How to smelt lead and make ...ammo or what ever you'd like.
1. Get lead. Go to tire shops and ask to purchase their scrap tire weights for $.15/lb. This is the going rate in Idaho, it may work elsewhere.
2. Get a wok or pot to use as a smelter. Also get a metal slotted spoon and ladle. These are best obtained from a second-hand store, not your kitchen.
3. Set it up: see pics. You need a heat source and somehing to hold the lead in while the heat is applied. You need somewhere to put the lead after is has liquified, like a mold.
4. Wear protective clothing: long sleeves and pants, protective shoes and gloves are all a must. You can wear eye and lung protection if you wish, or just don't do dumb things like throw extra weights at a boilingleadbath or stand downwind from all the fumes. Take extra precautions to avoid the fumes. Neither propane exhaust nor lead anything will prolong your life or increase your mental capacity, quite the opposite.
5. Add weights to wok. Try to remove the tire shop garbage from the mix: old valve stems, tire stickers, lug nuts, etc. Cover and heat on high
6. When you remove the lid: stand back with your arm extended. Lift up high and then step back. There are nasty gasses brewing here and you don't want to breathe them in. More importantly, these gasses and the hidden garbage inside are flammable and will combust in a spectacular fireball when supplied with oxygen.
7. Scoop out all non-lead items with your slotted spoon, they will be floating on top. You can also scoop out most of the dirt and dust. Place these very hot items in a water-filled tin can that you wisely prepared before-hand for this very purpose.
8. Break to snipe something on eBay. ...I won! Suckers!
9. Use ladle or pour from wok/pot into mold. Let cool- you just melted some metal, albeit soft, and it will retain its heat for a while.
Best molds are made of metal. Anything flammable has a good chance of burning quite a bit, if not combusting. Also, as seen during the smelting process, everything floats on lead. So, if you use a high-density wood for a mold, make sure it is fastened securely to the base, with no gaps.
Boiling Lead Bath
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willarddaniels
- Specialist 2
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- Location: Idaho
- Attachments
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- Set-up
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- Another view of the set-up. Bucket #2, one of the roses I planted on the right, next to the shop and does anyone know what car that is?
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- The set-up and bucket #1
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- Add the weights, remove the junk, crank up the gas
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- Fire on top means that most of the lead has liquified and you can start scraping off the impurities.
Note the bottle of fertilizer... I planted roses for my wife while I waited for the smelting process. This way, I got to do it and she didn't complain once!
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- the real boilingleadbath
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- "It floats!" -David Letterman
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willarddaniels
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- Location: Idaho
This was 225 lbs of lead done in about 2 hours. I only used one mold and it was made of wood ... When I get my welder I will do a how-to with pics on some molds.
Any ammo would really only be worth making for larger hybrids, unless anybody has creative ideas such making darts from plastic milk jugs and clothes hangers...
EDIT: I added some pics of some "lead apples" that I poured into an empty incandesent light bulb. While it was still cooling, I inserted/screwed a decking screw into the end. After the lead cooled, and shrunk just a little, the glass broke right off in my gloved hands. The screw can now be screwed out of the apple.
This is a very large projectile, and heavy. I've yet to try it on other molds, like candelabra-base light bulbs... whatever
This projectile makes for an expensive one, and time-consuming to make. But if you have the power behind it, you could knock out an engine in a car.
Any ammo would really only be worth making for larger hybrids, unless anybody has creative ideas such making darts from plastic milk jugs and clothes hangers...
EDIT: I added some pics of some "lead apples" that I poured into an empty incandesent light bulb. While it was still cooling, I inserted/screwed a decking screw into the end. After the lead cooled, and shrunk just a little, the glass broke right off in my gloved hands. The screw can now be screwed out of the apple.
This is a very large projectile, and heavy. I've yet to try it on other molds, like candelabra-base light bulbs... whatever
This projectile makes for an expensive one, and time-consuming to make. But if you have the power behind it, you could knock out an engine in a car.
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- lead apple 2.jpg (11.07 KiB) Viewed 10353 times
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Last edited by willarddaniels on Tue Mar 13, 2007 10:13 am, edited 1 time in total.
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pyromanic13
- Corporal 5
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any precautions for the fumes, or are they not noticeable?
Movie dialogue: "The good die first."
Tom: "But most of us are morally ambiguous, which explains our random dying
patterns."
Tom: "But most of us are morally ambiguous, which explains our random dying
patterns."
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willarddaniels
- Specialist 2
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- Joined: Wed Jan 31, 2007 2:34 pm
- Location: Idaho
They are quite noticable, mainly the propane exhaust because you are using so much of it. I nearly gagged each time I had to walk through it- and I was holding my breath. Do it outdoors, I don't think you can have a high enough CFM rating on a fan to get all the fumes out.
You could use a heavy metal / organic filter mask, but I would still recommend doing it outdoors.
You could use a heavy metal / organic filter mask, but I would still recommend doing it outdoors.
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willarddaniels
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- Joined: Wed Jan 31, 2007 2:34 pm
- Location: Idaho
Yup, that's my ghia. I love late model VWs. There aren't too many of these left, in good shape.isnt that a VW Karmen ghia?
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Matheusilla
- Specialist
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VW's are pretty rare up here...(Canada) but I have seen many carmen's. One time i even found two matching VW station wagons at a wrecker's, never seen anything like them.
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zeigs spud
- Corporal 2
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wow...nice how-to!
now i nead lead,and a propane,and parents gone allll day lol.
now i nead lead,and a propane,and parents gone allll day lol.
Well I tell you what I found a guy willing to sell me 180 pounds of lead for 20 bucks. He made me carry it though, which I regretted for 2 weeks due to a sore back. I found 7 good valve stems, 2 good wrenches, and a pair of pliers mixed in with the lead. Now I’m working on making molds for 1.5 inch slugs and cannon balls. Oh man I can’t wait to use them. I plan on using baked plaster of paris for the molds, but does anyone else have any good ideas?