Range lead fiasco. Help!

[Appalachian American]

I got about 1500-2000 lb of "lead" given to me. Dirty is not even close to what this is. Some has set up like concrete. When I have tried to smelt it almost has been absorbing into this powdery dirt looking stuff. I am assuming the concrete is lead oxide. This dirt is like I am turning it back into ore. I have a small cast iron pot with a lid and a 500K BTU burner. I tried sawdust and wax, maybe not enough. Lid on lid off. The dirt is crazy heavy. I am a welder not a chemist but I think I need to deoxygenate the lead. Anybody got a clue that can point me in the right direction?

[Smoke4320]

several good pics of the lead in raw form and in the pot might help

[bangerjim]

Your are more into alchemy than re-melting lead there! Sorry to hear you have such a mess on your hands. Sometimes "free" is not always free.

Mother Earth tries, over time, to take back what was mined out of her and you have an excellent example there!

Getting really badly oxidized Pb back into a liquid metal may be beyond a home-brew set-up. Most of us have messed with mild surface oxides and the internal Pb melts out when heated, leaving the oxide powder behind. What you have may be beyond salvaging. Give us some pictures as Smoke said.

I, for one, would probably sell it to a scrap yard.............and run with the money they gave me!

bangerjim

[Bent Ramrod]

I use Marvelux for really dirty lead, like range lead with sand and dirt in it. It's messier than sawdust or candle wax, but the lead is a mess anyway, and the Marvelux does go for the dirt and oxides. Scrape the sides of your pot to get the adhered black goo off afterwards. There will be some drops of good lead in the scraped off Marvelux melt and you can break it up when cooled and reclaim some if it if you really want to.

[lightman]

Pictures would help us offer advice. Sometimes free lead just ain't worth the effort. It almost sounds like you should consider selling it at the scrap yard and buying something with a known content. Its hard to do, but factor in your propane cost and effort.

[SciFiJim]

The best way that I have found to reclaim lead oxides, is to use a layer of sawdust on top. As the sawdust next to the metal starts to char, it will draw oxygen atoms from the oxides in order to burn. I've only done a layer on top of my melt, but it could eventually be done. Like others have said though, it might not be worth the time, effort and propane.

[sqlbullet]

Pictures would be key.

[triggerhappy243]

SOUNDS LIKE YOU NEED A SMALL CEMENT MIXER. Think of it like a really large brass tumbler. run it for a bit to turn your "LOAD"into something siftable. sift it thru a 1/4 inch screen after you tumble, this should remove the bulk of the dirt. keep it all bone dry. DO NOT WASH THE DIRT OFF. You should now have something to smelt without tons of dirt.

[Appalachian American]

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[Appalachian American]

163188
This "very heavy dirt" is what it is turning into. I am thinking about charcoal and lime to steal the oxygen or sulfur or whatever to get back to elemental Pb. I have been googling smelting ore. Seems the heat needs to be greater.

[C. Latch]

I'd be tempted to fill the pot 1/2 full of 'ore' then cover it with old motor oil or something similarly cheap and light the whole thing on fire, out in the yard somewhere safe, and leave it to burn.

[Dan Cash]

Dirt. Melt, flux. scrape off and toss the crud.

[Appalachian American]

Just tried a test run with copious amounts of sawdust and nozzle dip (handy hydrocarbons) then I put the lid on to make a low oxygen environment. I will post results.

[Appalachian American]

163201
This is what I got from about 1/3 pot of "ore", I let it cool in the pot to keep from combining with whatever is grabbing it. I will re-smelt into ingots. Only yielded about 2 lbs. Maybe a bigger pot would increase efficiency.

[bangerjim]

Well.....I sure would NOT pour ingots from that hunk-o-gunk......yet. It still is not clean lead and has a lot of inclusions of gunk and oxides in it. It now needs to be fluxed 3X with pine sawdust. Your lead should be clean and shiny-ish with no gunk in/on the pour.

Dirty ingots used in casting will foul/plug your casting pot & nozzle, give voids and uneven weights in your castings, and possiblly create unnecessary wear in your barrels.

Hope you have unlimited amonts of fuel and time! You are gonna need 'em.

banger

[Alan in Vermont]

I'm wondering if you're getting heat enough to it. That yellow flame I'm seeing, if that IS what I'm seeing under your pot, isn't making near heat enough. If that is all you can get out of your burner there may be something wrong with it. Can you turn up the regulator pressure? That is assuming there is a regulator. If not, and that is the best you can do with full tank pressure you might have a partially plugged orifice. If it's regulated is there a mixture control on the burner? Usually a circular metal plate that blocks part of the airflow to the burner. That may need adjusting to get the blue flame that makes decent heat. The only time I see a yellow flame on my plumbers pot, which works on tank pressure, is when the tank is just about empty or has chilled low enough to slow the liquid turning to vapor in the tank.

[edp2k]

From the pix, this does not look like oxidized lead, it looks like what you have is
a large percentage of plain old fashioned DIRT.

I'll bet this stuff came from someone shoveling out a dirt berm.

If you try to smelt it as is you will burn up a lot of fuel trying to heat up the dirt
to extract a small percentage of the lead dust/small particles mixed in.

I would try something like a sluice box to try and wash away a large percentage of the dirt.
Then try to smelt the product on some cheap source of heat, like a wood fire.

If not, you are going to go through a lot of fuel heating up dirt to 700+ degrees.

[edp2k]

Another thought is, get some 1/4" hardware cloth (screen) and sift it.
The big chunks of lead (major bullet fragments, mostly bullet sized) will stay and the dirt and small lead pieces will fall through.

smelt the larger chunks (cherry pick) and get the most bang for the buck.
then sluice out the fine stuff to get the lead dust, if you think that step is worth what you will get out of it.

