Window Came Yield....I'm Surprised!

[jsizemore]

I've been smelting this past summer's scrapyard finds for the past 2 weeks. I had neglected to stop by the scrapyard in that time and figured I needed to make a showing or lose my honeyhole. After 8 years they still charge me 25cents/lb and save any lead from prying eyes.
I've been reluctant lately to take window came because of the large amount of trash, zinc and dross. I figured my final yield was taking a hit but WW's have been largely steel and zinc. So I wasn't surprised that they had a bin 1/2 full of window came. Final weight was 240lbs for $50. I got it home and smelted for 2.5 hours. I had 9 3lb coffee cans of trash/dross and a decent pile of ingots. Final ingot weight was 205lbs 13ozs. I was expecting 50-60% but 85% was a big surprise. My attitude toward window came has completely changed.

[duckey]

Window weights?

[jsizemore]

Stained glass window came. H and C shaped extrusions with soldered joints to hold the pieces of glass in a frame.

[tg32-20]

Window came is an excellent source of lead. It is usually not completely pure but has a little Sb and Sn in it. I used to own a glass shop and we made and sold came to other shops as well. We pretty much made it out of whatever we could find cheap. As long as you could cut it with a lead knife once it was pulled it was good to go. There really is not much tin in the joints since most everyone used 50/50 solder, so very little tin from joints.
Get all you can.

Tom