Scrap jackets from smelting range lead...

[sargenv]

So I was sitting there wondering about this while I was separating the lead from the jackets the other day, wondering if the jackets can now be re-used via swaging or turned into gas checks for other calibers.. Since I melted the lead out of the jackets, that means that the copper and in some cases brass (if they were montana gold bullets) were now annealed to a point (up to 800 degrees +) though not water quenched.. and needing a polish job. Would there be any use for these jacket shells or am I just better off scrapping the whole lot? Out of about 200 pounds of scrap range lead, I got about 20-25 pounds of jackets, give or take.

[docone31]

I would ingot the copper.
That way you can sell it as clean.

[BT Sniper]

Anything is possible....just depends how much work you want to put into it. Throw some in the tumbler overnight or give them a acid bath then in the tumbler see what happens.

[BT Sniper]

How hot would it have to be to melt the copper to form an ingot?

[docone31]

Around 1700*.

[Ithaca1911]

putting the copper in ingots would work, but you've got to be VERY careful to ensure that there's no lead/zinc/tin contamination when you melt the copper, it'll alloy into brass, and you'll lose money, also, if you're going to do that, use a ceramic crucible and greensand/graphite/ceramic mold, NOT iron/aluminum/steel, I tried to ingotize my copper, ended up making brass with a 5% Fe content as it sucked part of my crucible into the alloy.

[mac0083]

I was looking into casting a solid copper boolit some time back. It flows around 2000degrees Fahrenheit. That's more than enough to melt an aluminum mold, so theoretically, you'd have to use iron molds. But forget about playing with molten copper.

Maybe you could just get a press to smash the spent jackets into thin copper disks. If you know a tool and die maker, you could have a set of dies made to create your gas checks from the flat copper disks.

When the copper comes out of your Lead Pot, does it have residue and dross on it? Or is it clean and shiny? Good Luck.

[evan price]

I just melted down 60 pounds of reclaimed range scrap. The copper jackets were not pretty, and this came out of a dirt berm. Most of them were split or smashed. Since I fluxed and skimmed to get them all out they look like crap, had lots of dirt and lots of lead oxides and dross spattered in and on them. I was planning on selling them for scrap #2 copper but they are not clean enough for that. I might have to let them go with the zinc WW as cast scrap and that's not worth much. I can't see how you would make the jackets into gas checks without so much work as to make it a negative payback issue. You could go ahead and buy sheet flashing- even at the price, it would be cheaper than spending the time to pound out those mangled bullet cups. Of course, if you are retired with nothing to do and no money, hey.. necessity is the mother of invention.

[sargenv]

Some of them are as Evan states.. kind of ugly.. but some of them and I'd have to hand sort it, would likelybe able to be recovered. I am not retired yet, but have some time on my hands occasionally where I don't want to do anything else or just want to try something different.

Casting copper is likely WAY beyond my means.. and there is the thing about what is on the copper (lead etc). I have a LOT of scrap jackets after now having smelted about 350 pounds of mixed range lead. The jackets are the traditional copper as well as the Montana Gold brass ones.. so I'd have to clean them up and sort them anyway.

My cousins run a machine shop, and they might be able to make me up something like you mentioned.. something to either flatten them out or reform and cut the jackets. Most of the calibers are 9mm up to 45 acp. Likely will have to sort by size as well.

It's something to think about.. I'd hate to simply get a few pennies per pound for scrap.. and the scrap places aren't in the best neighborhoods around here.. so I'm reluctant to head down there only to be told they don't want it.

[anachronism]

I give my leftover jacket shards, along with the range dirt, lead droplets & everything to the local Fire Dept on HazMat amnesty day. I do tell them it has lead in it.

[Ithaca1911]

if you can afford to cast boolits, you can afford to melt copper, my crucible furnace was build for a grand total of 40 bucks, my waste oil burner cost me 5 bucks for tubing, and 40 bucks for a blower fan, the furnace has got a 14 inch bore, and burns smoke free on free fuel.
first time I tried to melt copper in it, I put in 2 4in diameter iron crucibles full of jackets, 15 min later I checked it, I had a puddle of iron-copper sludge in the bottom. that's right, 15 min melted my iron crucibles.
2-4 minute from cold to melt aluminum, 6-10 minutes from cold to melt copper(to easily flowing point). now I can cast my own aluminum ingot molds, or brass blocks for boolit molds.

just google "hefty harriet", and dig through the backyard casters website, all sorts of interesting info in there.

I run my copper jackets thru a sluice box, and pick out ALL the fmj's that haven't popped, I get #2 for it at my local scrapyard, took back 200lbs last week, soon as I get a ceramic crucible, I'm gonna see if I can get #1 for it :-)

[sargenv]

Since I didn't build my casting setup, I wonder how easy all this could be. I didn't really want to melt it down.. that means wife will really question what it is that I am doing.. I'd be scared of blowing myself up.. If someone were to show me, I might take a look at it.. though like I said, the jackets are copper and brass.. would that make a difference or would they need be separated?

