Newby

[Ural Driver]

Let me begin by telling everyone that I am very new at casting. I have been gathering lead for a few years with the goal of making my own bullets or fishing weights. By my estimations I have accumulated approximately 1500 lbs of assorted lead. So, using info gathered from this and other sites, I have (finally) begun processing my (very messy and disorganized) stockpile. My first goal was to take the odd sized materials (mostly recycled plumbers lead) and smelt it into ingots thus allowing me to keep an accurate inventory...... and free up a lot of floor space. So far I have transformed about 500 lbs. of that soft plumbers lead into a neat "little" stack of ingots. I am currently working thru about 300 lbs. of Linotype that will become their own "little" stack. I still have several 50 lb bars of what I believe is pure lead along with assorted fishing and scuba diving weights to process. So, once all this material is transformed into manageable sized pieces, the plan is to begin mixing components to get suitable projectiles/weights.
So, now my first question: is there an absolute best fluxing material? I started off using what I had, pine shavings of the type used as animal bedding. They seem to do ok, but I bought some Marvalux just because I keep hearing it mentioned, a lot. The pine shavings gave me good smelling smoke, ashes that were not hard to remove from the pot and a pretty clean product. The Marvalux gave me acrid smoke (that gave me a sore throat) and a black, slimy, nasty, difficult to remove substance that left me with black wispy trails in my still liquid product. I have since found an almost unlimited supply of clean, fresh sawdust from a nearby pallet making operation. So, unless someone tells me I need to retry the Marvalux and do something different in its application, I'm thinkin that sawdust is gonna be my weapon of choice from now on.....
I look forward to your comments on the matter.

[mdi]

I don't see anything "wrong" with your methods so far. You are gong to get a lot of different answers about fluxing, and some real scientific foundry methods, so I'll just direct you to the sticky above; "fluxing technique". My experience I've used wood shavings/sawdust, charcoal briquettes, wax (candles, paraffin or bullet lube), Marvalux (ugh) and newspaper. And maybe a half dozen others I cant remember right now. All worked to some extent, some better than others. But when I'm casting today, I mainly just pick up bit of old bullet lube for the pot (98% of my lead has been cleaned with sawdust and poured into ingots and pucks) and I have a few lbs. of unused lubed bullets I drop in the pot).

One hint and it may sound real elementary, but it could save some time; mark your cleaned ingots. Use some sort of method to mark the ingots as to the type of lead, and if you check BHN mark your readings. I have used black marking pens, cold chisel to form letters selling the lead contents and some 3/8" number stamps.

[kevin c]

Pine sawdust and paraffin wax are what I use in the processing pot, usually twice each. That gets me large storage ingots. Smaller ingots of casting alloy are mixed in batches from the storage supply, during which an additional round of sawdust and wax are used. The casting ingots go into my bottom pour, which I reduce as needed with beeswax. I've avoided sawdust in the casting pot because I figure the prior process and beeswax leaves me with sufficiently clean and reduced alloy, though I've considered using enough sawdust on top of the melt as a cover layer.

I haven't used Marvelux because I'm satisfied with the sawdust and wax, which I have plenty of, and because I've read that, while it works well, there is that mess you described.

I second mdi's suggestion to mark your ingots or use a different shape or brand to make them distinct. When you get to the point of having tons of ingots, remembering what you made them of years back gets problematic.

And, welcome to the fun!

[USSR]

Okay, I'll be the contrarian here. No need to mark your ingots. Just put them in clearly marked boxes as to what the ingots are.

