Under Water Lead Cable

[cuslog]

So, I bought 250 lbs of "supposedly" pure lead. Was told it had been reclaimed from under water power transmission cable that went under a Lake in Northern BC. Believed the story because I saw the stripped outer sheathing and the (roughly 1/4" dia.) strands are quite flexible. Strands are quite "oxidized". From a 20 lb batch, I'm getting ~ .5 lb of "dross"
Been having trouble getting good looking bullets from it. Mix is roughly 20:1 lead / tin. Lee 20 lb. bottom pour pot. Bullets seem to be filling out well enough in the mold but the surface looks "blotchy" in patches. ~80% nice and shiny ~ 20% blotchy /pock marked. Fluxed several times with bees wax, not getting any better.
Any comments / advice ?
TIA

[Winger Ed.]

Any of that cable sheathing has lots of trash in/on it.

I have gotten pieces of it over the years and have to really run the heat up, flux and stir much more than normal to clean it.
But it will clean up though.

Once ya get the trash out, its about as pure Lead as you'll find anywhere else.

[cuslog]

Yeah, I was starting to think it was trash still in the mix, tried a couple other molds, still looked the same. Been fluxing with Bees wax - anything that might work better ?
TIA

[Winger Ed.]

Yeah, if the pour is the same-- it won't really matter which mold ya put it in.

All sorts of things do a good job of fluxing- sawdust, old paraffin candles, etc. Just don't be bashfull about getting the heat up.
They all work like a bag of fertilizer in your garage: It doesn't do much good until you use it.

[lightman]

I've melted a lot of cable sheathing, mostly from telephone cable. But I've never seen any underwater cable. This is a first! Turn the heat up and throw a few handfuls of pine sawdust in the pot. Let it char over good and light the smoke. When it goes out stir it in really well. You may have to repeat a few times.

[cuslog]

The saga continues !
Tried again today, set heat @ 9/10, fluxed 3 more times W/ beeswax, stirred quite a bit. Cast 10 bullets, no better, maybe even a bit worse.
Frustrated, walked away for ~ 45 minutes, left the pot @ 9/10, came back and found this ~ about 1/4" thick and had almost formed a crust.
287590
Anybody know what this stuff is ? Seems it just rose to the top on its own, stirring seems to have kept it in suspension. Skimmed this off, left it for another 75 minutes this time - came back even thicker, ~3/8 - 1/2" thick this time. Skimmed again, cast 10 more bullets - still looking blotchey / pock marked.
Can't believe how much trash I'm getting from this stuff.

[Winger Ed.]

I got a bunch of 'Lead' at the scrap yard once that did exactly the same thing as that,
but the massive amount of crud was more brown.
I also used a Lee pot, but it was turned up as high as it would go, and I might have let it sit & cook longer.

I had a customer at the time who was a metalurgical engineer, and had access to a big lab and electron microscope.
He looked at my stuff and told me it was Cadmium.

Then said, "Be careful with it. Cadmium is used in various things, but by weight---- it's about 1/3 cancer".

He was the senior engineer guy for Dresser Industries. The company that made those big Christmas tree
valves and $40,000 drill bits for the oil field & their drilling.
I didn't send a sample off for further analysis, I just took him at his word and sold it back to the scrap yard.

[Soundguy]

Could be up to 1/2% antimony in there too. I've had cable sheath that did. Copper in there can come out too. Remember that cable sheath is junk lead alloy.. If it's free it's good.

[cuslog]

Yeah, I was afraid it might be something like Cadmium or Arsenic or some other bit of bad news.
Got a bad taste in my mouth too !
That 250# might just be garbage - bought from some guy on FaceBook MarketPlace.

[Winger Ed.]

That 250# might just be garbage - bought from some guy on FaceBook MarketPlace.

Oh well,,,,,,,,, sometimes you're the bug, and sometimes you're the windshield.

