Can I melt the copper ?

[brown bass hunter]

I am looking at some ingots that have 4% copper. I am interested in using this material for the tin content (90+%). Will the copper melt in my pot (copper melting pt is 1900+ deg). Will it contaminate my mix or is it such a small amount it will not be noticeable. The mix I am looking at is a pewter alloy that has been melted into ingots. Maybe there is copper in WW and range lead and I just don't know it.

Any info would be helpful.

[Nose Dive]

Hay man... Mmmmm Ingots of 90% tin and 4% copper? Am i reading you correctly? If yes.... I say...go for it.....

Clear your smelt pot....add some ingots you have there...nothing else.... add some heat and pay attention......just go up slow on the heat... If your tin is indeed 90%...you should be able to melt it. See what it looks like.... ....The ingots if indeed are a 'pewter alloy'..(don't really understand this)... you should be able to melt them.

Some guys cast with a bit of copper...some don't.... See how it melts...repour into ingots.... I would keep my WW's out until your are happy with your test smelting efforts....

Try some flux....I use sawdust with sulfur powder and mix melted smelt well...add more flux...do it again and scrap off dross..... pour into ingot molds and see what you can see. If indeed you 'unknow' ingots are 90% tin.... I should melt for you. BE AWARE...sawdust and sulfur will run you out of your house, garage, town and county with stinking, burning smoke and fumes! BE CAREFUL...all OUTSIDE SMELTING!!

Let us know what happens and what you see. And...I use 'pewter' for my 'go to solution' for pour boolit castings.

Nose Dive.

Cheap, Fast, Good. Kindly pick two.

[GabbyM]

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?172475-High-Copper-Alloys-Lets-discuss-this-further

Well some of us blend Cu into our alloy specifically to make tougher bullets. See thread above. .3% ,that's with a decimal point, makes a very tough bullet. Using your alloy for adding tin at 2% or so you'll just have a tad of Cu that will show little effect on bullet fill out.

[BNE]

Also, even though the melting point of Copper is WAY higher than your pot can get to, the ALLOY that is made by mixing Tin and Copper melts at a much lower temp. It is kind of like adding sugar toyour coffee. Your coffee is not hot enough to MELT the sugar, but it will dissolve it. Copper will alloy with Tin at much lower temps.

The other wierd thing is that when you alloy two metals together, the resulting mix melts at a lower temperature than either of the two metals you started with AND the new metal is harder than you started with. (This is a rule of thumb, I can't swear that it is true in every case.)

[runfiverun]

take 1% and divide it by 4% that's how much copper you end up with [in your alloy] at 1% of what you got added in the mix.
I think you'll be fine [and won't really know it's in there] except it makes the boolits do different things like make holes in paper and kill deer.
oh wait they do that now [never mind]

[sqlbullet]

What else is in this starting alloy? 90% tin, 4% copper....What is the other 6%? With that information we should be able to track down a ternary phase diagram and find the melting point of the alloy.

Based on the binary phase diagram of copper/tin, a 96% tin/4% copper alloy should be fully liquid at about 620° F. No sweat for your pot at all.

[bangerjim]

That Cu alloy is really nice when you need a "tough" alloy (not hard). I use ~2-3% Cu in some of my mixes. And metallurgy dictates you can alloy small amounts of Cu directly into a Pb/Sn/Sb alloy without reaching those Cu melting temps. Simply the magic of metallurgy as expressed in #6! Do a search on the net.

bangerjim

[gpidaho]

BBHunter: I've been having very good luck alloying Copper Hard Babbit into range lead and wheel weights. Too much copper pours nicely with a ladle but may cause spout freeze on a bottom pour pot. Metallurgy is certainly not my strong point and I don't have a very scientific approach , I just add the babbit until I get a nice fill in the mould then test for hardness (most of the time it's plenty hard) one nice thing I've stumbled on to is that it adds a nice elasticity to the alloy, I can only assume this is due to the copper as my alloys with out the babbit is usually more brittle. I like a little copper added, give it a try and report back. Good luck Gp

[brown bass hunter]

I looked back and think I found the alloy to be 90% tin, 4% copper, 4% antimony and 2% lead.

Wow the info you gave is very helpful. I could just picture the copper being in solid state and being like grains of sand in the mix. I am working on a hunting load for my 35 Rem and bangerjim's comment about a "tough" boolit sounds appealing. I have been using 50/50 WW and soft lead. I was getting pretty good fill out, but some were not as crisp as I like. Man they shoot into a ragged hole @ 50 yds.

Once again thanks for the info. This forum is so helpful. I can ask a stupid question (like the one above) and you guys just start spouting out the info - and do it in a positive way.

[gpidaho]

BBHunter: Hope you'll forgive me for jacking your thread, but one bass fishing 35Rem fan to another I'd like to pass on some fun 35Rem plinking loads. I've been using 9mm pistol boolits, the Lee Tl-356-124- RN and the Lee C-356-125-2R powder coated and sized .358 over 6 to 8gr of TiteGroup. The 125s over 7.5 TG Chrono Av. 1516 SD 10, the 124s over 6.5gr TG Av.1406 SD 8. These have next to no recoil and are just the ticket for shooting beer cans when you don't have time for a hunt. Just a small trick to turn a 35Rem into a 357mag. Have fun. Gp

[drfroglegs]

I wouldn't worry about the copper. If you want to use the pewter to increase the tin content of your alloy you are going to severely dilute the Cu anyways. So if your final target tin content is around 5%, you will likely only have 0.2 to 0.4% Cu anyways.