Don

[unclemikeinct]

Old candles work fine to reduce the pot twice, then saw dust to flux. Repeat if dirty enough. First melts of scrap will be dirty. MARKING.. Pure lead ingots I stamp PB, clip on WW's I stamp COWW, linotype LN, Pewter scrap to add tin when wanted or needed, I keep that laying around to mix into my casting pot. 4 ozs per ten lbs. of wt. Keep it simple uncle mike

[454PB]

Your description of the results using Marvelux tells me you're using WAY too much. While I use Marvelux for boolit casting (done indoors without ventilation), I use a carbon based fluxing material for rendering and large ingots, and I do it outdoors. When using Marvelux for casting, I use 1/4 of a teaspoon for a filled 20 pound pot. Sawdust, used motor oil, and candle stubs are relatively cheap or free, Marvelux and the similar Frankford Arsenal fluxing agent are not so cheap (or easy to find).

[JSnover]

Dry pine (in stick or sawdust form) is my favorite. Metal stamps are the best way to mark ingots but it depends on how you decide to store them.

[RU shooter]

Everyone has their favorite flux but honestly anything that is carbon based will work. Dry grass clippings leaves wood chips candle wax ect ect . Just mix it into the alloy well and often when smelting I like to stir and mix the pot with a dry stick like used for stiring paint or small branch if it's dry .

[Winger Ed.]

Your description of the results using Marvelux tells me you're using WAY too much..

What he said^^

I use it in a 20lb. Pro-Melt, but just a pinch at a time.
Aggressive stirring will do a lot all by itself.
The trash in the molten Lead wants to float up,
stirring well on the sides and across the bottom with a big screwdriver helps it along.

I mark my ingots with a sharpie as to pure Lead, WW, etc.

Swaged, pure Lead boolits would work fine in the pistol loads I use,
so I don't add any more 'goodies' to the pot past the point where the molds fill out well.
Rifle stuff gets more care about alloy and hardness.

[WRideout]

My favorite for smelting wheelweights, etc, is vegetable oil, but I find that almost any oily substance works pretty well. Anymore I flux with used motor oil I get from my mechanic. He looks at me funny when I hand him a pint bottle for it. He's the same one who gives me wheelweights free, but I did bring him pizza once and I buy all our tires there. I also use the dry stick stir after most of the crud has been scraped off the top.

Wayne

[gpidaho]

Marvalux is right up there with Frankford Arsenal spray on mould release as the worst product ever invented to mess up your day! Gp

[Wayne Smith]

I use the term 'cleaning' and the term 'fluxing' differently. Cleaning is the process of getting impurities out of lead, a challenge since the density of lead is so high not much moves through it spontaneously. Wood shavings/sawdust work well to accomplish this as long as they are stirred through the melt.

Fluxing is the process of reducing the tin that has oxidized out of the melt when I am casting - and when ladle casting this can happen quickly because the lead is continually being mixed with air, unlike a bottom pour pot. Wax seems to work best for this.

[Mitch]

look for the stick above this section for.From Ingot To Target.Agreat read for a new Caster.

[Huskerguy]

I have no idea what I am doing so take this for what it's worth. When melting the big pieces I quit using sawdust and use some old candles cut up. I usually do it a couple times in a pot of about 10 lbs. I then do it again with smaller pieces when I mix different ingots in my pot. When I first started doing this I skimmed as much off the top as possible. Now I find that if I just stir it more, most of that gets stirred back in. My assumption is there is some separation of materials and I figure the really bad junk will come back and it does, but not much.

I also mark all of ingots with a black marker and store them in same lots of soft, range or WW ingots. This way when I am gearing for a day long pouring session I made three piles of ingots and mix them together. I would get confused on what is what if I didn't label each one.

The thing I figured out was anything that makes a bigger mess or creates unwanted smoke isn't worth it. My bullets look very nice so I know there is a more simple and effective route to arrive at the same place.

And BTW, congrats on accumulating such a large stockpile of lead. I suspect many on here would be jealous of it.