[lightman]

The saga continues !
Tried again today, set heat @ 9/10, fluxed 3 more times W/ beeswax, stirred quite a bit. Cast 10 bullets, no better, maybe even a bit worse.
Frustrated, walked away for ~ 45 minutes, left the pot @ 9/10, came back and found this ~ about 1/4" thick and had almost formed a crust.
287590
Anybody know what this stuff is ? Seems it just rose to the top on its own, stirring seems to have kept it in suspension. Skimmed this off, left it for another 75 minutes this time - came back even thicker, ~3/8 - 1/2" thick this time. Skimmed again, cast 10 more bullets - still looking blotchey / pock marked.
Can't believe how much trash I'm getting from this stuff.

I've melted a lot of cable sheathing and I've never seen anything like that in it.

[cuslog]

I don't think this is sheathing. Its solid round "wire" about 1/4" dia. quite soft and very flexible. Cuts very easily W/side cutters. I saw what I assumed was the outer sheathing (from a distance) - looked to be ~ 1" OD. Definitely lead in it but something else suspended in the mix that rises to the top (yellow / green powder) when allowed to sit but still heated.
287603

[Soundguy]

that's lead wire... could be anything from soft to 10-11 bhn with some antimony. could be many different materials in there depending on what the lead wire was meant for.

I've seen 6 bhn lead wire that wa used for swaging bullets.

I have a few feet of 10 bhn antimonial lead wire setting on my bench with a pile of linotype typeset words that i havn't melted because I am keeping for souvenirs.

[dondiego]

How does the lead underneath cast boolits? That is what you are after. Skim and throw the other stuff out.

[cuslog]

How does the lead underneath cast boolits? That is what you are after. Skim and throw the other stuff out.
Not very well:
287607
From a 20 lb. batch, I've skimmed 3 times - pile I've skimmed off would amount to ~ 2 full cups of yellow / green powder.
Just wondering - that powder wouldn't be lead oxide from over-heating the lead ? Somebody did say "turn up the heat" - I turned it up to 9 / 10.

[dondiego]

From the looks of those castings, I would say that your mold is too cold..........or your melt.

[Soundguy]

Agreed..cold mold.

Green powder could be copper.

[cuslog]

Hmmm.... interesting - don't think it would be melt too cold, I had the pot set to ~ 9/10 so almost maxed out. Could be the mold I guess, I'll try it again. I had been thinking that aluminum molds tended to get too hot - no?
Drained the pot, scrubbed it out, tried another batch this afternoon, kept the heat in the pot down to about 6/10, only had time for ~ 20 bullets cast but no green hair growing on the pot as of yet. Is there such a thing as melt over-heated and oxidizing ?

[dondiego]

I have seen that green stuff often when melting water pipe. There are a lot of things that can plate out onto lead pipe when in contact with water.

cuslog - did you add any tin to your allow when making those boolits?

[cuslog]

I have seen that green stuff often when melting water pipe. There are a lot of things that can plate out onto lead pipe when in contact with water.

cuslog - did you add any tin to your allow when making those boolits?

Yes, it was about 20:1 lead : Tin

[rintinglen]

Were it I, that would not be in my lead pot. I have an old cast iron pot that I use for smelting, and I would be doing about 40 pounds at a time with a big handful of sawdust followed by a candle stub of wax, stirring constantly for about five minutes. I'd flux it and scrape out the scum about three times before pouring it into ingots (may have to flux and clean it four or five times to get the crud out.) I would not waste any tin on the melt until I had it at least reasonably clean
I'd not even try a boolit until I had the melt clean.

The boolits you show are very likely cast from a really cold mold. I'd preheat the mold before casting and then I'd cast a freaking bunch before I even looked at a single boolit.

[Soundguy]

This ^

[GlocksareGood]

I have melted several hundred pounds of lead cable jackets over the years. All came from medium voltage lead cable also called PILC. It makes good bullets I just usually mix it 50/50 with COWW cause it is a little softer. I have never had any filler material in it.
I did melt down 50lbs of lead blankets from the navy yard. It was pure soft lead but had about 20% by weight of some filler. The filler came out when I melted the "lead cloth" down in a pot. I just skimmed it off the top.

[Buck Shot]

If that's cadmium coming out of your melt, be very careful with it. I know from welding that cadmium fumes will kill you in a hurry. In vapor form, I believe it's one of the most toxic metals out there.