Pewter? Help me learn

[imashooter2]

Those look much better. Your melt temperatures sound low though. With the electric pot, my melt temperatures are closer to 450, and I take it to 550 before fluxing with sawdust and pouring.

[Drm50]

I've got several Lyman & RCBS ingot molds that cast a regular size ingot, I have a Lee that I dont
use very often that cavities are a combo, regular and 1/4 size. I use it for tin, casting the small
ones.

[jsizemore]

Melt temp is a bit low for pewter or the thermometer needs calibrating. Could have some bismuth mixed in.

[Hardcast416taylor]

As far as finding pewter I look for estate auctions or on line auctions. I must warn you about hitting the jackpot on a box of hall market pewter items and making a notation about it here on the site. Beware, you must post a picture of the find as well as your Hawaiian birth certificate and your High School year book picture. There are `doubting Thomas`s` aplenty here abouts that will doubt what you have, and no I still can`t post photos.Robert

[imashooter2]

Let it go man. It was all good natured ribbing. No one questioned your integrity.

[jsizemore]

Speak for yourself. That rascal bears watchin'.

[Crusty Deary Ol'Coot]

Following this topic along and watching/reading about the effort and yes expense that many go to trying to find pewter, seems it would just be time and money better spent with an order to Rotometal for some pure tin.

Then that along with the fact that providing your casting from typical Clip on Wheel Weights alloy adding even small percentages of tin or pewter is simply wasted money. Not needed for quality bullets or casting.

Yep, been there and done that and there was little to nothing to be gained.

Crusty Deary Ol'Coot

[6mm win lee]

Following this topic along and watching/reading about the effort and yes expense that many go to trying to find pewter, seems it would just be time and money better spent with an order to Rotometal for some pure tin.

Then that along with the fact that providing your casting from typical Clip on Wheel Weights alloy adding even small percentages of tin or pewter is simply wasted money. Not needed for quality bullets or casting.

Yep, been there and done that and there was little to nothing to be gained.

Crusty Deary Ol'Coot

I think you are correct that sometimes it would be easier to just buy it. Buying from Rotometals or Zip Metals would have been my option until the guys here got me to looking for pewter. I have picked up around twenty-five pounds of pewterware with an average cost of just under six bucks a pound over the last year.

Could it be the availibility of old pewter is a regional thing? Stieff and Woodbury are east coast houses. There might not have been a big customer base west of the Great Plains.

[imashooter2]

Following this topic along and watching/reading about the effort and yes expense that many go to trying to find pewter, seems it would just be time and money better spent with an order to Rotometal for some pure tin.

Then that along with the fact that providing your casting from typical Clip on Wheel Weights alloy adding even small percentages of tin or pewter is simply wasted money. Not needed for quality bullets or casting.

Yep, been there and done that and there was little to nothing to be gained.

Crusty Deary Ol'Coot

I gained a pretty decent return on investment from folks that disagree with your assessment.

[dbosman]

In years past I didn't see much, but I've picked up about twenty pounds in the last quarter. Here's last weeks score. 6.8 lbs for $20. After weighing it up, I actually felt I'd over paid.

Attachment 184479

[Crusty Deary Ol'Coot]

imashooter2,

Can you explain your comment, you lost me.

Thanks

CDOC

[jsizemore]

He's saying lots of people buy pewter from him to enrich their alloy.

[Scorpius]

Ok here is another.....had to look this up since a minute under a torch didn't start any melting I'm thinking its not pewter. Unless the whole thing has to get uber hot first to melt.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/4864931...-of?ref=market

This is exactly what I have but I have the entire set of 4.

The stamp on the inside reads "Old Mill Ent. Lancaster PA"


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[308Jeff]

Looks like aluminum to me.

[Scorpius]

Looks like aluminum to me.

Well...guess they will make good mugs for mule kickers with the neighbors


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[imashooter2]

Yes, aluminum. Study some of the pictures in the thread I have linked in my signature. You'll soon be able to eliminate stuff like that from across the room.

[308Jeff]

I'm still very novel and identifying and buying pewter, but here's what I've learned.

-Pewter has a very distinct, dull and darkish grey patina.
-If you can't bend it with your hands/fingers, it's not pewter. No matter how thick it is.

I purchased a couple of items recently that I thought MIGHT be pewter based on the maker/markings, but I should have trusted the above qualifications. Both turned out to be aluminum.

Fortunately, I've also ventured into some aluminum/brass/copper ingot making so it wasn't a total loss. But I obviously way over-payed for what I got.

[CastingFool]

FWIW, I have found that some of the markings on some pewter pieces I find are very small and hard to read, so I have taken to carrying a magnifying glass on my pewter hunting trips.

[dbosman]

I should take a magnifier, but my son is young enough. Even so, we had to take a picture of one hallmark and blow it up to full computer screen to read it.

[Scorpius]

Actually this might help some of us older guys but I found an awesome app for my iPhone. Called super vision+
Open it up and look at the details, zoom even if needed and you can take pics. Good for checking out guns I'm thinking on for import marks or simply all matching serials you can't quiet tell.
You can thank me through a 1 bar shipment of pewter to me
Any weight will do I'm not picky lol


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk