Scrounging.

[buck1]

The other dayI noticed lots of boolits laying on the dump at the public outdoor range. Well I couldnt help myself. I found a old wire mesh basket and cought the range void of shooters.I spent a hour scraping the dump between the weeds.

Today I metled the mess of ore like lead ,jacketed bullets and dirt and rocks down. I had some odds and ends of unknown lead laying arround so in it went. I also had some chunks of stuff I had came across years ago that looked like unfluxed dross from some sort of type melt project(just a guess).
It was a pain but the range scrap all melted or got skimmed off, fluxed and poured. About 100#s or so in ingots now.
BUT I may have been right about the dross as my melt kept getting a heavy tin oxide film on it very fast. It acted like type alloy.
I havent hardness tested it yet but it seems fairly soft somewhere about WW from my drop,clang tests. But it does have a bit of a ring also.
I am thinking that I have some tin rich lead not unlike the old 20:1 or there abouts. It should be good to alloy with after I test cast a bit just to be safe..Buck:drinks:

[Centaur 1]

A hundred pounds of boolit lead is a great day in my book. Even if you don't know what alloy you have I'm sure that if nothing else it will make fantastic .38 semi-wadcutters for plinking, and 100 pounds is about 4,500 of the little buggers.

[jmsj]

buck1,
Good going. A couple of weeks ago I got permission to pick up lead off the ground of a black powder range. A few hours later I had been able to pick up enoough scrap to make 170 pounds of ingots. There is also a pistol range that doesn't get used much that lets me pick up range scrap. Last year I was able to gather about 75 pounds worth of ingots off of that range. I use the pistol range scrap to cast practice ammo for my wife's 38/357. Using the Lee 358-105-SWC, that 75 pounds will make 5500-6000 bullets.
Some people can't understand why I would spend my time picking up and smelting range scrap and casting bullets. But these are the same people that complain about the high cost of store bought ammo.
Now if I could only figure a way to pick up the lead shot from a shotgun range that I have access to that is in real steep, rocky, and forested terrain, I would be set.
jmsj

[Firebricker]

A boolit scrounged is a boolit earned ! FB

[eljefe]

You can smelt the jacketed bullets, too. FMJ and HP will yield a soft alloy and the jackets float to the top of the melt. Plated bullets are usually smashed at one point
or another. If they aren't, they can be cracked in a pair of bolt cutters. The majority of what I smelt is range scrap from an indoor range which does not permit lead bullets.

[lwknight]

Its not worth sorting the TMJs to smash them for the lead.
I smelted about #40 of range scrap and got about #32 if good soft almost pure lead.
I spent another 45 minutes sifting and sorting the TMJs that still had lead in them.
The total of what I found and smashed with a hammer to re smelt was about 1/2 pound.

From now on , I just smelt the whole lot and toss anything that does not melt. It does help a lot to use a slotted spoon to lift the jackets out. As you lift it out of the pot , shake it to roll the jackets around to pour out any liquid lead trapped in the cups.

[sisiphunter]

I just got a 5gal bucket of ww. lots look to be AL or ZN or something....I still want to scrounge my burm at our police range. pretty much all Winchester white boxFMJ and rangers, so should smelt down nicely, just will have a ton of jackets to sift out, but should make for a nice soft lead to mix with my ww. Should be a good fall of smelting and casting!!!!!!!!!!! This is soooooo addicting. and I love it