So I made my own lead melting pot

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09-29-2021, 07:42 PM
Mwilson0173

So I made my own lead melting pot

So after using many small smelting cast iron pots and going bigger and bigger i found a piece of 10" pipe 12" tall and welded a 3/8 plate and gave it a try melted lead until it reached about 3 1/2" from the top. Marked the level and started to laddle it out to my 1lb ingot molds. Had 156lbs with just a little left over. Would love to figure out how I could put a t handle spout in it like the satans little smelter for a bottom pour. Has anyone made one like this? What components were used in your home build? Any and all input is appreciated
09-29-2021, 08:02 PM
oley55

Welcome to the forum, BUT without pics it didn't really happen!!?!!
09-29-2021, 08:07 PM
Mwilson0173

Quote:

Originally Posted by oley55

Welcome to the forum, BUT without pics it didn't really happen!!?!!

Oley55
I'll try and get a few pics of it when I get home and get them up lol.
09-29-2021, 08:08 PM
la5676

Years ago, Dad and I took a 14" steel pipe cap (I worked in the pipeline field then), welded three angle iron legs to it, and found an old gas burner assembly from a stove tossed out, and I think we fit two 5 gallon buckets in there, while skimming the clips off. We had an assembly line of ingot casting when we got the pot full and drossed off. Had 4 ingot molds, a bucket of water, and an air compressor hose to blow off the mold after quickly dipping it in bucket to cool, otherwise, it took forever to cool ingots with ever hotter molds.
09-29-2021, 08:57 PM
Walks

After filling ingot molds I quickly move them to cool concrete. Have to take a short break for more cooling after 3-4 fills. Tried the wet towel approach, that just causes flash rusting on the bottom of ingot mold.
My 10" Cast iron pot has a spout and tab. I have to grab the tab before lifting the bail to empty the pot at the end of a session. Otherwise it tips and pours molten lead into my burner. Poorly balanced. Usually the last 5-6 pounds.
09-30-2021, 02:37 AM
GregLaROCHE

A little off subject, but I have a ingot mold made of angle iron. It’s very thin metal. Thinner than what I’ve seen pictures of. It cools down super fast. So if anyone is thinking of making angle iron molds, think thin.
Also, I don’t really worry about a little surface rust on an ingot mold. If your ingots pick up a little rust from the first few pours, it will be removed when you flux before casting boolits.
09-30-2021, 09:31 AM
MrWolf

When I first started melting my wheel weights, I used cast iron corn bread moulds. I purposely left them in the rain to rust to make releasing much easier. Not sure I will do that when I smelt my next batches of remaining weights as I have ingot molds now.
09-30-2021, 01:59 PM
lightman

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mwilson0173

So after using many small smelting cast iron pots and going bigger and bigger i found a piece of 10" pipe 12" tall and welded a 3/8 plate and gave it a try melted lead until it reached about 3 1/2" from the top. Marked the level and started to laddle it out to my 1lb ingot molds. Had 156lbs with just a little left over. Would love to figure out how I could put a t handle spout in it like the satans little smelter for a bottom pour. Has anyone made one like this? What components were used in your home build? Any and all input is appreciated

It sounds like you built a nice smelting pot!

A lot of guys use a threaded steel rod with a bevel turned or ground on the end, maybe 45º, that hits a hole drilled in the bottom of the pot and welding a flat piece of steel across the top of the pot thats threaded and lined up to work. A piece of angle iron will make a trough on bottom for lead to flow in.

Search through the stickies for smelting pots. What I tried to describe is in there somewhere along with lots of other ideas.
10-01-2021, 04:20 PM
Mwilson0173

Quote:

Originally Posted by oley55

Welcome to the forum, BUT without pics it didn't really happen!!?!!

I can't get the pics to load from my phone
10-01-2021, 11:45 PM
Minerat

They have to be under 250,000 bytes roughly 4x5 to upload most phone pictures are much larger.
10-02-2021, 09:24 AM
oley55

2 Attachment(s)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Minerat

They have to be under 250,000 bytes roughly 4x5 to upload most phone pictures are much larger.

All of my pics posted started life on my phone, but I must first email them to myself and open, and then save on my laptop. When I hit the send button on my iPhone it always asks what size I want to send; Small (38.0 KB), Medium (97.7 KB), Large (654) KB, and Actual Size (2.0 MB). The actual size does vary some per photo.

I always select Medium and am satisfied with the resolution and it allows me to hold more pics in the forum's allocated space. It goes without saying the Actual Size would never work.

edit I just added a pic and the phone message I get. The size is larger because I was sending two phots versus one mentioned above.

(An FYI the lead ingot pic shows the different ingot appearance I got after taking a propane torch to one of those treated bread pans. It eliminated all of the off gassing the coating produces. I just heated the sides n bottom of each cavity until just turning cherry red. The bumpled surfaces shouldn't matter but it was bothering my anal retentiveness a wee bit.)