Obtaining Alloys

[Half Dog]

Where is your favorite place to get alloys?

I am in the Dallas area and I am hoping to tap into your knowledge. Are web sites the best way to go or are there local suppliers that are preferred?

[RogerDat]

Buy from folks in the castboolits swapping and selling forum. Can get stuff there for about 1/2 of what a commercial foundry charges. However they won't necessarily be "pure" alloys. Whatever you need however is available. Ingots made from WW's (wheel weights), Plain lead, scrap pewter, solder, lead radioactive isotope medical containers, range berm scrap and the occasional batch of printers lead all at generally decent prices.

Local scrap yards that buy metal will sometimes sell metal. Some of the independent tire stores will sell the scrap WW's they take off when they change a tire. That can be great source or real headache and you will have to do some reading on that subject to be able to use that source.

I would avoid eBay unless a seller was recommended by someone with a good reputation here. Too many less than scrupulous sellers and with tin at $10 a lb. and lead at only $2 lot of incentive to present the lead as higher tin alloy.

[scottfire1957]

I live in Amarillo. I have had no problems obtaining wheel weights, pewter and plumbing lead. I can't imagine how easy that would be in Dallas.

I was visiting my daughter in San Antone, stopped by a random tire shop ang got over 150# for ten bucks.

Go look. You'll find what you need.

Edit. I picked over 1k# in a year. It's easy. EASY.

[Nose Dive]

I'm in San Antonio.... where to get "ALLOYS"?.... I use RotoMetals... advertizer on this site. Good products...good qaulity...comes to my door via USP BROWN MAN.....

Now...'smelt materail'.... stuff to melt down and make ignots to make boolits.... this is Different...and my answer is...'everywhere'....


I have scored at salvage yards. One guy told me to fill my bucket and he'd talk about price once my bucket was full. Not too bad, and did get the bucket for $20 bucks.

I have two or three 'home boy' tire shops here in South Texas. When my daughter lived down here, I carried her with me, (She speaks Spanish), and I always did very well. I did however always take some:

1. Beer
2. home made deer sausage
3. breakfast tacos, or sausage biscuits..

A few years back, she moved away...but,,,the fellas now know me, and we do business with smiles, hand shakes, and one of the three above items.

I was at a SAM's in Indiana once....getting tires....asked the quy if he had any.... I left with three buckets full!!... He did get a case of beer however.

So... be nice...ask.... try several places... Tire Shops have been the best for me for WW's. Go in and ask for wheel weights. There are tire shops in Grand Prairie!!

Nose Dive

Cheap, Fast, Good. Kinldy pick two.

[Jtarm]

I'm in Fort Worth.

I started casting again last year after about a 15-year hiatus.

Being time challenged by domestic responsibilities, I thought long & hard about whether to take it up again, including reading a lot on this forum to get the current state of the practice.

I decided scrounging for, then smelting/refining scrap was no longer for me, unless I happen on a large, cheap source of fairly clean stuff.

So my sources have been Rotometals and the forum WTS.

Even at $2 per lb, for alloy, my cast handgun boolits cost 50% less than commercial. Rifle about 66% less. Plus I get boolits tailored exactly how I want them.

Of course, buying more molds than I need in the GB forum hasn't helped my economics[emoji16]

[RogerDat]

Small independent tire stores, especially those that work on older cars (advertising used tires for sale can be a clue) are your best tire stores to try. The big chains mostly have corporate contract to pick up from all their stores in a given region.

Know what the scrap yard will pay the tire stores and offer that amount plus a few cents. Even an extra 5 cents makes selling them to you the better deal. And that is like $5 on a 100 lbs of WW's. Last time I checked that lead was selling for $1 a pound in swapping and selling.

Jtarm reminds me of a consideration. Scrap and WW lead collection and making your own ingots requires some investment to be practical. You don't really want to do 200# of WW's, which is just a couple of 5 gallon pails in a 3 Qt sauce pan over a $20 hot plate, and you don't want to melt nasty scrap in your casting pot so you are going to be sinking some cash into getting set up for WW's or scrap. I would say around $75 - $100 when you count turkey/fish fryer & dutch oven of decent size. Maybe a propane tank. Plus some welding gloves and buckets.

Already in ingots from foundry such as RotoMetals or this forums members in Swapping and Selling avoids that up front cost. It somewhat depends on how much you plan to cast. A thousand rounds a year has a lot longer payback on that upfront investment than a couple thousand rounds a month does. If your going to use a few hundred pounds in the next 10 years vs. Joining the One Ton Club in the first month.

[Hardcast416taylor]

Got a buddy that has a car dealership. I get to empty the pail of used weights whenever I`m there for free. I was asked, jokingly to only bring low calorie doughnuts from now on as the service dept. guys are getting fat off my thank you boxes of regular doughnuts. Sad thing about these free weights is the steadly climbing percentage of non lead weights in the bucket. With about 1500 lbs. of various types of lead in my casting barn, I think it`ll last me for my lifetime.Robert