I've read as much as I could watched videos so mind as well start asking questions here

As Far as I can tell the equipment is basic

Melting Pot
Ladle
A spoon of some sort (to skim )
Towel
lube and sizing
mould

There may be other thing (and if I am missing them please by all means tell input)

None the less my biggest thing is acquiring lead. What do you use? Where do you get? Is there a place I have over looked that possibly be able to acquire?

I would also like looking at set ups of your rigging

Thanks

add flux


ingot mold


kitchen matches to blacken the mold cavities



get an old piece of plywood, cut it so it's only 2-3 feet tall, then cover the surface with aluminum foil to catch splatters and such, lead doesn't stick to aluminum



add eye protection

heavy duty leather gloves

lead free solder as a source of tin



Most of my lead, virtually all is from wheel weights.




 

For your wheel weights are you actively obtaining them or old stock. been reading and even discussed with dryflash3 that many are just zinc

I just scored a big bucket full yesterday, after watching some youtube videos on making ingots, I resigned myself to sorting the wheel weights by hand before melting them, zinc has a melting point of 50 - 60 degrees more than lead so there's a good chance it'll melt in the melting pot unless the temp is precise.  Easier to nip it on the bud and have no zinc ones in the melting pot.



Most buckets of wheel weights have other crud in them too: tire stickers, valve stems, cigarette butts, other crap



I have a 10 lb Lee Product Pot IV I used in the past to melt wheel weights, it's too slow for dealing with large quanities of wheel weights, so today I went and bought some stuff so I can melt the wheel weights en mass using my propane cooker burner, expect pics and a write up soon



A propane torch is handy to help speed up heating of the bullet molds as well



 

Good video on how to mass produce lead ingots from wheel weights and more importantly, how to tell zine from lead wheelweights

Never use steel or coated muffin tins for ingot molds - only plain Aluminum

Never add material to a melt inprocess that has not been baked first.

Never cast outdoors if rain is possible - 1 rain drop can ruin your whole future....

Never cast in sneakers/tennis shoes etc - wear real leather boots that a lead splatter won't injure you.

Best to use a bottom pour type pot for casting and only feed it pre-cleaned ingots.

Use a coffee can or buy a cheapy stainless pan to melt out the steel clips and burn off all the other scum - Never do this indoors! I use the small dutch ovens sold by Harbor Freight and put new WW on the lid to bake out any moisture before I add them to the melt. You can use a camp stove, propane burner, charcoal BBQ, even a wood fire to do your ingot casting - just try to keep the melt covered with a lid if there will be ash blowing around like on a charcoal BBQ.

Consider using an extra large pair of Channel Lock type pliers to allow a better grip under all the weight for pouring ingots. (also keeps your hands farther from the pot.)

Join Cast Boolits website!

Always wash your hands before eating or drinking anything after or during casting. I don't know of any casters who got lead poisoning - BUT Wheel weight lead and some lead shot is often hardened with Arsenic which can burn off while your cleaning your ingot metal.

Lastly - I would not allow any young children anywhere near my casting area - There are many hazards for them and they will be a distraction for you. To be safe, you need your attention 100% focused on what you are doing. I would not even let them watch from a distance till they reach a certain age - again you need to be 100% focused - not involved in a Q & A or other discussion.

That said I taught my cousin to cast boolits for me when he was 11 lookin to earn pocket money. The kid was all ready good at soldiering copper pipes and using other machine shop tools so he was ready to learn and respected the potential dangers.

What would happen if some zinc wheel weights got into the melting pot and melted into the lead? would it be rendered useless?

You can get free lead in the berm at the range where you shoot.

Good list^
One personal favorite missing is a small wooded mallet (hammer) When I cast I have that mallet in one hand and the mould in the other. I use the mallet to open the spure plate and to tap the mould so the bullets fall out, then to close the spure plate. Can't do without it.

I use a cut down section of a broom stick as my mold whacker, cheaper than a mallet



 

So any pictures of everyone's set ups?

