Indoor Range Scrap

[0802]

What's a current good price on indoor range scrap? Local range will sell it to me for $0.25/lb, as that is what the local(?) scrap dealer gives him. Don't know the composition of it, I expect most is jacketed as I think autopistols are largely in favor there.

I searched the archives, but didn't see much as to actual prices and what I did find I might have been dated.

Not an urgent need for scrap right now, but any at decent price is to be considered.

[sheepdog]

Most yards are paying .15 to .20/lb right now but thats better then buying from the yards. Composition of indoor seems to be alot more 22 lead and of course very little rifle lead then outdoor. Heres how I tend to see down range scrap, its pure an opinion:

22 jacketed and unjacketed: soft but not quite pure. Lots of dross.
Jacketed: usually little harder then pure but softer then WW.
Cast boolits: WW with a little tin. Occasionally alot of tin (lymans #2 or lino?)
Rifle jacketed: Varys, but usually very hard and chalky. White in color usually.

Because jacketed projectiles can use any quality of lead for its inside this can vary alot. I would stock up on clip on WWs right now, as its pretty predictable usually cheaper and alot less particulate (ie less chance of poisoning). Most people get range scrap free at their local ranges in small quantities and mix it in large batches of WW to make it a more predictable alloy.

[deltaenterprizes]

Range lead is 50% trash, I don't think he can get 25 cents/lb any more.

[RayinNH]

What Delta said, lots of trash. I got about 800# last time we cleaned our indoor range. They only allow jacketed along with .22s and airgun pellets. Lots of jackets, target paper, wood and homasote which we use to tack targets onto. If your desperate for lead or you have plenty of time on your hands then go for it as a source. I wouldn't pay that price though, in fact I paid nothing for mine. Save the jackets and turn them in at the recycler for lead...Ray

[Gunslinger]

RayinNH:

If you disregard the fact that range lead is an unknown and inconsistent alloy, I do see some advantages to it: It doesn't smell when meltet, you don't have to spend hours on end sorting out zinc and stick ons and you don't have to go look for it... you already know where to find it.

That being said - I don't pay for it, I just dig it out of the bank and take it home. And no, I would not pay $0.25/lbs for it... I don't even pay that much for WWs.

What do you mean by "if you have plenty of time on your hands"? I've only meltet down range lead once, and it was pretty painless I think. But I do recall having read that it takes more time to melt down than WWs. Is that what you mean?

Oh and you really think it's worth the effort to save the jackets and trading them for lead?

[RayinNH]

Gunslinger, I think were talking different things here. Sheepdog was asking about indoor range lead. You said you dig it out of the bank, by that I gather your talking outdoor range.

Let me tell you about our indoor range so you know my situation. Our backstop is steel plate set at an angle. When projectiles hit they then angle down into a concrete water tank about two feet deep. In front of all that are homasote target backers that get shot to pieces and also end up in the water tank. About every year and a half a work party is organized to clean out the tank. Last cleanout we took out 12, 55 gallon drums full. I took home 10, 5 gallon buckets about 3/4 full or about 80# each.

When the bullets hit they pretty well shatter. The lead ends up being just a bunch of crumbs that are soaking wet with the afore mentioned target backer material as well in the mix. I let it dry about a year and a half before smelting it, it was totally dry. The first pot full is the slowest, having to keep turning the mixture over to get the lead to go to the bottom of the pot. After you have liquid lead at the bottom, everything added afterwards goes a bit quicker. Everything skimmed of the goes into an old french fry basket to separate the dirt and dust from the jackets. The jackets go into a bucket. It's a slower process than wheelweights by far. Would I do it again? Only if wheelweight got very hard to find or if I was getting real low on supply.

As to saving the jackets, on 8/28/2008 I turned in 38 pounds of them and got $1.73 per pound for a total of $58.82. The price has come down since then. Before posting this I weighed my bucket of jackets, I now have 46 #. The scrap yard I go to is only 3/4 mile from my place so I feel it's worth it to me...Ray

[sheepdog]

Gunslinger I think they mean range scrap might take longer to melt. Range scrap is far from trash or even mostly trash but it has its pros and cons like anything else.

Rayin do they make you clean the dross off the copper or take as is?

