Lead sheathed cable (old conduit?)

[BIGOX]

So the other day I picked up 79 lbs of lead sheathing from what I guess was old cable conduit this stuff was already stripped so all lead no copper cables. It fells really soft so I'm assuming it's close to pure lead. Anyone have an ideas on its purity? I don't have a pencil to test lead this soft.

[jim147]

Nice find. I think it is pure or very close to it. Hard to tell without checking it.

[Winger Ed.]

If it's about 3" dia. and has been split open-- there's a good chance it is old telephone cable
that had a gaz-illion of those little Copper wires inside and was buried.

It's about as pure as you'll find.
But there is usually a lot of oxidation and surface dirt & trash that floats up off of it.

[BIGOX]

Yes this looked to be about 3'' diameter and was split. Most of it looks really clean. Weird how clean this stuff actually look if it's as old as I think it is.

[BIGOX]

Here is a picture showing some of the dirtiest peices in the center. My plan is to add this to some of my harder lead alloys. I have around 300 lbs of Lyman #2 to play with. I'll save what little antimony and pewter I have for another session.

[sqlbullet]

Good score. As others have said, treat it like pure lead.

Also, be prepared for a lot of dross. I am always surprised by how much I get when I process things like this. The high surface area to volume of thin sheet/tube wall lead results in quite a bit of lead oxide on the surface.

[bangerjim]

Old phone cable jackets. Pure lead. And there will be a LOT of dross when you finally melt it down ( and not in your casting pot!!!!!!!!!)

[imashooter2]

Dad was a lineman for Bell Telephone. We cast literally tons of that into .38 Wadcutters with just a bit of wiping solder added in. He was told that it was "arsenical lead" that is, pure with a bit of arsenic to keep the rodents from chewing on it.

[BIGOX]

Thanks you for all the great information here. I plan on using my a propane burner and my largest cast iron pot for this session. This way I can do larger amounts at a time. Once cleaned and formed into ingots I will mix it with some clean Lyman #2 alloy I have (also in ingots) in my Lee 420 pot for casting as needed.

[lightman]

I have melted quite a bit of cable sheathing in my time. It was not all buried, some was in overhead lines. Its soft but not pure. What I have had tested was 98.5% lead with a small % of other stuff. Its close enough to pure to use in a muzzleloader. Any joints will be soldered and the little air valve will be soldered in as well.

Somewhere back in my older post I had pictures of smelting a pretty good truck load of this stuff down. I think I ended up with about 800 1# ingots.

I've also melted a lot of splice covers. They look kind of like an automobile muffler and have a soldered seam. You still see a little lead covered cable in service if you know what to look for but its mostly a thing of the past.

[gwpercle]

Yes this looked to be about 3'' diameter and was split. Most of it looks really clean. Weird how clean this stuff actually look if it's as old as I think it is.

The cable that was buried under ground is usually in rough shape , dirt and oxidation but when used inside a building , mounted overhead or on the walls ...it will be nice & clean .
Consider it pure soft lead for all practical purposes . Good Score !
Gary

[SoonerEd]

I melted a batch several months ago and the ingots tested 5.5 to 6.0 using a LHT.