zinc bricks?

[jonp]

One of my wives employees found out i cast and told her that he has a bunch of lead, did i want it? Heck yeah so last night my wife brought home the first 60lb box. It had a couple of brick sized chunks in it obviously cast that way and each had 2 dime sized holes about 2 or 3 inches apart drilled or cast through them on the large flat side. Since the guy said he had them buried all over his yard and they had no rust i thought cool until i picked one up and tapped it on the other and heard a nice clink, clink, clink. Not lead as too hard, not aluminum as too heavy and not steel or iron as too shiney and no rust. I will test tonight but im thinking zinc.

Any ideas on what someone would do with zinc bricks? I thought maybe tractor weights but they are awful small for that and ive not heard of zinc being used for that.

[mold maker]

An acid test will solve that question. Might be Linotype.
We can always hope.

[BK7saum]

With bolt holes are they an anode?

[ZippyHillbilly]

With bolt holes are they an anode? This is a possibility. Anodes for boats are aluminum, magnesium or zinc.

[jonp]

I had thought about anodes for a boat but it's way way in land and the property was not used to repair of boats or had anything to do with them.

I had not thought of Linotype the guy said there were over a hundred of them in his yard and we can only hope I guess

[ZippyHillbilly]

If it was far inland ..... maybe a babbitt of some sort is possible if not Lino. Any saw mills, large machinery or printing operations around the area?

[toallmy]

Zink is used on the large metallic power lines as well , I have a younger brother that found a lot of lead for me " that turned out to be zink" bless his Hart . He almost blew the tires off of his little pickup bringing it to me. Glad he onely paid .20 a pound I still have it.

[bangerjim]

Guess.......guess......guess........! We can guess all day.

Only at test will tell. Take one to a scrap yard and have an x-ray gun analysis. Since there are potentially so many of them, paying a few $$ for a test will definitely not hurt you!!!!!

Muriatic acid is a start that will cost you only a few bucks for a gallon of it at a pool or big box store. Or take a 6 pack over to a buddy that has a swimming pool!

banger

[country gent]

Are there any die cast shops in the area, if zinc they may have een ingots for alloying the furnaces and bring up to proper alloys.

[jonp]

If you read my.post i indicated im testing it tonight. I was wondering what a zinc brick might be used for. I thot wrong shape and location for a boat keel but others have come up with some ideas including a powerline which i had not heatd of

[jonp]

They appear to be zinc. When I get home from work today I'm going to cut a 1cu inch square from one and figure the density to make sure. Oh well, anyone know what scrap zinc go's for???

[Sasquatch-1]

Could they have been decoy weights?

Shame they are not pewter. Your friend would be sitting on a small fortune.

[historicfirearms]

I think I could use some of those zinc bricks to cast up some big round balls for my mortar project. Maybe you could use them for other casting projects besides boolits.

[jonp]

I have no use for them. If they turn out to be zinc ill see if that guy wants to get rid of all of it and what he wants. If the price is good, cover the shippping and ill send it along if you want it.

[toallmy]

How about shotgun slugs in wad , or muselloader with a sabot.

[jsizemore]

There are some guys in my area that shoot canon that use zinc for the cannonballs.

[country gent]

Had a friend that had several lead soilder moulds , H e was using zinc for those for awhile.

[Hogtamer]

Full bore 12 ga .731 Zlugs for rifled gun. Cast BoolitZ rule!
154795

477 grns Zamak 3 alloy (96% Zn, 4% Alum.) vs 775 grns of same boolit cast in lead. 1500 fps w/manageable recoil = truck stopper.

[toallmy]

You could shoot a lot of 1 oz slugs out of a 60 lb block of zink . Just have to have a different back stop , so you don't contaminate your lead recovery later. The last time I went out to shoot slugs I took 5 boxes of rem 3 in 12 ga acku point slugs to sight in my slug gun , buy the time I gave up I was flenching so bad I was darn near ducking behind the bench when I squeezed off. I came home swapped out the slug beral to the smooth beral and haven't went back.

[toallmy]

Hogtamer if you don't mind could I pick your brain a little on your slugs. I'm a rifel shooter in a slug onely county. And it is killing me.

[Tackleberry41]

They sound like sacrifical anodes used in steel hulled boats. My dad used them on his, last time I saw his 55ft sailboat it was out of the water in KY at land between the lakes, come up thru the waterways so it was closer to where he lived in Indiana. So distance from the ocean doesn't mean anything. Who knows why somebody collected the dang things, or why someone would bury them in their yard. Maybe paranoid so salted the yard with junk so metal detectors couldn't find their buried stash of guns and ammo, the anodes were free? I have seen people haul all sorts of 'junk' long distances so it could sit and rot.

[jonp]

Full bore 12 ga .731 Zlugs for rifled gun. Cast BoolitZ rule!
154795

477 grns Zamak 3 alloy (96% Zn, 4% Alum.) vs 775 grns of same boolit cast in lead. 1500 fps w/manageable recoil = truck stopper.
ate you using a dedicated mold and pot?

[Hickok]

As Jsizemore stated, if you could find some "cannon cockers" or Cohorn mortar shooters that involved in N-SSA, they would buy it from you, as they use Zinc to make cannon balls and conical shells for competition.

[Hogtamer]

Jonp, yes to both...a small cast iron skillet from Walmart and an accurate mold that Tom made for me. melt on a coleman propane stove. slower than casting lead as you have to wait a while for it to frost. casting temp about 825* and the mold is iron... here's the mold and tom does great work! http://www.accuratemolds.com/bullet_detail.php?bullet=73-770SU-D.png Load with slow powders like Steel and 800x and a solid wad column in 3" hulls. Had loads pressure tested. 44 grns Steel, 10,000psi, 1600 fps. See the Zlug thread in shotgun forum for the whole journey.