Any new testing extracting antimony with sulfur?

[triggerhappy243]

on a different forum someone was asking if the powdered sulfur treatment extracts any antimony. I know it will pull Zinc out.

[Dr3wcifer]

Give me a few days and I can test it. I have some superhard I can dilute down to ~8% antimony and get some baseline hardness, and then see if fluxing with sulfur softens the alloy.

[poppy42]

Why would you want to extract antimony? If it’s to hard dilute it with soft lead. Or sell/ trade it for pure soft lead. Just curious.

[triggerhappy243]

Why would you want to extract antimony? If it’s to hard dilute it with soft lead. Or sell/ trade it for pure soft lead. Just curious.

2 reasons actually. If you can extract antimony, it can be added to increase in another batch. So, in the case of raw w/w, 3.5 % on average. extract that and then add to a 2nd batch and you would have 7%.

2nd reason. if you have a tainted batch of w/w, you would pull out the tin, zinc, copper and antimony, leaving you with close to pure.

[kevin c]

Wouldnt you end up with zinc or antimony in the form of sulfides? What would it take to convert that into the metallic elements?

My impression is that extracting anything close to all the antimony or any other element, purifying them and the lead to near 100% pure elemental metals, would be economically and practically beyond the capabilities of our home processing set ups, though I'd love to be proved wrong.

[Dr3wcifer]

If you're trying to remove the antimony from wheelweights to reuse later, sulfur is not going to be a good option. You'll end up with antimony trisulfide in addition to tin and zinc sulfates, which would be incredibly difficult to separate without some significant chemistry. If you're simply looking to remove sb/sn/zn from a melt to get more soft lead, sulfur appears to be a good option, but if you're trying separate any of those elements out for use elsewhere, sulfur isn't going to work like you're hoping.

[poppy42]

+1^^^

[triggerhappy243]

Wouldnt you end up with zinc or antimony in the form of sulfides? What would it take to convert that into the metallic elements?

My impression is that extracting anything close to all the antimony or any other element, purifying them and the lead to near 100% pure elemental metals, would be economically and practically beyond the capabilities of our home processing set ups, though I'd love to be proved wrong.

yes, i guess it would be possible. My main goal was to remove any possible Zinc. If the process also removed the antimony, that would be a plus for me. I could use more antimony free lead for my muzzies.

[bangerjim]

If you have 5% or less of Zn in your mix..............FORGET ABOUT IT!..


That amount of Zn, from my very extensive testing, proves to be hardly noticeable in normal casting. It decreases the weight a bit but actually adds hardness! If your pours are a bit rough, just add a little more Sn to decrease the surface tension and things will be OK.

And sulfur will only create lots toxic chemical by-products and toxic smoke. And you recover no usable metals (Sn/Sb/Cu) in the end.

I use CuSO4 to remove any large amounts of Zn (in my past testings). It is readily available in the plumbing department of big box stores as Root Killer for septic systems.

Easiest way to avoid Zn contamination (if that causes you restless nights!) is to check EVERY and ALL COWW's for zinkers that you re-melt. Keep your re-melt temp low so zinkers float on the top, if any are in there. Melting point of Pb is 627°F and Zn is 787°F , so there is plenty of room to control the temp below the liquidus point of Zn.

And you DO want Sb and Sn in your mix, so don't remove it!

Good luck!

banger

[triggerhappy243]

If you have 5% or less of Zn in your mix..............FORGET ABOUT IT!..


That amount of Zn, from my very extensive testing, proves to be hardly noticeable in normal casting. It decreases the weight a bit but actually adds hardness! If your pours are a bit rough, just add a little more Sn to decrease the surface tension and things will be OK.

And sulfur will only create lots toxic chemical by-products and toxic smoke. And you recover no usable metals (Sn/Sb/Cu) in the end.

I use CuSO4 to remove any large amounts of Zn (in my past testings). It is readily available in the plumbing department of big box stores as Root Killer for septic systems.

Easiest way to avoid Zn contamination (if that causes you restless nights!) is to check EVERY and ALL COWW's for zinkers that you re-melt. Keep your re-melt temp low so zinkers float on the top, if any are in there. Melting point of Pb is 627°F and Zn is 787°F , so there is plenty of room to control the temp below the liquidus point of Zn.

And you DO want Sb and Sn in your mix, so don't remove it!

Good luck!

banger

My end game goal is to eliminate the zinc (if any) and to (would be nice to see) eliminate antimony, in a 50 pound sample. I do not care if the tin, antimony copper is lost in this sample.

[Conditor22]

trade it for pure on S&S

Pure has always been the easiest lead alloy to find

[Dr3wcifer]

It appears that the zinc most readily compounds with the sulfur, but if you use an excess of sulfur as flux, you are certainly going to pull off a significant amount of antimony as well. I have a few hundred pounds of WW ingots, if you want me to test the hardness on those, and then flux them heavily with sulfur and give you a followup hardness.

From the testing I've done with sulfur, you can draw enough of the alloying metals out of lead to bring the BHN back down below 8.

[triggerhappy243]

trade it for pure on S&S

Pure has always been the easiest lead alloy to find

Sir, you missed my point. pure lead is everywhere............. I already know this.

[Conditor22]

I thought you were looking for pure -- "I could use more antimony free lead for my muzzies."

[triggerhappy243]

It appears that the zinc most readily compounds with the sulfur, but if you use an excess of sulfur as flux, you are certainly going to pull off a significant amount of antimony as well. I have a few hundred pounds of WW ingots, if you want me to test the hardness on those, and then flux them heavily with sulfur and give you a followup hardness.

From the testing I've done with sulfur, you can draw enough of the alloying metals out of lead to bring the BHN back down below 8.

I probably have 500 pounds of clip on wheel weights still in the raw. and another 300 pounds in 20 pound ingots. A few of those 20 pound ingots tested positive for Zinc. It is those ingots that have the Zinc, that I want to sulfur bomb to clean up and while I am at it................ see how much antimony I can remove. It is nothing more than an experiment to appease my curiosity.

[triggerhappy243]

I thought you were looking for pure -- "I could use more antimony free lead for my muzzies."

I am looking to extract the Zinc and antimony............... and to see how close to pure I can refine it to pure.

[Dr3wcifer]

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...Sulfur-Fluxing

We know that sulfur will compound with antimony, and I proved in the above thread that it will compound with zinc. I haven't tested if it will remove any tin, but tin would be a pretty small fraction in any WW alloy. I was able to pull the majority of the zinc out, and I would assume it would be the same for antimony.