[Ural Driver]

Thanks to all for the helpful replies. Never gave much thought to how much was enough so I just keep getting it as I find it. Except for a couple hundred pounds of Lyman #2 that I bought from Rotometals, everything else has come out of my favorite scrap yard....at $.30 a pound.
The recycled plumbers lead was really nasty with gobs of dirt and leaves in most every fold. The Linotype's condition ranges from clean with a bit of what appears to be surface oxidation to dirt packed into the voids. In an attempt to keep the skimming to a minimum I've spent a lot of time unfolding the soft lead, dropping it on the floor and banging it with a hammer.
The Linotype is a real pain in the hands, as much of it has dirt/mud packed into the voids.....so I spend a lot of time smacking it down on my steel workbench to dislodge as much as possible prior to melting it down. With the plumbers lead the sawdust and pine shavings both seem to work well in cleaning out the impurities. The Linotype seemed to need much less at this point.....I hope that means I did a decent job knocking the dirt out.
Today I did find the aforementioned article "From Ingot to Target". Got it printed out and look forward to reading it.
I am separating the various types in appropriately marked boxes, but I do like the idea of marking/stamping each one.
Again, thanks for the input. I have no doubt there will be many more questions.:D

PS: here is a look at how much floor space I was able to reclaim.......:grin:

[Ural Driver]

Progress so far...........:lovebooli

[Burnt Fingers]

Let me begin by telling everyone that I am very new at casting. I have been gathering lead for a few years with the goal of making my own bullets or fishing weights. By my estimations I have accumulated approximately 1500 lbs of assorted lead. So, using info gathered from this and other sites, I have (finally) begun processing my (very messy and disorganized) stockpile. My first goal was to take the odd sized materials (mostly recycled plumbers lead) and smelt it into ingots thus allowing me to keep an accurate inventory...... and free up a lot of floor space. So far I have transformed about 500 lbs. of that soft plumbers lead into a neat "little" stack of ingots. I am currently working thru about 300 lbs. of Linotype that will become their own "little" stack. I still have several 50 lb bars of what I believe is pure lead along with assorted fishing and scuba diving weights to process. So, once all this material is transformed into manageable sized pieces, the plan is to begin mixing components to get suitable projectiles/weights.
So, now my first question: is there an absolute best fluxing material? I started off using what I had, pine shavings of the type used as animal bedding. They seem to do ok, but I bought some Marvalux just because I keep hearing it mentioned, a lot. The pine shavings gave me good smelling smoke, ashes that were not hard to remove from the pot and a pretty clean product. The Marvalux gave me acrid smoke (that gave me a sore throat) and a black, slimy, nasty, difficult to remove substance that left me with black wispy trails in my still liquid product. I have since found an almost unlimited supply of clean, fresh sawdust from a nearby pallet making operation. So, unless someone tells me I need to retry the Marvalux and do something different in its application, I'm thinkin that sawdust is gonna be my weapon of choice from now on.....
I look forward to your comments on the matter.

Just a note. Paragraphs are free. Use as many as needed. As we age our eyes can't handle large blocks of text. This causes many of us to just skip over the post.

Thanks.

[kevin c]

Ural Driver, you are too neat and efficient!

[Ural Driver]

Ural Driver, you are too neat and efficient!

Thanks, I try to keep stuff where I can find it.............well, eventually.

[mdi]

Okay, I'll be the contrarian here. No need to mark your ingots. Just put them in clearly marked boxes as to what the ingots are.

Don

No, you don't have to mark the ingots or, for that matter the boxed they will live in. Just grab any old ingot and toss it in the pot, we all know BHN and alloy is a bunch of hooie! And casters have never made a mistake...

[jimb16]

Hey guys! What about that old ground corn cob you use for polishing your cases? How many of you use that for flux? I do. Why waste a "resource"? Seems to work ok for me.

[Mitch]

alotof difernt thing can be used to clean lead.if it is like wood and produces carbon like a chacoal filter it will clean lead.then there is the wax that is a reucer or helpks mix oxcidized alloy on the top back into the mix.like i said the Ingot to Target web site in the stickys here do a fine job of explaining the differance and why you need both.Saw dust.dry pine neadles and the like all work.

