Ingots?

[swOhioMatt]

Its been 20 years since I cast bullets. Being older, wiser and perhaps mostly a little more discretionary funds, I’ve jumped back in with a Master Caster. I’ve got a lot of raw linotype. Based on what I am reading, it appears the accepted practice is to make ingots and then use those in your caster. The ingots themselves are processed in a separate melter. Is this so you’re running a “dirty” and “clean” pot? Processing the raw pb and fluxing in a dirty pot to keep the crud out of the casting pot?

Matt

[imashooter2]

It’s because crud clogs bottom pour spouts leading to all sorts of frustration. "Smelting" (cleaning/mixing) pots are generally just a steel or cast iron pot and alloy is ladled out of the top to cast ingots.

[BattleRife]

Is this so you’re running a “dirty” and “clean” pot? Processing the raw pb and fluxing in a dirty pot to keep the crud out of the casting pot?
Matt

Partially. Since so many casters use scrap from a variety of convenient sources it certainly helps to keep all the dirt, oxides, and various whatevers out of your casting pot.

It also makes sense to do your primary melting in as large a pot as possible, to minimize the work and homogenize your stockpile. I do my scrap melting in a 100kg pot, pouring it out into 1kg ingots that fit easily into a Lee 20-pound casting pot. A single afternoon with the big pot creates enough ingots to keep me casting for a few years.

[Winger Ed.]

I make ingots separately.
Some are pure Lead, some are specific like wheel weights, some are the hard stuff with more goodies.

When I get ready for a run, I'll add them into the pot as a ratio,
or sometimes mix several for a batch to add and know when I refill the pot they are all the same.

Starting from start to finish doing the separation of trash, hard initial fluxing, etc. then cast is beyond frustrating.

[El Bibliotecario]

...I’ve got a lot of raw linotype. Based on what I am reading, it appears the accepted practice is to make ingots and then use those in your caster. The ingots themselves are processed in a separate melter. Is this so you’re running a “dirty” and “clean” pot? Processing the raw pb and fluxing in a dirty pot to keep the crud out of the casting pot?
Matt

For years all I had was linotype from a press room, caked with ink. Not knowing any better, I melted it, fluxed it, scraped a copious layer of debris from the top of the pot, then cast from the same pot using a dipper. Then I read what the original poster apparently read and found I had done it all wrong. The bullets, unaware of their ignoble origin, worked perfectly.

[yetavon]

I make ingots separately.
Some are pure Lead, some are specific like wheel weights,

I have done the same... But have discovered that permeant maker is not permeant on pure lead, and my dumb butt piled them in the same bucket.

[WRideout]

Some of the scrap I have used is incredibly dirty, and produces a great amount of dross on top to be removed. The design of common bottom pour pots, with valve stems etc. on top of the pot would make it extremely difficult to scoop all the dross out. Also, with a large amount of lino, you may find it beneficial to go ahead and make up an alloy to fit your purposes, and store them separately. I mark my ingots by scratching with a screwdriver or equivalent.

Wayne

[lightman]

Its been 20 years since I cast bullets. Being older, wiser and perhaps mostly a little more discretionary funds, I’ve jumped back in with a Master Caster. I’ve got a lot of raw linotype. Based on what I am reading, it appears the accepted practice is to make ingots and then use those in your caster. The ingots themselves are processed in a separate melter. Is this so you’re running a “dirty” and “clean” pot? Processing the raw pb and fluxing in a dirty pot to keep the crud out of the casting pot?

Matt

I would say you have a pretty good grasp on this. By using a separate pot you keep the trash out of the spout of your casting pot. And you can do larger batches for a more consistent alloy. I do batches of 350 to 400 pounds and mark the container with the date. Some see this as an extra unnecessary step while others feel its the best way.

A few years ago I started using steel stamps to mark my ingots after seeing plastic buckets fail and sharpie marks fading.

[swOhioMatt]

I do batches of 350 to 400 pounds and mark the container with the date.

Thanks all for the replies.

A follow up question, what are you using to process the ingots? I’ve looked around and large capacity melters are stupid expensive. There must be something that can process 100 pounds at a time and not have to mortgage the house.

BattleRif, you mentioned a 100 kilo pot. What heat source do you use?

Matt

[414gates]

A follow up question, what are you using to process the ingots? I’ve looked around and large capacity melters are stupid expensive. There must be something that can process 100 pounds at a time and not have to mortgage the house.

You could either make this yourself, of pay someone to make it for you. Either way it'll cost less than what you paid for the Master Caster.

I made mine because sometimes the scrap is from lead sheeting, or of a size that is a lot of effort to cut smaller.

https://ysterhout.net/docs/melter/index.html

[Bigmancrisler]

Thanks all for the replies.

A follow up question, what are you using to process the ingots? I’ve looked around and large capacity melters are stupid expensive. There must be something that can process 100 pounds at a time and not have to mortgage the house.

BattleRif, you mentioned a 100 kilo pot. What heat source do you use?