[mac0083]

XD-40, it seems like such a waste to recycle all that copper! Surely, if you can melt it down, then there must be something better you can do with it. Try to pour a solid copper boolit or something. Don't take it to the scrap yard.

[Storydude]

I would ingot the copper.
That way you can sell it as clean.

Untill the scrapyard hits it with a composition gun and then gives you the red brass price for your unclean copper.[smilie=s:

[onlylead]

i work at copper refinery we pour copper on copper moulds with aspraywash of boneash or use grafite for gold silver and other such trash

[daveinsvaz]

Having been stationed various places through the years and not being able to take all my lead and such with me I devised several alternative methods of utilizing range scrap.
The best is when I can reclaim bullets from sand dunes or soft dirt. Sort out bullets that have very little deformation othr than rifling groves. Clean them in a tumbler using 'Lizard Litter' from a pet store. After cleaning thoroughly, put them in your swaging die NOSE FIRST. That way the nose of the new bullet is made from the BASE of the old bulet. As for rifling, it turns the swaged bullet into something like the old Herter's Banana Peel bullet. Lots of soft lead and it mushrooms back along the old rifling marks.
I have used this method for 45 ACP, 9mm and 38 Special. All work very well. But make sure you mike the 9mm and 38 bullets, they look similiar.
Someone will say something about putting dirty bulets in their dies. Well, I have a set of old C&H that have been working well for over 30 years.
In the last few years I have discovered I can do the same with rifle bullets. But normally I run them through a sizing die only and fire at lower velocities. This includes 50 cal. Make sure you look at the extreme distance berms, otherwise the bulets are still at extreme velocities and are mangled.

[sargenv]

A lot of the bullets I pull from the berm are disformed having likely been hit by subsequent bullets while in the sand and dirt. Sometimes on the surface I'll find complete bullets that are not deformed with just the rifling.. but likely not enough to bother putting through a swage die. I guess it was just one of those thoughts that some people would say "Yeah I do that" and some people say, "eh, don't bother". :) It's all good.

[testhop]

sounds like agood idea .
BUTitried to sell 3 5 gal buckets to the scrap he put a magnet on them and thay stucked to the mag net (I KNOW COPPER DONT BUT THESE DID ) thay tere from a2700 match that lasted 3 days
on a milatry base i picked up 9 5 gal buckets iirc .
i dont know if he told the truth or was just blowing smoke but he wouldnt take them .
anybody else have thos happen to them?

[Storydude]

sounds like agood idea .
BUTitried to sell 3 5 gal buckets to the scrap he put a magnet on them and thay stucked to the mag net (I KNOW COPPER DONT BUT THESE DID ) thay tere from a2700 match that lasted 3 days
on a milatry base i picked up 9 5 gal buckets iirc .
i dont know if he told the truth or was just blowing smoke but he wouldnt take them .
anybody else have thos happen to them?

Steel jacket/core.

[Ithaca1911]

I always run mine through a sluice box(this pulls out unpopped fmj as well as cleaning out the ash, slag,etc...), then I spread it on a tarp, drag a magnet through it, and scrap what doesn't stick.

if you're getting your pot too hot, you could be absorbing some iron, and forming an alloy, I've done this, lost 5 gal of copper jackets to Fe contamination.

you could also be dealing with soil that has a high Fe content, if you've got a bit of dirt inside the jacket, and the dirt has high Fe, then bam, magnetic appearing jackets.




sounds like agood idea .
BUTitried to sell 3 5 gal buckets to the scrap he put a magnet on them and thay stucked to the mag net (I KNOW COPPER DONT BUT THESE DID ) thay tere from a2700 match that lasted 3 days
on a milatry base i picked up 9 5 gal buckets iirc .
i dont know if he told the truth or was just blowing smoke but he wouldnt take them .
anybody else have thos happen to them?

[Dschuttig]

When I melt down range scrap I take the jackets out of the mix and drop them into a box with 1/4" screen on the bottom. Give it a little shake while the jackets are still hot and most all of the lead still stuck to the jackets drops out the bottom, along with dross/dirt. When i'm done I remelt the pile of lead and dirt, I would say you get an additional 20% more lead, and a pile of much cleaner jackets. Dan

[sargenv]

That's good to know.. Thanks for that addition.

[evan price]

I remelted all of the copper jackets and dross and got another 5 pounds of lead out of them. Now the jackets look good enough to sell. Dumped them on a tarp and then waved an old speaker around in the pile and picked out all the steel jackets that way. What was left after 180 pounds of range scrap was around 24 pounds of copper. Slow process, and if I didn't need the lead I wouldn't do it, but the lead is the goal and the copper a bonus.