Valve packing as lead source.

[.455 Webley]

Good morning,

My workplace is about to undergo a major rebuilding project and a large part of my involvement will be the disassembly and rebuilding of perhaps 10,000 valves.

This will generate a large amount of used scrap valve packing. It appears to be a braided material that is impregnated with a soft slippery metal. It looks like lead, everyone calls it lead, so it must be lead right?

Has anyone messed with this stuff as a lead source? Did it work out well or was it a big pain in the backside for very little usable lead? And if it did work out how hard was the resulting alloy?

Thank you for your time.
.455

[Bookworm]

I haven't used valve packing, but I have used plumbing joint packing. It is oakum (tree fibers), packed around the joint with a packing chisel, then liquid lead is poured into the joint to solidify the whole mess.

I rendered it down, it came out beautiful, soft lead. Very close to pure.

And, it was self-fluxing ! No need to add sawdust, the carbon is already present. Very smoky, render it outside. I lit the smoke several times, which helped.

[NyFirefighter357]

Valve stem/bonnet packing may have lead in them but they usually are made with a graphite material and the older ones had mainly asbestos in them.

https://www.asbestos.net/asbestos/products/valves/

https://www.mesotheliomasymptoms.com/workplace/valve-stem-packing

[Pipefitter]

All of the valve packing I have ever used is a woven fiberglass impregnated with graphite or maybe lithium.

[CastingFool]

I have seen lead packing, but it was used in pumps. It was very thin sheets of lead, with graphite powder. Never seen lead packing used on valve stems.

[lightman]

Wow, rebuilding 10,000 valves sounds like job security! I hope there is something in them that you can salvage. Good Luck!

[NyFirefighter357]

https://i.imgur.com/8OmlF6W.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/y9raxKw.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/w7HeAvB.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/Da0NkOw.jpg

[OldBearHair]

If at first you don't succeed, keep on trying. you may find another use for them. I would have to try some of those heavy dark grey ones in the fire. Asbestos ones go into the castables mix for building forges and kilns. But...... first would be to consider your safety as you are working all those valves with worn particles of asbestos.

[samari46]

This is going back a bunch of years. But some of the valve packing I used was a type that used wire and asbestos with graphite with a lead sheath. The wire would score the valve shaft and pump shafts so contacted some packing companies to see what was out there. Since some of the centrifugal pumps ran up to 300psi we switched to mechanical seals. The reciprocating pumps lead graphite with no wires. Old packing definitely used asbestos. Frank

[Walter Laich]

sounds almost as safe as lead for batteries

[bangerjim]

What you have is NOT lead. It is standard high-temp Grafoil packing.....made up of graphite and (in those days) asbestos. Today other materials are used.


I have been an engineer in the valve industry since 1973. I have never seen Pb used in standard or special industrial grade control valve packing. I have had my shop guys rebuild many MANY valves and the old stuff that comes out of the bonnet packing gland of a control valve is just garbage.

If you have that many old valves to rebuild, you may have a hazardous waste disposal site situation on your hands due to all the asbestos in there.

[Lloyd Smale]

yup even back in my sailor days in the early 70s valve packing had graphite impregnated. Ive never seen any with lead.

[.455 Webley]

The best part of this site is the backgrounds and abilities that we all bring to this hobby of ours. Thanks for your input help and guidance. Fortunately for me all the valves that i will be repacking have been repacked in the last decade at least once before. Thus reducing the likely hood that i will be going toe to toe with large amounts of asbestos.

The large coil of packing that i saw may have been a type of lead containing pump packing. It looked a lot like this.

http://www.abmco.com/sites/default/files/ABMPDS8010.pdf

And even if i end up with large amounts of that for free i doubt that it would be worth the time, effort, and potential health pitfalls of dealing with the stuff.