Matt

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20220303/a697ee3cbd35c3a9c729d666ccbe8a25.jpg
A turkey burner ($70-80 at lowes) and a $4 cast iron pan, with a $2 steel soup ladle and a $5 cast iron corn cob shaped corn bread for an ingot mold seems to work just fine. I also use a muffin pan for stuff I plan to store longer and use the corn bread one for stuff I plan on using more immediately. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20220303/b4942cda0ba22138a5697ab8e352e9b3.jpg
If I had a bigger Dutch oven I could fit a whole lot more in but I can usually melt down a 5 gallon buckets worth of WW in about 1.5-2 hours. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20220303/037004910cb8ef920fb503a2e527d327.jpg

[swOhioMatt]

Turkey fryer! Perfect. Never crossed my mind, thanksgiving dinner is always cooked in the pellet smoker.

Matt

[Jack Stanley]

Two pots has been the way to go for me for many years . My pot for melting scrap is a section of thick wall pipe with a bottom welded to it and is fired by a mixer bar from an industrial water heater . It uses propane and a large single stage regulator . It holds about six hundred pounds , lead is ladled out into ingot molds from one to twenty pounds .

Jack

[Land Owner]

One way to answer to the OP question may be, melt (say) one hundred pounds (+ or -) of alloy components in a large pot, (say) a 25-gallon propane tank cut in two, over a turkey frier (that's my way anyway). Carefully pour 2 to 3 pound ingots (when cold).

Once you are heated up and well into your boolit casting session, with boolits coming out of your hot mold in the quality way they were intended, it is useful to melt and prep a lesser/equal quantity pot of the same alloy, including cooled spru cut offs, then, when the 1st pot is depleted, change to making boolits from the 2nd pot of now hot alloy, so the casting session is not interrupted. Refill the first pot with spru and cold ingots to heat up in the meantime.

The introduction of cold ingots (or sprus) in a single pot effectively "kills" the heat, stops production, and starts the whole heat process over again. A lot of time is wasted (or maybe taking a break is useful) in getting the mold and melt back up to the previous production temperature. It is easier to STAY at production temperature, or much closer thereto, by melting ingots and sprus in another pot.

[lightman]

Thanks all for the replies.

A follow up question, what are you using to process the ingots? I’ve looked around and large capacity melters are stupid expensive. There must be something that can process 100 pounds at a time and not have to mortgage the house.

BattleRif, you mentioned a 100 kilo pot. What heat source do you use?

Matt

The link that 414gates posted shows a nice 1st class set-up. If you are at the beginning of your casting career and plan to stay with it that would be a nice way to go. If you want to go with a simpler set-up a large Harbor Freight Dutch Oven heated on a Turkey Fryer will work ok. Many guys on here use an old 20# Propane tank cut off to the height that you want for a pot. You will also need a ladle of some sort and something to skim the junk off the top with. I use a nice ladle from Rowell and a solid and slotted one piece spoon from Walmart. And ingot molds. I have found that the bigger the melting pot the more ingot molds that you need, or you will be waiting for them to cool.

[Winger Ed.]

What heat source do you use?

Gasoline fired Coleman stoves will work too, but you're encouraged to have a rack over it to support the weight.

I've seen pictures of them with re-bar rods going across cinder block bricks with the stove under it.
Also, wind screens or something else to focus the heat up into the bottom of your pot is helpful

[imashooter2]

Harbor Freight sells a Dutch oven that will hold 100 pounds easily. Turkey fryers are a common heat source. I recommend buying a good iron ladle meant for the purpose as opposed to repurposing a soup ladle.

http://imashooter2.com/pictures/kitchen600.jpg

[oley55]

Harbor Freight sells a Dutch oven that will hold 100 pounds easily. Turkey fryers are a common heat source. I recommend buying a good iron ladle meant for the purpose as opposed to repurposing a soup ladle.

http://imashooter2.com/pictures/kitchen600.jpg

although I have a dutch oven (10” 4.5 qt) I just checked Harbor Freight and am mildly amazed that a 6qt, 12” pot is only $25. amazing that a pot that size with lid costs less than cast iron ingot molds. makes ya think lyman and rcbs are sticking it to us.

[imashooter2]

although I have a dutch oven (10” 4.5 qt) I just checked Harbor Freight and am mildly amazed that a 6qt, 12” pot is only $25. amazing that a pot that size with lid costs less than cast iron ingot molds. makes ya think lyman and rcbs are sticking it to us.

In defense of Lyman and RCBS, the HF Dutch ovens are as cheaply made as man can make them. The first one I had split straight up the side the instant heat hit it. I thank God the lead in it was still cold. HF replaced the pot without further issue. The one pictured has melted a few thousand pounds and is still going strong.

[Cosmic_Charlie]

I think a mild steel vessel like an air or propane tank is the way to go. A round bottom helps when dipping out lead for ingots and there are no worries about them cracking. You can find a good propane turkey fryer on Amazon for cheap.

