Range lead?

[selmerfan]

I've got about 60-70 lbs. worth of range lead that I need to smelt down. Is this stuff pretty consistent in terms of alloy, or is it a total crapshoot? It's 90% handgun bullets. I've only ever casted with WW or linotype, not sure what to do with this, maybe sell it?
Selmerfan

[Doc Highwall]

First I would not sell it, second it probably is a crap shoot. If it came from a indoor range that only used 22lr then it is almost pure lead, if from a outdoor range just check the bullets you cast against your alloy for weight. If they are lighter they are probably harder and if they are heaver they are going to be softer, just add more lead or wheel weights to suit your needs.

[1Shirt]

Where in Ia, and what do you want for it. If within reasonable driving distance I might be interested. Like Doc said, it is a crap shoot. Have BH tested a fair number of range lead samples and found anywhere from about 8 to 15. A lot depends on how many cast shooters use the range.
1Shirt!

[Poygan]

I pick up boolits occasionally at the outdoor range I belong to. Mostly cast with some soft lead slugs. When melted down, it seems to test consistently (Cabin Tree) at almost the same as air cooled wheel weights. It works well for me in pistols.

[GSM]

Scrap can be a crap shoot. Depends on how much jacketed and 22 is in the mix.

[billyb]

I have used a lot of range lead. I take time to sort out the cast from the jacketed and swaged. The former cast stuff is normaly pretty hard, mostly commerical cast. The softer cores and swadged stuff i mix in the harder alloy's to make it go farther. Bill

[Freightman]

I use range scrap almost exclusively! the range has a commercial caster that is a member so 80-90% is cast at the pistol range makes very good boolits and I never have any trouble. Smelt it in a separate pot not your casting pot as it has a lot of sand, rocks, and dirt in it.

[shotman]

save the jackets and run magnet over them you can sell them for brass or maybe No 2 copper depends on the scrap place. I bought about 300lbs last year and got 3 times more out of the jackets than it cost for the bunch. rick

[wheelgunner]

I use a lot of range lead, I "smelted" almost 1000 lbs last weekend. Our backstop uses ground tires as a media and is a PITA to seperate out but is worth it compared to the price of lead these days. I'm averaging about 25-30% by volume of dross, jackets and burned up tire. The bullets cast from it are plenty hard for the type of shooting I do, handgun low to medium velocity target and steel plate loads. I also give some of my heavy bullets to some friends that shoot a lot of pins and there have been no complaints of leading from them either.

[utk]

Wheelgunner, how do you separate rubber from lead? We tried water but the rubber sank to the bottom too...

[wheelgunner]

We're still experimenting. Tried various size screens, mixed results. It seperated out all the bigger rubber pieces. A cyclonic seperator work great but the cost is huge! Plain water gave the same results as you, the rubber sank like a stone. We're currently playing with salinated water. It works in small controlled experiments, the salt makes the rubber more boyant, I don't quite grasp the science behind it but from what I understand it's damn near imposible for a body to to sink in the Dead Sea, the salt increases boyancy. Our next step will be to try a kiddie size heavy plastic swimming pool about 1 1/2 ft deep. We figure we can skim the rubber from the top, add more lead/rubber mix, skim again until we have a foot or so of lead then empty the pool and scoop out the lead.

The manufacturer of our backstop went belly up shortly after installing our backstop and took the $$$ for our ten year service contract with them. We did find another company to come in and seperate the lead/tire media and put back the media refilling as needed. It cost us over $10,000!!!! We figure we can do quite a bit of experimenting if we can save even 1/2 of the 10 G's every 18 months to 2 years.

If we figure out a better mouse trap I'll post the results.

[Scrounger]

Scientifically, an object sinks in a liquid when the object's density is greater than that of the liquid medium. Introducing salt to the water increases it's density to more than the rubber.

[utk]

Very interesting! I've also been thinking of salt water!
I have no direct connection with the small-bore rifle range that has this separation problem, though. I want their lead and offered to try water but since that experiment failed I don't know how the work has progressed.

How do you figure a cyclonic separator, the kind you find in woodworking shops, would be able to separate rubber and lead? I've seen them but as far as I know it only allows the solid matter (wood chips) to fall down into a big paper sack while the air is passed through the top porous filter bag...

[mooman76]

I just picked out the larger rubber pieces and the rest I just chuck in with the the rest. If you already have a good pool of lead started you can usually skim it back off right away before it gets too nasty melty.

[pps]

For the rubber mulch boolit trap I use my shop vac. It lifts the rubber mulch and leaves most of the lead in the bottom of the trap. I say most because sometimes the vac picks up a clump with a boolit entrapped.

[Bigjohn]

I process and cast a LOT of range scrap. I am also able to sort it out fairly well. It is sourced from an outdoor range with natural limestone for a backstop.

I can go and sit down by the backstop with my bucket and from within arms reach collect several pounds before shifting along. When I get home, I sift the material to get out as much dirt as I can then spread them on a bench for sorting. I have also laid the out on a sheet of old roofing iron to hose them down if the weather is damp and the soil wet. I spread them out under cover to dry before sorting.

Jacketed into one bin, cast into another, swaged into the third.

With regards shoot boolits cast from range scrap, I have used it straight (no additions, lead/lino) in some rifle loads with very good accuracy. If it is too hard, then I add some lead to make pistol boolits.

The only problem with range salvage from my viewpoint; It requires extra effort to obtain.

John

[Kraschenbirn]

The last two lots of range scrap I've smelted were raked from in front of a dirt pistol berm after heavy rains. After washing and smelting, both produced a 60%-70% yield of fairly consistent (8-9 bhn) alloy which I mix with lino to replicate Lyman #2.

WARNING!! After you've washed your range scrap, be darned sure it's thoroughly dried before smelting. Any water remaining inside those mangled bullet jackets is an open invitation for the tinsel fairly. Believe me...been there, done that, wasn't fun.

Bill

[UweJ]

Keep it,smelt it and shoot it. I have gotten about 1500 lbs out of our backstop which is sand.Nobody at our shooting range bothers with smelting so I´m having a ball.
Most of the lead I melt and use as is for handguns up to full house .357.The rest I mix with lino for rifle use.
Don´t sell. U never know what you can use it for.
Regards
Uwe

[selmerfan]

Yeah, no one else seems to be reclaiming it. It's just there for the taking and I've figured out a pretty simple technique for reclaiming, and it's a gold mine about 18" into the berm!
Selmerfan