Not set up but here's some of my stash and gear, less the stuff I just bought yesterday for bulk wheelweight smelting




Sorted, cleaned wheelweights









Ingots








Lee ingot mold on top of RCBS ingot mold, mold whacker (the stick)









Lee Production Pot IV, the brick wrapped in foil is a hot mold rest









Lee six cavity molds









Lead free solder (tin), stick lube,  and Brownell's Marvelux (flux)









RCBS lube/sizer dies








RCBS lube/sizer







 

That's why it's important to render your lead into ingots before use.

Make sure you stay under 700 degrees in the rendering process, that will float the Zn weights to the top and not melt them.

Then you can use all the heat you want/need in the casting process because you will only be casting lead.

Never had this happen before so I'll ask, say you're melting wheelweights and happen to melt some zinc ones along with the lead ones, will you be able to skim off the melted zinc? Will it float to the top even though it's melted?



 

Dryflash3: Never cease to amaze, What lube/sizer are you using?


AssaultRifler: What are the coiled up rounds next to your flux? As well as what lube/sizer is that?

lead free solder, 95% tin, 5% silver



ETA: some people use just pure wheel weight alloy with satisfactory results, I always add a bit of tin to my casting alloy





RCBS Lube-A-Matic





 

Good question.

I'm not a metallurgist (but #1 son is) so I'm guessing that there may be convection currents in the pot that would make it hard to get all the melted Zn.
Also, it's probably possible for the Zn and Pb to alloy themselves together but I don't know what temperature that would take.

I'm thinking (guessing) that if you were just at 780 degrees you could probably get most of the melted Zn off the top.

One more guess, if the amount of Zn in the mix was only a couple of percent you probably wouldn't notice it during the casting process.

You can get a 1000° thermometer from howegauges on ebay for about $20.






















 

In your Opinion why is a bottom pour better? Haven't bought equipment yet so would like to hear what you have to say

Here's my opinion, the lead doesn't have a chance to cool off when pouring vs using a dipper





You have precise control of how much lead pours, no guess work needed, like a faucet, open and close the valve to pour lead





Using a ladle you could do something stupid like pour molten lead on your hand if you're holding the mold in the other hand, usually your weak hand.  You'll also have to return the unused lead from the ladle back into the pot while holding the mold with the other hand.  What if you dipped too little lead, then you need to double dip.





Lead of the bottom of the pot flows faster than being dumped from a ladle because it's on the bottom, think of how water pressure works.





Bottom pour pots are faster and easier to use
 

to start out casting, just start by making ingots, dont make bullets yet, gives you a chance to play with your equipment and such.  When you run out of wheel weights and have all ingots, then try casting with a mold

That's for sure a plan. Lucky for me Im picking up my propane stove when I go back north. Just need a pot a scoop, ingot mould and my safety equipment

As for the bottom pour pot any suggestions? Lee or Lyman or another brand, Just want to start up my pricing list so my wife doesn't kill me right away.

Dryflash3 and AssualtRifler, Did you pick the Lee bottom poor on price or is it a really good one or both. I was looking around and the Lyman was around 300....

The Production Pot IV works fine and priced right.  When I bought mine the Lee 20 lb pot wasn't on the market, I woud suggest buying this one http://www.midwayusa.com/product/645810/lee-pro-4-20-lb-furnace-110-volt



Looks like 'flash has the 20 lb'r in his picture





 

No, don't throw away the zinc contaminated alloy... send it to me... zinc can be removed from your alloy using sulfur, or, as some on cast-boolits are doing to make super-tough alloys using small amounts of copper, you can take zinc contaminated alloy and perform a chemical reaction using copper sulfate. The zinc in the melt and the copper in the copper sulfate trade places leaving you with zinc sulfate and a copper enriched melt that gives soft bullets that are very tough (hard to tear/shear).



The Lee is pretty low quality. On castboolits they have the nickname "Lee Dripomatic" for a reason. They like to leak a lot out of the spout on bottom.

Regarding wheel-weights, the amount of zinc/steel is going to be highly dependent on your location. Some states have banned lead weights and they are very hard to find, and therefore a bucket of wheel weight may only have 5-10% lead in it. OTOH, here in the midwest, lead weights are alive and well and buckets often contain around 85% lead for me. My yields, after sorting and smelting to remove clips and all the impurities come out at no less than 70% but often higher.

