fieldwanderer Posted September 4, 2012 Report Share Posted September 4, 2012 A friend of mine is a tyre fitter and can get me substantial amounts of scrap tyre weights. I explained to him that as far as I know, only lead is usable but being the curious person that I am, it set me wondering.... Why is zinc / antimony or whatever they're made from be unsuitable? I know it's lighter than lead but so is steel. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vince Green Posted September 4, 2012 Report Share Posted September 4, 2012 It won't melt, not at temperatures that you can create. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hchris Posted September 4, 2012 Report Share Posted September 4, 2012 Years ago we all ways used wheel weighs for .38 9mm and .45acp heads As it is harder than pure Lead Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Imperfection Posted September 4, 2012 Report Share Posted September 4, 2012 As Vince says-it requires far greater temperature to melt.Im not even sure you could get anywhere near the temp it needs without having to resort to a really hot burning gas or a semi-professional furnace. You can always tell zinc from lead by tapping it with a screwdriver.Lead has a dull thump while zinc has a 'ring' to it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Geordie Posted September 4, 2012 Report Share Posted September 4, 2012 Have a word with the car breakers yards see if you can get the weights from their old wheels. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hchris Posted September 4, 2012 Report Share Posted September 4, 2012 The wheel weights melted in a standard Lee lead pot the metal clips and all the **** just float to the top make sure you don't drop in any old rubber valves smoke for hours Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fieldwanderer Posted September 5, 2012 Author Report Share Posted September 5, 2012 I can probably get very hot temp's, definitely in the 6-800'c area in a home made furnace I have but that's not much help. Thanks for the replies though, the same guy's collecting lead weights for me when he gets them, obviously though there won't be anywhere near as many of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Geordie Posted September 5, 2012 Report Share Posted September 5, 2012 I read there is animony in car battery lead plates? Anyone tried using this and if so is it any good? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sitsinhedges Posted September 5, 2012 Report Share Posted September 5, 2012 I read there is animony in car battery lead plates? Anyone tried using this and if so is it any good? Start trying to melt down car batteries and there's a good chance you'll poison yourself there's some very nasty stuff in there. Sell them and buy some shot. As far as zinc goes even if it could be turned into shot, lead shot data is for lead shot and using something totally different would probably end in tears. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tad-blody Posted September 6, 2012 Report Share Posted September 6, 2012 It might be a daft question but is there a reason why antimony can't be purchased to add to the shot as per manufactured shot ? If it is daft go easy on me I'm no metallurgist. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Geordie Posted September 6, 2012 Report Share Posted September 6, 2012 It might be a daft question but is there a reason why antimony can't be purchased to add to the shot as per manufactured shot ? If it is daft go easy on me I'm no metallurgist. you CAN buy it. Its in little ingots £5 ish iirc but only makes about 5lb of shot. Thats why I was looking into.recycling from elsewhere if possible. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JonathanL Posted September 6, 2012 Report Share Posted September 6, 2012 I used to cast pistol bullets from wheelweights. There are two types - the ones with a steel clip to grip the rim and the type with an adhesive back which you stick on alloys. The former type were really a bit soft for pistol bullets so you needed to add something else, I had (still have) a quantity of Lino-Type which is printers metal which is very hard and made excellent bullets when mixed 50/50 with the wheelweights. The stick-on type wheelweights were harder but not as hard as lino. Having said all that I haven't done it in a ling time and people have told me that modern wheel weights of either type contain no, or very little, lead. J. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snarepeg Posted September 6, 2012 Report Share Posted September 6, 2012 I have made shot from Zink wheel weights, as said you need a higher temperature to melt, it doesn/t run very well and you need a deep catcher as it builds up like a pyramid as it hasn/t cooled anough. john Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scully Posted September 6, 2012 Report Share Posted September 6, 2012 I used to cast pistol bullets from wheelweights. There are two types - the ones with a steel clip to grip the rim and the type with an adhesive back which you stick on alloys. The former type were really a bit soft for pistol bullets so you needed to add something else, I had (still have) a quantity of Lino-Type which is printers metal which is very hard and made excellent bullets when mixed 50/50 with the wheelweights. The stick-on type wheelweights were harder but not as hard as lino. Having said all that I haven't done it in a ling time and people have told me that modern wheel weights of either type contain no, or very little, lead. J. We used to do this when reloading for handgun shooting,but always used gas checks also. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fieldwanderer Posted September 7, 2012 Author Report Share Posted September 7, 2012 The stick on ones are now usually steel I believe, they're stamped "Fe" (the chemical symbol for iron) and are magnetic. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henry d Posted September 7, 2012 Report Share Posted September 7, 2012 (edited) Why is zinc / antimony or whatever they're made from be unsuitable? I believe that zinc was looked at many years ago, for non-toxic shot, and rejected due to it being poisonous, so I would steer clear of anything like that myself. Edited September 7, 2012 by henry d Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sitsinhedges Posted September 7, 2012 Report Share Posted September 7, 2012 I thought zinc was the stuff they galvanised with and that you weren't supposed to try and weld because the fumes were poisonous. What the heck would you do with zinc anyway, it would be totally different to lead and couldn't be used in the recipes we have. As far as antimony goes, yes you can alloy it yourself but it is difficult and toxic too and the temperatures you need to take the antimony to are about the same as those at which lead fumes can become very toxic too, about 700c, so if you try it make sure it is outdoors with a suitable respirator. I have done it but wasn't happy doing so It can also be melted at lower temps by crushing into a fine dust and adding it like sugar into coffee so I'm told but I've never tried this and I wouldn't like to be risking breathing the dust in. Buying it in an already alloyed state such as linotype avoids all these issues and preferable. I have found good supplies by looking on ebay and asking typeset sellers if they have any scrap kicking around. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fieldwanderer Posted September 7, 2012 Author Report Share Posted September 7, 2012 Just curiosity really s.i.h, if you don't ask, you don't know. Zinc does give off fumes, I worked as a welder / fabricator for a while. I think it's more as it burns but, standing over it for quite a while sometimes welding galv never did me any harm, I know some of the guys I worked with got "galv sickness" though which was a lot like a 24hr "bug". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
henry d Posted September 7, 2012 Report Share Posted September 7, 2012 Wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc#Toxicity Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paulbanco Posted September 14, 2012 Report Share Posted September 14, 2012 I used to make .45ACP bullets and the best material I could find came from scrap yards using soldered joints from old lead pipes, perfect for a saeco 206grain semi wad cutter, used to put them into a cartridge with 5.2grains of 700X shotgun propellant behind it and what a handful that was !!!!! never had any fouling problems either Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vince Green Posted September 14, 2012 Report Share Posted September 14, 2012 I still cast bullets Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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