention ground wire, I have to say that looks right. Still puzzled as to why, but I'm ready to let it go.

Simon

[hiram1]

i think it is for shot capsuls made by spear.i have used it cut it down and shot it.works real good on snakes