Is this about right ?

[Digger]

lucky enough to have a source for radiator shop drippings ......
Have about three five gallon buckets full but melted down a 3/4 full three gallon bucket just to start .....
Wow ! , every body is right about being messy , smoky , had to stop for fear the neighbors might call the fire dept. ....wound up with ten pounds of ingots out of the small bucket , little more than two hands full but thought I would ask if that is a decent return for all the effort .
First time smelting drippings and the other buckets will have to wait for a more convenient time and place.
Thanks , digger

[fryboy]

let's see ....6-10#'s of tin ( appox ) for how many hours and how much gas ? ( still sounds good to me

[kbstenberg]

Digger good to have you on the website!
If you baught 10lbs pure its about 12$ a lb + shipping. Only you can tell if it is worth it. To me it would be.
I get most of my tin through Pewter.
Kevin

[mold maker]

Pewter
I lucked up in one of those dollar store that the wife drug me to. There on a top shelf, in plane sight were cute little (marked) pewter jewelry boxes. (really dusty/old stock) I got one and hurried home for the acid test. No reaction at all except a clean spot. Hurried back and dickered with the manager, and got (42 pcs) 19 lbs for $11.88. That should last a long time.
BTW I bought the wife that fancy "doodad" she went in there for. Now we're both happy.

[Digger]

From the info in this forum , what I have is 60/40 ? ....tin /lead ?
with that added to a 50/50 stick on/ ww will make a good alloy ? ( in proper percentages of course.)
digger

[blaser.306]

In response to your mention of a visit from the fire dept. I had one tonight ! No smoke , No fire just a neighbor that was convinced that I was going to stop the eco. system in its tracks ! After a 10 minute conversation with the FD boys , they told me that nothing was out of the ordinary and to carry on !Clean fuel(propane) sasfe burner (factory)They had been told that I was burning dirty fuel and causing all kinds of smoke polution , to the point the neighbors couldn't leave their house ! Aparently after our conversation ( standing beside my running smeltin pot ) they saw things a little diferetly . somertimes things work out in the end . Perhaps this is one of them!!!!!!!!!:lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::l ol::lol::lol:

[Digger]

If that happened to me I would have to bribe my way out by inviting the fire dept. to the range ![smilie=1:

digger

[captaint]

Digger,
Unless I'm mistaken, you have 60 lead 40 tin. Not to worry. Try dropping a 1 lb ingot of that in your mix and see if all doesn't fill out well. I'm bettin it will. Now go make some boolits!! enjoy Mike

[canyon-ghost]

I'd agree, a single ingot should produce the fillout that tin is used for. With wheelweight you may not need to get alloy frenzied.

[geargnasher]

Most radiator shops use anywhere from 60/40 to 40/60, so average it out. You can figger it's a binary, almost no antimony and only trace other stuff, so you can determine what it is by finding the specific gravity of an ingot and working the percentages.

Pure lead is 11.3 g/mL
Pure tin is 7.28 g/mL
50/50 is 9.49 g/mL
60Sn/40Pb is 8.94 g/mL and so on.....

Get the volume in mL by using a measuring cup and water to see how much the ingot displaces. Weigh the sample on a postage or food scale, and convert ounces to grams. Divide the gram weight by the amount of water displaced in mL. Play with the numbers until you end up getting a match.

Gear

[lwknight]

Here is an easy way to determine the S.G.

1. Weigh the sample with any kind of appropriately sized scale.
2. Get a container just large enough to easily fit the sample in it with plenty of room left over.
3. Fill the container with enough water to submerge the sample easily.
4. Weigh the container with the water in it.
5. Suspend the sample with a fishing line or something like that in the water in the container without touching the sides or bottom.
6. Note the weight.increase. Thats your displacement weight.
7. Divide the real weight of the sample by the displacement weight.
8. Violah! You have the S.G. precisely.

I find that using a metric scale is the simplest. No converting anything required.

Here is a chart for the SG. You can edit the percentage cells till you get the right match.
Chart XL Spreadsheet (http://castboolits.gunloads.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=18225&d=1261865841)

[dale2242]

I was lucky enough to get a lot of radiator shop drippings years ago. Well over 100# of ingots. It is not very important for me to know the exact lead/tin ratio. I add 1# of solder drippings to 9# clip on WW. This gives me roughly a Lyman #2 alloy. I know some think I am wasting tin , but I have plenty and it works for me. When the solder is gone I will alloy with the several 100 #s of linotype I have.....dale

[crabo]

Pewter
I got one and hurried home for the acid test. No reaction at all except a clean spot.

What is the acid test and what kind of acid are you using?

[lwknight]

A few drops or muratic acid ( diluted hydrocloric acid ) will react noteably if there is zinc present.
Also toilet bowl cleaner for hard water will have muratic in it. You can get muratic acid at just about any hardware store that sells paint. Its like $5.00 per gallon.