[RayinNH]

Sheepdog, when I do the smelting I flux very often so I get as much off the jackets as possible. The jackets are pretty clean but may contain some dirt that gets stuck in the nooks and crannies, even after being sifted through the french fry basket. Some of those jackets I'm fairly certain are brass, they have a definite yellow color as opposed to the orange color of copper. That being said you get the lower price of mixed metals. When I bring copper pipe( #1 copper) I get max dollars compared to copper pipe with solder joints or brass fittings soldered on ( #2 copper)...Ray

[imashooter2]

Indoor range scrap. Note the amount of debris. This batch was pretty good. I've gotten some with some trash in it.[smilie=1:

http://home.comcast.net/~imashooter2/pictures/scrap600.jpg

I estimate that melting 150 pound batches takes 30-50% longer than WW by the time you burn off all the junk. Scrap yards around here won't touch the jackets.

I've gotten a lot of it for free in the past, but free went away when prices peaked and the membership decided they were going to get rich on their waste. The most I've paid was 14 cents a pound shortly after that. Today, I'd rather pay a quarter a pound for WW and have a known alloy.

[Brick85]

Posted this in the other thread about range lead, but figured I might as well duplicate it here since it's the same subject.

I'm thinking of buying up some range lead. I figure I'll go with 15 cents a lb (depending on what the scrap dealer in town offers) and bring in a bathroom scale. My thought is that I can probably actually make a profit and keep the lead, by keeping aside the jackets and selling those to the scrap yard. Anyone ever try that? Is there a good way to truly separate them so there's no lead in the jacket material? Is that a normal product of the smelting or are you using special flux, Ray? Also, wouldn't some lead stay inside any busted jackets that aren't flattened or shredded?

[anachronism]

I just got 450 lbs of indoor range scrap from a friend who didn't want to mess with it. I've melted it down before so I know what to expect. The loss will be about 40% or so by volume. I'll probably have at least 1 propane bottle used up before I'm done. I'll end up with a little less than 300 lbs of fairly soft lead, my last batch ran about 8-10 BHN, & I'll need to add tin to the melt to make it work smoothly. Still, I feel it's worth doing. My scrap was free, .15-.20 cents/lb is still pretty good.

When you have everything melted, almost all the lead will come out of the jackets. It would require some sort of physical lock to keep it in place. Many guys melt down 45 ACP ball & end up with neat empty jackets that look like they should be useful for something, but never are. All the lead comes out of them nicely.

[RayinNH]

Brick85, the jackets on indoor range scrap, the ones that hit the steel plate backstop, totally flatten and look like copper banana peels :-D,no way to hide lead in them. Outdoor range scrap that hit the gravel berm tend to maintain their shape, at least the hardball type. You simply turn between ladles a few times to empty the jackets. For flux I'm just using old candle stubs or used motor oil, whichever is at hand...Ray

[TAWILDCATT]

my club had the backstop cleaned and got 26,000 lb of lead.we all have used it as is.its mixed WW and 22.worked in our target guns 38 and 45.I have never added tin and I have Lee and Lyman molds as well as Modern Bond.shoot rifle at 1680 in 1903.:coffee: [smilie=1: :Fire:

[Leftoverdj]

Range scrap is going to vary by the range, and it's going to vary a lot. A range with a very active small bore program is going to have dead soft scrap. There are ranges that ban jacketed bullets and ranges that require jacketed. There are ranges that use homosote backers and other ranges that only allow paper targets held from a wire by a clip.

Only way to tell what you are getting is to look at it, or,better yet, smelt a small batch.

[lawboy]

I love indoor range scrap, shoot about 500lbs of it annually. We take it home in 10 gallon buckets. It has wood and rubber and jacket material in it but it is no big deal to skim that stuff off the top, flux and cast ingots. It is just like skimming metal clips off of wheel weights. I much prefer the range scrap because, although it is unknown alloy, it tests out at 1:20 on a Brinnell tester and makes FANTASTIC bullets for both handgun and rifle use. I find that year to year, the bullets weights I am getting from my moulds vary less than one grain in a 500 grain bullet so I think it is fairly consistent. I use if for everything from 380 ammo to 45-70 ammo and have had ZERO problems in several years of using it exclusively. I love it. It is free. It makes excellent projectiles.

[jleneave]

Me and a cousin just came into a little over 2000lbs of indoor range scrap. This indoor range uses a wire that is on an electric motor and has clips on it to attach targets and then run them out to the various ranges (25yds max). The scrap has a lot of jackets but most of the lead is flat and about the size of a half dollar. The deal was is that he paid .07 cents/lbs and picked it up and I smelt it and cast the bullets. I have smelted about 600lbs so far and it all seems as hard as wheel weights to me. When you drop the ingots on concrete they have the same high pitch ring as wheel weight ingots.