[swOhioMatt]

Thanks all for the replies.

I’ve got an old LP cylinder with the old style valve which no one will fill. Think I’m going to cut it in half and try over a turkey frier. I’ll try that and if it’s not as I hoped, 12” pipe with a bottom welded as shown in the link will be welded up.

Edit, the 12” dutch oven at Harbor Freight is only $25. I couldn’t get someone to weld the bottom to a pipe for that money.

Again, thanks all.

Matt

[RogerDat]

Harbor Freight sells a Dutch oven that will hold 100 pounds easily. Turkey fryers are a common heat source. I recommend buying a good iron ladle meant for the purpose as opposed to repurposing a soup ladle.

http://imashooter2.com/pictures/kitchen600.jpg

Been using my harbor freight dutch oven for many years and thousands of pounds of scrap. Muffin tins and bread loaf pans make good cheap ingot molds. Pour about 12 pounds into a bread loaf pan and you have a stackable slab. Good for storing until time to mix into an alloy for making bullets. Always test first, some baking pans will bond with lead, best to find out with one filled muffin than with all 12 muffins filled in the muffin tin.

There is a vendor Lakehouse in S&S that sells really nice molds. The ingots come out with the Cast Boolits logo or "Redneck Gold" embossed on them. Stack great and fit a USPS flat rate box if you decide to sell or swap some lead and need to ship it. Each one has some common lead alloys abbreviations embossed on them allowing one to mark what alloy by just putting a dent over the correct one.

Steel stamps from harbor freight are cheap and won't fade or leave you guessing as to what the lead is. Well worth the cost and time. If you find you have a lot of different ingots it can be worth spraying some semi-clear colored paint on the ends using a different color for different lead. Easier to spot than reading the stamped abbreviation.

I found soup ladles IF they are all steel with wood handle can work OK but avoid plastic, really no fun to have the plastic handle start to slide off as it melts. I bent one to get it at a good angle for scraping last little bit from dutch oven. I also have a tiny metal ladle such as you find in salad dressing at a salad bar. That gets that last little bit or is useful for making smaller pewter ingots in a pot on a hot plate. I like my bottom pour ladle for ingot making but it is heavy and not really required.

Find this stuff at Salvation Army or garage/estate sales. Picked up some smaller iron or steel pots with solid handles in the same places. Use on a hot plate or over the burner for smaller batches. Have even cast from them sometimes. DO NOT use aluminum pots! Aluminum won't melt at molten lead temperatures but it gets softer, and with the weight of the lead in the pot it can bulge at the bottom and "fail to contain your molten lead" fancy way of saying test your foot gear as burn protection, confirm you are or are not wearing shorts and make a mess.

One can often find turkey or fish fryers cheap at garage or estate sales. Look for very sturdy legs. The less expensive ones won't put out as much heat as the really good "jet" burners but they work pretty well for the $50 or less new and $10 at a garage sale. Jet burners will speed things up for the cost of a more expensive fryer. For speed you can't beat a harbor freight weed burner, also useful when doing large items that stick out of the pot like lead water pipe or pieces of sheet lead. Won't have much contact with pot and the large area sheds heat like cooling fins. Weed burner goes through that stuff like a hot knife & butter.

Raw linotype in the original form is worth keeping in that form and not converting to ingots. An ingot can be any alloy. A line-of-type or individual printing letters is a known alloy. Same as a silver half dollar or silver quarter is a known amount of silver. Printing lead is too rich for general use on its own so making a big batch of bullet alloy you would mix it in but leave the raw source as is until used.

Large batch of mixed alloy for bullets will provide for greater consistency than mixing small batches.

50/50 plain lead and linotype is hardball a typical commercial bullet alloy. Suitable for most uses and actually harder than needed for many uses so one can use even less linotype and more plain lead in many cases.

[BattleRife]

BattleRif, you mentioned a 100 kilo pot. What heat source do you use?

My scrap melter is entirely home built. A 10 inch pipe with a plate welded to form the bottom, slotted angle for legs, a bottom pour valve, and a wrapping of mineral wool insulation. The heat source is a "Reil Burner", Ron Reil being a blacksmith who has online pages showing how to build forges for metal working. I took his standard design for a propane burner and modified it with a 90° elbow at the front to make a flameholder that points up.

https://i.postimg.cc/rpwSbDHH/Burner-burning.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/50GytTj1/Burner.jpg

I actually live in a fairly compact inner city home, so my biggest driver in building the melter wasn't performance, it was compact storage. The unit packs down to be reasonably easy to store and to move.

https://i.postimg.cc/NjgsQBbm/Packed.jpg

And I also made stamps, I can't recommend them highly enough for quickly and permanently marking ingots.

https://i.postimg.cc/BvbKpdL9/Stamps.jpg

[imashooter2]

The stamps are a reasonably impressive use of the Dremel.

I just pile mine into the bucket the ore came out of and mark what they are on the lid. As a plus, the bucket keeps dust and dirt off the clean ingots.