[44Blam]

I like saw dust. I've been using pine because I have a lot of it.

I would say mark each ingot, if things get kind of knocked around it'll be hard to tell what it is.

[Hanzy4200]

As others have said, marking containers instead of ingots is much simpler. I still have buckets with individually marked ingots from my first year. With time you will know pure PB from alloy just at a glance. Pure has a sheen unlike alloy. For flux I use sawdust or candle wax. I feel the wax work better, but puts off more stink and can flare with high heat. Sawdust swells good and doesn't flare.

[Ural Driver]

As others have said, marking containers instead of ingots is much simpler. I still have buckets with individually marked ingots from my first year. With time you will know pure PB from alloy just at a glance. Pure has a sheen unlike alloy. For flux I use sawdust or candle wax. I feel the wax work better, but puts off more stink and can flare with high heat. Sawdust swells good and doesn't flare.

I have settled on the fresh pine sawdust......and it does indeed smell good. As for how to keep track of what-is-what..... I was lucky enough to find one of our own (a BIG thanks to Lakehouse2012 :cast_boolits:) who offers molds that have ID markers for PB, LN, WW, OT that cast right into each ingot. Even as a newby, I am impressed with how well these things work. I gave em a test run this afternoon........ending up with a bit over 100 pounds of very nice product. I marked each one of these as PB, simply by taking a cold chisel and striking across the other choices. [smilie=w:

261733

[lightman]

Okay, I'll be the contrarian here. No need to mark your ingots. Just put them in clearly marked boxes as to what the ingots are. Don

This was the method that I used years ago when I first started casting. But after a few years and a move or two and I wish my stash was stamped. Plastic buckets deterate and boxes come apart. Most of my stash is stacked in plastic milk crates now. We'll see how the years treat them.

Ural Driver, it looks like you are off to a good start. Casters either love or hate Marvelux. Personally I'm not a fan. The scum that you skim off will stick to your tools and that will absorb moisture. And moisture in hot lead is dangerous. When I melt scrap I use pine sawdust followed by some type of wax. Currently I have a good supply of Beeswax. I only use a wax of some type in my casting pot.

Cleaning your scrap lead before melting it may or may not make for less work. Any trash in it will float to the top. Do what makes you happy. You will settle on a method that works for you.

All in all, I would say that you have made a nice start.

[Dapaki]

I have tried all the possible flux that have been available and after 35 years, I find myself going back to purified bees wax, just 2 of the very tiny pellets will both flux the tin as well as clean the pot, it does not flash off on its own (my experience so far) and it does not hurt my lungs.

Most of all, SWMBO does not object to the smell (HWHL) as she has a bench in the shop for her green house operations.

Now, for processing WW and bulk scrap lead, I use a propane stove and an iron pot outside and use sawdust (whatever is sitting in my dust deputy) to clean the melt. Its free and offers a lot of carbon to free up the debris in the scrap melt.

As far as marking lead bars, I admit that I have in all practicality, abandoned the practice of reserving different hardness and purity and primarily make one alloy for all my boolits from pistol to .223.

With powder coating everything I make, I find no advantage in soft or hard lead, its all about 10 BHN and with WW in all the bars, they will all heat treat if I want to drive them hard (.223).

Congrats on all your work, your stash looks great, welcome and lets see some targets! :drinks:

[fredj338]

Welcome to a great hobby. If you have that mad scientist/HS chem lab personality, boolit casting is a natural.
I like sawdust, forget the Marvlux. I keep track of diff alloy by using diff ingot molds, makes it easy to see at a glance what I have. So range scrap in one, clip ww in another, pure lead in a another. Lino I keep as I buy it in pig form or letters/spacers. Then just blend in the pot when I cast. The issue with marking anything is the marks can wear off or boxes can get dropped & contents spilled. I always know what I have by just looking at the diff ingots.