I was actually fixin to start a new post when I saw this one so I will try and ask my question here first. I hope I am not thread jacking by asking this, but here goes.... Will it do me any good to heat treat this alloy? It will mostly be used to cast 230gr .45ACP round nose bullets fired in the 750 to 850fps range. I have a fairly good stock of WW alloy to use on my higher pressure bullets for .44Mag, .40Cal/!0mm, and 9mm bullets. Or will water dropping them from the mold suffice?? Thanks in advance for ya'lls help. Sorry to the original poster if I am high jacking this thread.

Take Care,

Jody

[Windy City Kid]

My indoor range is half FMJ and half commercial cast bullets. The lead is about 12.5 BHN. It makes excellent bullets with out adding anything.

[Leftoverdj]

it all seems as hard as wheel weights to me. When you drop the ingots on concrete they have the same high pitch ring as wheel weight ingots.

Will it do me any good to heat treat this alloy? It will mostly be used to cast 230gr .45ACP round nose bullets fired in the 750 to 850fps range.



Nope, if it's anywhere close to WW hardness, it's plenty hard for .45 ACP air cooled. Water quenching or heat treating would be counter productive.

[jleneave]

Nope, if it's anywhere close to WW hardness, it's plenty hard for .45 ACP air cooled. Water quenching or heat treating would be counter productive.

Thank you sir!!

Take Care,

Jody

[dwtim]

Range lead is 50% trash, I don't think he can get 25 cents/lb any more.

This is precisely what I find. Berm scrap tends to be about 35% trash, if you bother to sift.

It's not so much the weight as it is the work and getting rid of the garbage. Ask a local scrap dealer what he gets for indoor range scrap. I bet it's much lower than 25c/lb.

Also: I find that range scrap is mostly .22 rimfire and j-word bullets, and comes in fairly consistently at between 8.5 and 10.5 BHN, mostly on the low side.

Also also: Lead is on it's way up again. Looks like it will break 80c/lb. for the first time in months.

[lawboy]

my range scrap tests out at 9 t 10 bhn. I have heat treated it to 21bhn. for 45ACP loads, you don't need to do anything but flux it nice and clean and cast boolits! :-D

[jleneave]

my range scrap tests out at 9 t 10 bhn. I have heat treated it to 21bhn. for 45ACP loads, you don't need to do anything but flux it nice and clean and cast boolits! :-D

Thanks, that is what I will do then.

On another note, the place that we got our indoor range scrap was getting .07 cents from the scrap yard and they had to haul it off. So we gave them what the scrap yard was giving them and we hauled it off for them. We also bought a 55 gallon drum of brass from them most of it being 9mm, .40 S&W, and .45 ACP. Hopefully this will be a steady source of lead and brass.

Take care,

Jody

[lawboy]

That is not a bad deal at all. I get all the lead and brass I can handle, free. Keep about 800lbs of ingots stacked in the garage. Top off my supply every spring, also smelt for some of my club members who have back issues and cannot deal with the heavy lead. Trade them powder, bullet moulds, etc. for the clean ingots. Good times!

[mroliver77]

I have quite a pile of indoor range scrap. Range uses a cble to run targets out and clips to hold targets. Steel at 45 deg for stop and water tank to catch everything. I find with most batches to recover about 2/3 in weight in alloy. My scrap yard was leary of jackets but atthe right price he can "hide" them in other scrap. (ya) I didnt have a hardness tester until recently and have not tested the alloy. It makes nice .38 boolits but is on the soft side. Appears to be mostly jacketed bullets shot there. I heat treted some and it was definitely harder than non HT. WW are hard to get around here nowadays and having little in the range scrap I find it more than worthwhile to smelt it.
Jay

[smaj100]

Hey guys my local indoor range just offered me the chance to clean out the backstop for free if I took the lead. I made a few calls to inquire about the copper jacket material for scrap. My local scrap center offered me $1.70/lb for clean jackets with no lead. I am going to try to put the scraps back into the basket and use a torch to quickly melt any remaining lead out of the mixture. Since the scrap guy wanted it as clean as possible.

I figured out a fairly easy way to get most of the jacketed material and crap out quickly. My turkey fryer kit came with a fish fry basket and a shorter fryer pot. I melt several lbs of lead in the bottom of the pot to just cover the basket then I load the basket with range scrap and sit it in the already melted lead. I wait for the mix to begin melting and stir gently then lift the basket with all the junk in it out. Then I pour a few molds to keep the level just at the bottom of the basket. Sorry forgot to add that I flux before pouring the molds. I have noticed the lead is very soft.

Once I get the range lead cast into ingots. I mix my range lead with linotype and ww ingots. I use 1lb of each as a mix then cast into boolits. These have worked well in my 308 with GC's and my 40. I leave out the linotype for my wifes 380 since the speed and pressure are lower.

