How clean is our wheel weight metal

[giz189]

I have melted and shot a lot of wheel weight metal as most of you on this forum have. Lately, I have been wondering if, when we skim all the clips and other gunk off the top of the melt, then flux it with whatever it is fluxed with, do we even come close to removing the dirt, grit, sand and other abrasives (rust) that have accumulated to keep from abraiding the bores of our barrels. Even if we do not get it cleaned up as well as we want to, is it still less hard on the barrel steel than gilding metal? I have not really noticed any loss of accuracy in any of my pistols or revolvers, but I have not shot as much as most of you on this forum. What do you think?

[454PB]

I think you worry too much.

After putting several tons of lead alloy (mostly WW's or combined with other alloys), I've seen NO evidence of any abrasive effects.

[giz189]

I think you worry too much.

After putting several tons of lead alloy (mostly WW's or combined with other alloys), I've seen NO evidence of any abrasive effects. I expect you are right. With nothing to do but settin' around all day while it is to dang hot to get out, ones mind wanders. :redneck:

[Calamity Jake]

No matter how much you flux/stur the melt you will never get ALL the crud out. You do want your melt as clean as possible but don't work your tail off doing it
When smelting, after I skim clips and trash off I flux/stur at least 4 times with some sort of wax/oil then stur with a stick/skim at least twise then pour into ingots.

[riverwalker76]

No matter how much you flux/stur the melt you will never get ALL the crud out. You do want your melt as clean as possible but don't work your tail off doing it
When smelting, after I skim clips and trash off I flux/stur at least 4 times with some sort of wax/oil then stur with a stick/skim at least twise then pour into ingots.

Good description there Jake! I've often wondered if I flux and stir often enough.

I don't worry too much about rust. It's ferric oxide a.k.a. iron (III) oxide , (Fe2O3). It isn't as corrosive as Iron (II) oxide (FeO) to barrel metal as long as you clean properly.

[lwknight]

I've shot so many cast bullets through my GP-100 that I would not know how to guess a count and the bore stays clean, slick , shiny and has never grown in size from wear.
I load em hot quite often too.

[easyrider604]

I use a Lee 20 pound bottom pour pot. Any dirt, sand, rust, other metal or foreign matter that are lighter than lead will float on top.

Whether you skim this material or dross will not matter as long as you maintain the molten lead at least a half inch above the mouth of the bottom pour spout.

Don't run your bottom pour down to below the spout, and only pure lead will pour out the spout and into your bullet mold.

If you use a pot and ladle, that is a different story. You will probably have some minute amount of dross lifted out together with molten lead every time you fill your ladle.

That is one good reason to use a bottom pour pot.

[BABore]

I used to melt, skim the clips, and flux a couple times with sawdust and motor oil, then pour ingots. Thought I done good. The end result was boolits that had ugly spots and dust floating to the top every time I scraped the sides of the casting pot.

When I wised up I took my time smelting. I get the clips out and flux one time. Then I spend close to 30 minutes doing nothing but stirring and scraping the pot to remove all the dust and grit possible. I use a slotted stainless restaurant spoon for this. Scrape the pot sides and bottom, then lift the spoon straight up. The dust seems to stick to the spoon and comes off when its lifted up straight. When I don't see anymore dust, I flux again and call it good. That extra 30 minutes spent initally saves countless hours when casting and no ugly boolits with intenal/external voids and higher weight variance.

[357maximum]

What BaBore says it spot on, but I will add the following. When you are adding tin or tin/lead to wheelweights the "dusties" problem is even worse. Always add your tin to the now clean wheelweight batch and do one more final flux before pouring your ingots. Never add the tin before the wheelweight is surgically clean and then start smelting the dusties out of the mix. The additonal tin makes it even harder to do a good fluxing...so I do not do it that way no more. I now get the wheelweight ready to pour into ingots and then add my augments for the alloy I want to make in the end. The tin or tin/lead changes the surface tension and wants to cling to the "dusties: for some reason or another.

[fredj338]

IME, everything flaots to the top of a lead melt evenetually. I flux prior to skimming the clips, then again prior to making ingots. Then again when I add ingots to my casting pot. My alloy seems very, very clean.