All my zinc weights get set aside in a box to trade to the guy out west that makes cannonballs with zinc. He will trade pound for pound his clean lead for your zinc.

What pot do you have then?

With Lead based alloys - almost any impurity will float, steel - it floats, Zinc, before it melts will float. Even any "dirt" floats. I will ofter sir in sawdust with the flux and leave the slag floating on top to prevent exposure and more oxides forming.

You might add too many or too fast feeding ingots in as you replace what you have cast - if so there are times when the surface will semi-harden - yet the lower half of the furnace is still hot fuild lead.

Some molds like .22 or .17 may work better under pressure - fill directly then give some gap for your sprue puddle.

Multi- cavity molds like a Lee 6 cavity - or a double sided 12 cavity you can get a pace and fill like you were filling ice cube trays.

Brand - what ever you can find a deal on - used reloading gear is one of the few great deals yet to be found at gun shows.

I am only 5 months older than my San Diego Machine Star Lube sizer, and I can join the AARP in a few months... Gun show score. My Lyman #20 pot - Gun show score and its about the same vintage as the Star. I started casting with several Lyman 2 cavity molds and a LEE 10# bottom pour pot.  I later bought a LEE 6 cavity and cast several K with it before I broke down and replaced that ID10T designed Aluminum Sprue cutter with a good STEEL one.

Before the LEE bottom pour I cast using a Lyman dipper and a small cast iron pot that I think was once a plumbers pot* (* old sewer pipe was cast iron and each segment had a funnel like end that you inserted the next pipe into. these joints were sealed by soaking up lead with a hemp rope like a wick then wrapping it around the pipe and stuffing it into the joint. As the lead cools it shrinks a bit forming a good seal yet is a bit flexable under load..)

BTW - I love using a plumbers furnace for cleaning lead and making ingots - but these are all rare antiques these days and its hard to find a working example. They used white gas or kerosene but I run mine on cheap pump gas ( as if pump gas was really cheap!, but price a 1 gal can of "Coleman" stove fuel...)

I scored on the LEE #10 too -  my friend was going to a big sale at our fav sporting goods outlet and I couldn't go - one thing mentioned was LEE reloading gear, so I gave him the item number and ask him to get me the pot. Well he stops by the next day and hands me the pot ( in box ) and recipt and says I owe him dinner. Who ever did the sale markdown must have made a mistake because the receipt and the sticker on the box was for $9.99 .  I went back later to see if this was correct and the pots were now priced at $29.99, I pointed it out to the manager and he claimed ( WINK, WINK ) our employees could never have made such a mistake and the price I paid must have been the proper price.

EDIT: BTW as an old fat and lazy caster I now do alot of my casting on a Master Caster . But to be honest this didn't start until after I bought my first submachine gun.

I don't know if this has been mentioned yet.  If using a spoon or ladle and it's a humid day check your dipper first and make sure there isn't a lot of condensation on it before dipping the lead out.  Can have the same results as rain falling in the lead pot, not good.

Well I have an update: Today I bought Lyman's 4th casting book from optics planet but more importantly I picked up WW. I didn't have enough buck/ or strength I filled about 3/4ths of a bucket and they still have more. What the owner and one of his workers said they are all lead. Both SO and CO need to pick up the rest today and sort (and check to see if they are lead to be safe). None the less to me its a decent score for myself and its only one place ive checked so far.



Got this all for free from a tire shop in town. Like on Monday they were gonna dump it so I came at a good time. Figured they did good by me ill do good by them and give them my business. Next is sorting.

ProfGAB101 if only I could get that master caster you have

Join Cast Boolits website!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  best place for casting etc .. great bunch of guys on there .. buy abc's of reloading and read it .

Already have joined, as for ABC I  do have an older version somewhere and read it before I started (or it was RCBS from way back that dealt in metallic reloading). But I do need to get the book anyways as reference for some of my friends that want to get into it