:drinks:

[imashooter2]

I sure hope that basket and fryer pot are steel... The thin aluminum that comes with most kits is a disaster waiting to happen.

[smaj100]

Ima,

The basket is aluminum. I know this isn't the optimum type/style to use due to failure potential. I try to keep the temp down and inspect the pot closely for bulging, cracks and other sign of failure.

:D

[chas8008]

would .33 cents per pound for lead shot be fair?

[briang]

if you mean lead shot like for shotgun shells, then yes that is a very good deal. Last time I looked at the price of new shot it was around $1.50 a pound. Buy as much as you can afford.

[smaj100]

I am curious does anyone know what the BHN of #4 magnum shot might be? How would you mix that with WW, Range scrap and so on to attain an average BHN for 40SW and 308 boolits?

[img=http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/2063b7a6a4.jpg] (http://www.freeimagehosting.net/)

Thanks
:mrgreen:

[chas8008]

if you mean lead shot like for shotgun shells, then yes that is a very good deal. Last time I looked at the price of new shot it was around $1.50 a pound. Buy as much as you can afford.

They did not look new, used in someway

[briang]

They did not look new, used in someway

Than it's likely shot recovered from a skeet/trap field. That's still a pretty good price. Some people say recovered shot patterns wider due to flat spots in the shot, I haven't been able to find a local source.

[chas8008]

Than it's likely shot recovered from a skeet/trap field. That's still a pretty good price. Some people say recovered shot patterns wider due to flat spots in the shot, I haven't been able to find a local source.


180lbs later:holysheep

said it was used at a Fair?

[evan price]

Used at a fair, probably lead BB's from the shoot-out-the-center target game.

I've been picking up range scrap for $10 a 60# bucket. So far I've melted down and ingotted one bucket, have two more to do today. I got 48# of ingots out of the first 60# bucket, and ten pounds of copper jackets. Takes more heat to melt this stuff. Doesn't seem to be too much different than WW from how it scratches. I get a good mix of jacketed bullets and cast boolits so maybe it balances out. I've also been throwing in battery cable ends from my junkyard buddy when I melt range lead.

Looks like the #2 copper recovered from range lead should cover the $10 it costs to buy the whole bucket. That's sweet.

[canebreaker]

One co-worker and a friend of his cleaned out a closing indoor gun range some years back. He had it stock piled in a storage building. In needing more storage space, he asked if I wanted it. We unloaded 11 ammo boxes from his car to a pallet and carried it to the scales. Each box weighed 63 to 68 lbs. The next week he brought me another 11 boxes. The next week he brought me 9 more, 31 boxes total.
I started out melting some in my Lee production pot. But filling a 3 lb. coffee can with the
trash, I found that I wasn't melting all the lead/tin. The full can weighed 22 lbs. So I set up my large pot with extra heat and got less weighted trash. I sifted the trash from the copper jackets and brass, I had 180 lbs. Sold it as scrap for .90 per lb.
When I melt these ingots in my production pot, I start off with it on 10 and can reduce temp to 8. With ww and battery lugs, I can reduce temp to 6.

[RayinNH]

We just cleaned our indoor range again. I grabbed three buckets full. I mentioned above it has a lot of trash, backstop material. It does however cast very good boolits.
I just changed my smelting pot. My old one was made from six inch pipe eight inches tall. The new one I made from four inch wide stock and rolled it into a twelve inch diameter circle and welded a bottom on it. This shallower pot makes things much easier to smelt in. It allows you to turn over the mixture to get out the trash that has already released it's lead...Ray

[geargnasher]

FWIW one of our new sponsors "lead & brass" is going to start selling their smelted range scrap ingots soon, will sell it by the flat-rate box with a foundry analysis certificate at a reasonable price, I'll let them post the official price, or you can email them. When you factor in the cost of smelting fuel and the pita of dealing with jackets it isn't bad to pay someone else for doing the dirty work, plus you know exactly what you have.

Gear

[Zbench]

Gear,

Thanks for the mention. We just put up for sale the range scrap that was discussed in various threads over the past week. It is priced at .90/lb and is perhaps the cheapest commercial price you will find online. Visit leadandbrass.com and surf to the lead area to read about it. Lyman #2 should be in our hands by Tuesday.

Pete

[WILCO]

I've been smelting some indoor range lead from the gun club and it's been a slow process as I'm only working with a hot plate and cast iron frying pan. Discovered that if I sift it with a screen, I can get alot of good sized nuggets that melt rapidly, but it's the smaller stuff with the trash that slows me down............working a on a better set up. I have a cast iron pot, industrial grade turkey fryer, regulator valve and now need to get a propane tank.