Zinc in the ingots

[gdkmedic]

Buddy brought me 1200 pounds of muffin tin pucks he melted down to make shot for him. I think there is zinc in them but he swears him and his buddies were careful in sorting.

[Dusty Bannister]

Might put a drop of acid on a cold ingot and see if it bubbles. Bubbles indicate the presence of zinc.

[gdkmedic]

Cool tip. What kind of acid?

[Wheelguns 1961]

Muriatic.

[imashooter2]

Doesn’t matter what’s in it. Show home those pictures and tell him to pick up his lead, he isn’t getting any shot from that.

[farmbif]

that's really sad. 1200lbs lost

[m37]

when melting type metal I get slush till I crank up the heat

[lightman]

It sure looks like Zinc! But I wouldn't trash all of that, I would gradually add it to a known good alloy a little at a time. Doing that with 1200 pounds would take forever but............ Or you could sell it to a scrap yard and buy another batch of lead.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

It doesn't look like zinc contamination to me. Zinc'd up lead alloy is more oatmealy.
I think there is other junk in there, I would fire up your large smelter and flux flux flux, pour some ingots, then put in your Lee melter and pour some boolits.
I don't know nothin about pouring shot, so good luck with that.

[Silvercreek Farmer]

Not sure if BNE is still doing tests or not, but 1200 lbs is worth paying for a test.

[m37]

did the muffin tin pucks ingots look good well filled out???

[bangerjim]

Can you say "boat keel? There is something in there you do not want. As said, crank up the heat higher than you normally would ever use and melt it. Pour some ingot and try them in your casting pot.

It would take a WHOLE lot of Zn to do that!!!!!!!!

The acid test is your "leeeeetle friend" Just do it.

Many guys are now switching to Zn for casting boolits, now that Pb is getting banned in many liberal blue greenie states. You gotta rethink your casting techniques a little and definitely powder loads, but it works!

[imashooter2]

LOL! I can see trying to save 1,200 pounds of alloy I own. I can’t see messing with it to drip shot for a friend. Give him back his alloy and tell him you are happy to drip shot as soon as he has alloy that will drip.

[gdkmedic]

Tried the muratic acid. Tried it on a zinc wheel weight and it bubbled like crazy. Tried it on my ingots but no bubbling. Will try raising the heat. I know the ingots are from wheel weights and I trust the fellow that made them when he said he fluxed with wax several times. Not sure why they are not the same as mine. The muffins are filed out. The lead makes great bullets. Just not sure why of the build up of almost pudding on top of the melt.

[mha]

Try some clean motor oil, the carbon helps separated alloys remix better. Worked for me with some high tin alloys that were separating out....that and a lot of stirring.

I found the idea here somewhere- it seemed to work. No idea if it will help you, but it cannot hurt at this point compared to what you have going on.