No ulterior motives here, just genuinely curious where I am relative to the rest. I'm new to buying lead so I want to know, what makes you get your wallet out? Not what you are paying now, but what catches your attention when you hear it.
No ulterior motives here, just genuinely curious where I am relative to the rest. I'm new to buying lead so I want to know, what makes you get your wallet out? Not what you are paying now, but what catches your attention when you hear it.
A dollar or less a pound shipped - free would be great anytime.
.40/#
50 cents a pound and I take all they have, if it's random scrap lead.
If it's verifiably solder or pewter or high-tin babbitt or type metal (in the recognizable original form- rolls, bars, linotype, letterpress, etc. NOT re-ingotized or melted globs or etc) $1 per pound.
Due to market fluctuations I am no longer buying range scrap jackets.
Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc
Range scrap. My retired time only. Pewter, I just spent $2.00 for a 19.5 oz stein.
A vote for anyone other then the conservative candidates is a vote for the liberal candidates.
My scrap wheel weights range from free to .50/lb. I won't go over that. If buying ingots, I would go $1/lb plus shipping.
Hmm, I pay somewhere between $1.60-$1.70 per pound for bullet alloy delivered. I pick up wheel weight ingots on the boards sometimes when I need something softer, but I can add on pure lead, or 3% antimony lead to my bulk orders and get bulk pricing. Pure lead actually costs MORE than the alloys, go figure.
I personaly would not pay more than 25 cents a pound for WW after you sort out the Zinc & steel weights and smelted clips along with the other junk your yeald can be as low as 50% which can double the cost to 50 cents a pound not counting the labor , time & expense of gathering ,sorting & smelting.
I now only use range mined lead , it is about 95% or better usable material and usually has a BHN of 14 to 15 bhn in the 4 years ive been mining seriously ive collected almost 2,000 lbs
Depends how bad I need the lead.
If I had tons of lead and just wanted to add more to my stash, then I would lowball and go as cheap as possible.
If I was new to casting I would by from a dealer for a couple bucks a pound. Buy $200 worth every month for awhile and you'll be set.
As I said. It all depends. I rarely get lead under $1.00 a lb because I only buy smelted and ingotized lead. It is cheaper for me that way since I live in the middle of nowhere, and I would more than $1.00 a lb into lead if I went scrounging.
Tin - under 10 cents a pound as scrap solder.
WW - $20 a 5 gallon bucket.
'pure' lead 75 cents a pound.
trk
aka Cat Whisperer
Chief of Smoke, Pulaski Coehorn Works and Skunk Works
N 37.05224 W 80.78133 (front door +/- 15 feet)
It is $.50 at the scrap yard and that is sorted scrap, and it includes all the lead alloys, even old solder and babbit etc... That gets my undivided attention when I'm there. I usually buy everything they have on hand. Varys from a few lbs. to biggest haul was 380 lbs. ($190) and I had over 1200 lbs. of Al, Cu and Fe to sell and took some cash home as well as the lead. Free or up to $20 bucket for unsorted WW gets attention. I've never had to buy smelted ingots as I'm building my own cache. Have about 3K and over 1/2 that has been no cost other than smelting. I have paid up to $2 for larger pewter items at yard sales but never over $.50 lb for lead. That is the way it is here for me.
10 ga
10 gauge: as per Robert Ruark, "use enough gun"
MOLON LABE
"I have a list, and am prepared for widespread civil disorder!" 10 ga
I have a Craigslist add for "lead wanted". I can usually get all I need for .60-.85 /lb. I pay more if it is smaller pieces but if it is large and I have to cut it up or it will be a pain to smelt I pay less. WW with clips I won't pay more than .45, too much work. I have a guy locally who scraps out sailboats and he sells 40 lb ingots for .70/lb. I had another guy who sold me a bunch of rolled up roofing sheet for .65/lb. A guy I shoot with does machine repairs and he is always coming over with buckets of scrap lead of all kinds, he I trade bullets for as he shoots BP like I do. It pays to be patient and cultivate contacts. Online here I see that 1.00/lb shipped goes pretty fast.
The only scrappie that sells locally, charges up to .60/lb for soft. When he has WW's they run .45 for smalls, to .55 for truck type. I haven't be able to find any type or solder in quite a while.
We mine a good bit of range scrap for free. We are paying 80 cents a lb for pure lead. It may be a tad high, but the supply looks somewhat unlimited and I hate to turn him away or try to bargain. It looks like we're in the ballpark anyway.
I have been purchasing re-claimed shot @ $0.85 / lb; it is very easy to work. Only issue I have ran into is there is some steel shot mixed in, really not too big of a deal since is floats and can be skimmed off. After I informed the seller of the steel shot he has refind his process and now runs it over electro magnets as he polishes and graphites it in a vibro tumbler. I could get it for $0.15 to 0.20 less / lb if there is no value added just wash only. (no polish and graphiting )
I bought 400 lbs of Linotype for $0.50 / lb in 2009 and a few months ago bought an add'l 1,100 lbs @ $0.58 / lb. Most of the 400 lbs was foundry type very high Sb & Sn so I add a few slivers of foundry type to the re-cliamed shot melt for the tin. Foundrytype does have some Cu in it but I have not noticed any issues.
I found a place that swages bullets. I buy their 97% lead, 3% antimony weeps for lead spot prices. Tin is my only killer, I have two radiator shops saving me drips, but they want $7-$8 a pound.
Rich
I don't have any FTF numbers, because there are no local lead/tin sources here.
'Buck a pound - shipped (stick-on, clip-on, or pure), gets me busy calculating how much I can afford.
Pewter or tin.... $8/# shipped or not, and I'm rolling some quarters!
Less than that, and I'm yanking the keyboard off the desk, trying to type "I'll take it!!!!!".
It's an addiction, I tell ya!
Last edited by Beagle333; 06-20-2013 at 04:14 PM. Reason: spellin'
AT 50c/#, I am buying 1000# easy.
EVERY GOOD SHOOTER NEEDS TO BE A HANDLOADER.
NRA Cert. Inst. Met. Reloading & Basic Pistol
I volunteer to maintain and clean our range traps. 200 lbs of lead cost me about $2 gas and $5 in propane.
BP | Bronze Point | IMR | Improved Military Rifle | PTD | Pointed |
BR | Bench Rest | M | Magnum | RN | Round Nose |
BT | Boat Tail | PL | Power-Lokt | SP | Soft Point |
C | Compressed Charge | PR | Primer | SPCL | Soft Point "Core-Lokt" |
HP | Hollow Point | PSPCL | Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" | C.O.L. | Cartridge Overall Length |
PSP | Pointed Soft Point | Spz | Spitzer Point | SBT | Spitzer Boat Tail |
LRN | Lead Round Nose | LWC | Lead Wad Cutter | LSWC | Lead Semi Wad Cutter |
GC | Gas Check |