[Appalachian American]

Flame was turned down, the burner is 500K BTU. Jet burner, pot too small. Will try to screen, possibly sluice too.

[dilly]

I agree with the consensus that your stuff is too dirty to be over the burner already. The sluice idea sounds pretty good; wash some of that dirt out of there.

Don't forget that wet lead is very dangerous and lead that has been wet needs to be melted starting from a pot with no lead already melted.

[Springfield]

A bigger pot will help quite a bit, you just need more room for the dirt to rise to the top. I like a sawdust/beeswax mix to clean my lead. My pot holds almost 180 lbs, on top of my high pressure turkey fryer. When do nice clean x-ray lead, there is almost no dross. When i do a big batch of roofing sheet I get lots of red dirt and stuff that looks like rust chips. It sometimes takes a lot of work to clean dirty lead, but it is worth it in the end, usually.

[Jeff Michel]

Sell it for scrap, unless you like a challenge, your likely going to have a bunch more in it than it's worth.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

From the pix, this does not look like oxidized lead, it looks like what you have is
a large percentage of plain old fashioned DIRT.

I'll bet this stuff came from someone shoveling out a dirt berm.

If you try to smelt it as is you will burn up a lot of fuel trying to heat up the dirt
to extract a small percentage of the lead dust/small particles mixed in.

I would try something like a sluice box to try and wash away a large percentage of the dirt.
Then try to smelt the product on some cheap source of heat, like a wood fire.

If not, you are going to go through a lot of fuel heating up dirt to 700+ degrees.
+1 on wood fire. I'm not sure what you have to put that awful looking oxidized range lead in, but find something that'd withstand the heat of a hot bonfire, with the pot/bucket of junk lead in the middle.

[bangerjim]

Agree.......the ONLY way I would ever attempt to re-melt/refine that carp you've is over a big hot wood fire. Gas is just too expensive. A good ole wood fire with a BIG CI pot sitting in the middle will melt it.....proably.....and cost you only your time. Lot's of it.

Good luck on that one.

banger

[Engineer1911]

Sometimes it just best and easier to walk away, oh!, I left out cheaper.

[RogerDat]

I would totally go for a wood fire. See if you can get a 20# propane tank with the top cut off to make a big pot. Those I believe can hold close to 200# I have a harbor freight cast iron dutch oven (approx. $25 with 20% off coupon) That is good for better than 100#. Both should be broad enough to better match your burner diameter.

What about making pig lead in dirt forms? Put some sort of iron trough or pot on the wood fire, dig holes or modest sized trenches for the lead to flow into? Pot to melt the "crud" pour into channel that is inclined to flow into sand or dirt as a mold. http://www.backyardmetalcasting.com/oilburners/oil04_alumlogs.JPG This would not be a final form suitable for casting but would get the lead into a clean enough form that melting in the pot would allow fluxing it clean.

Might even be able to get a wide iron channel incline across fire and just keep feeding it shovels full of the dirty ore that you push and crush using a piece of wood as the fire melts the lead out. Lead flows down channel into dirt hole or big mold, or heck large puddle at the bottom. The dross gets pushed up the channel and either scooped out of the channel or just shoved off the high side and more "ore" gets shoveled in. I find that bar of wood or other implement used to crush the dross is essential to getting the lead to "squeeze" out of the crud. Lead flows down and crud gets pushed up and out of the channel after heating and crushing to dust so the lead can flow down the channel. That is what I would try first.

Any way you slice it I think you have a two step process to get to the point where you have clean lead ready for casting ingots. Or maybe three steps if you sluice and sift first. Real problem is with too much dross the dross won't float on the molten lead as much as the lead can be crushed out to flow to the bottom of the pot.

[mold maker]

A cement mixer and flowing water through it will rid most of the sand and dirt. I reclaimed over 2 tons from NC red clay berms that way. I also had over 16 gal of jacket material to trade at the scrap yard.
The washed lead was dried on a concrete drive in 90+ Summer sun. raked and turned several times. Be sure to catch the dirt and sand outfall for disposal, cause it contains lots of oxides. The lead % is too small to attempt to reclaim, but you don't want it in your yard.

[merlin101]

I'd wash it too, you've got a lot of just plain dirt there, then let dry WELL! I'd also DITCH THE SNEAKERS and put on a pair of leather boots!

[sprinkintime]

If you need a little lead to carry you over while you ponder on your fiasco, I will send you 20#s just pay postage.
Sprink

[Sasquatch-1]

A lot of responses here so I did not read all. If it was mine and there were large chunks like I am seeing in yours, I would first take and bust up the chunks with a hammer as best as I could. Then starting with a 1/4 inch screen, I would sift and the I would use something smaller and sift again. Discard the powdery dust you get after fine screening. I use one of the mesh type in-baskets you can get at office supply store. Sift through the large screen again and then melt the big stuff. After all this I would decide if it is worth melting the smaller stuff. This is what I would do and I have about 1200 pounds of salvaged range scrap, though I never ran into the large chunks like you have.

PS you may try getting a one pound tub of plumber's flux from the hardware store and put a tablespoon or so in each batch.

REMEMBER, CASTING IS A HOBBY TO SUPPORT A HOBBY.

[Appalachian American]

I forgot to mention I own a welding shop. I have been fluxing and raking. After 1-1/2 five gallon buckets I have about 150 lb of lead that needs another smelt to clean up. I am going to look at making this pig thing. A lot of the dirt disappears after fluxing leading me to believe it is Pb compound of some sort. I need to clean sticks and such out of my yard so two birds.

[Appalachian American]

I took about 4k lbs of that stuff to the recycle place today. It is so bad they are going to use a gun to see how much yield before they will even buy it.