X-ray Shielding lead..........

[Bullshead]

Anybody know what the composition of X-Ray shielding lead is?

Is it pure lead.......or alloyed to be harder?

I have a chance at 500 pounds of shielding lead........mostly in containers formerly used to transport Nuclear Medicine........it has NO radioactivity.

I've knife cut it.......it seems harder than pure lead.

[Old Ironsights]

Let's see... the composition of X-ray Lead is...

32 parts pb alloyed with 60 parts Lead and 8 parts galina.... ;)

Snatch it up.

[johnly]

Anybody know what the composition of X-Ray shielding lead is?

Is it pure lead.......or alloyed to be harder?

I have a chance at 500 pounds of shielding lead........mostly in containers formerly used to transport Nuclear Medicine........it has NO radioactivity.

I've knife cut it.......it seems harder than pure lead.

I have the ability to analyize the material. Send me a generous sample and I'll e-mail you a report within 48 hours of its arrival.

John

[13Echo]

The sheet lead in the walls of Xray rooms is pure or nearly pure lead. The lead in transport containers is alloyed and the alloy seems to be diffeent for the different containers. The small lead cups used to tansport Iodine 131 is realtively hard. The alloy in the larger (about 40lb) containers seems somewhat softer but still not pure lead.

I use the sheet lead as if it were pure. I have a lot of the containers but have yet to render them and test for hardness or castability. I think they'll make excellent bullets, maybe needing just a bit of tin to improve casting.

Jerry Liles

[Shotgun Luckey]

I suppose you could take it to the scrap yard and let them use their little gizmo to analyze it.....then when they tell you what they will pay you for it, "change" your mind...

[felix]

The small containers are excellent when they are added to WW, for as much as 50 percent worth. 25 percent is good enough, via casting and shooting 22s. Additional tin was not necessary. Do smelting outside for sure, and stay upwind at all times. Might be, or might not be, any residues of hot "medicine", but the smell indicates something is not kosher from every sample I have used over several years. Makes excellent boolits. Gotten several groups at a quarter inch with aged boolits in the bench gun. ... felix

[Ricochet]

Hey, maybe you could make cast tracers with that stuff! :mrgreen:

[Heavy lead]

My favorite lead I've ever gotten was from this, very soft, great casting and shooting (I like soft boolits with soft lube). Who knows if it's all the same, but I would think it would have to be soft. I didn't check to see if it glows in the dark though, wow, night tracers, cool.

[cohutt]

Specs for xray shielding call for pure lead- is in panels so that added strength / stiffness of alloys isn't needed. pure = more dense = better radiation shield

scrap from this is great stuff:

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m284/cohutt/pb/leadleadlead006.jpg

[Pitmaster]

Here's some picks of part of my stash. Nice and malleable to roll up.

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c400/bdcbbq/Lead1016002.jpg


http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c400/bdcbbq/Lead1016001.jpg

[cohutt]

Sweet.

Looks like yours was from a demolition- has the epoxy and some plywood residue it appears.

The stuff that goes around the big linear partical accelerators in cancer centers is the holy grail. This little bit weighed in at 500 lbs, the bricks are over 50lbs each. :mrgreen:


http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m284/cohutt/pb/leadleadlead002.jpg

[Pitmaster]

If I remember right mine came from the demolition of a mobile medical trailer of some sort. There is glue on some of the pieces and one has plywood attached. Mine is a little more flexible than yours but you don't have to make ingots. Nice stash though.

[jawjaboy]

:holysheep

[Tom Herman]

Hi Felix,

The most common medical tracers I believe are Technetium 99, with a half life of 5.9 hours and Iodine 133 with a half life of 22.4 hours.
In that time period, half of the material will decay to a stable isotope.
The whole idea behind medical tracers is to put an isotope in the body that is long lived enough to do what it needs to, but short enough so that it decays and becomes non-radioactive quickly.
Statistically, an isotope is considered gone when you go through ten half lives. You then only have 1/10th of 1% of the material you started with.
For Tc 99, that's only 2-1/2 days. For I 133, that's ten days.
If you're working with plants to check nutrient uptake, you might use the longer lived Phosphorus 32, which has a half life of 14.3 days.
Even there, you let the lead sit five months and it's (P 32) all gone.
If in doubt, find someone with an alpha/beta/gamma (mica window Geiger-Muller tube or equivalent) capable counter and check the lead out.
I wouldn't turn down any lead from either shielding or containers for fears of dangerous levels of radioactivity!

Happy Shootin'! -Tom



Do smelting outside for sure, and stay upwind at all times. Might be, or might not be, any residues of hot "medicine", but the smell indicates something is not kosher from every sample I have used over several years. felix

[454PB]

If they look like this, they are about the same as WW alloy.....11 BHN, and cast very nicely.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v16/eddard49/Leadcontainer.jpg