Anyone using "used" bullets to melt down for reloading?

[berettaprofessor]

I see a lot of discussion (there's a current one now), on using wheel weights for casting. If I were to start casting my own, and I've thought about it, my most likely source would be a brief mining excursion into the 10 square feet of hillside that I've been shooting plated and jacketed bullets into for several years....don't know how many lbs would be there but it would be substantial.

Anyone ever just melt these down for casting? How clean and how dry do you have to make them before melting to avoid catastrophes like the pot blowing lead everywhere from retained water? Is the molten lead hard to separate from the copper plating and jackets?

Is this just a stupid idea?

 

[clearcut]

Range lead is recycled quite often I wouldn't put it in a hot pot of molten lead you should always start cold and heat slowly so any moisture can steam off. The copper and dirt will float to the top you should flux and stir to keep your alloy mixed then clean off the dross flux and stir again before casting your ingots. Then you can test for hardness and cast . Don't forget the safety gear!

CC

 

[243winxb]

plated and jacketed bullets

May produce an alloy to soft for magnum loading. Adding linotype will fix it.

 

[30Cal]

It comes out pretty soft. I treat it like pure lead and cut it 50/50 with clip-on wheel weights for my pistol applications.

Mine end up pretty dry by the time I get enough to bother smelting. I knock off the big chunks of dirt, but all that stuff ends up skimmed off the top of the melt.

 

[blue32]

Mine comes out to around 11bhn but that's probably because of all the hard cast bullets I find. I've made it work with 357 mag up to 1200 fps without problems. I make ingots first so I don't have to deal with all the dirt and other matter. Fully encapsulated jacketed bullets will require a cut in the jacket to get the lead. I'll add tin solder to the casting pot for mold fill out.

 

[edwardware]

Yes, in dry weather I mine the pistol berm at the club.

A few notes:
1) The lead is pretty soft, but not quite stick-on WW soft. This will vary with your shooting habits; cores for jacketed bullets are softer than bare lead bullets.
2) Heat with caution. I've never had a problem with moisture while pouring the next 30# of scrap bullets into the pot, but a live round going off is quite a thrill!
3) Your pot will emit the most heinous looking yellow fog. . . like a witch's cauldron in a Disney movie. As near as I've been able to determine, it's an oxide of either antimony or zinc. I melt outdoors with a breeze, and I've never noted any effects of the smoke, but it surely is impressive looking!

Have fun, wear safety glasses, gloves, and good boots, and watch out for the tinsel fairy.

 

[Dog Soldier]

I acquired 1,500 Lbs. of range lead a few years back. It was collected from a large indoor range. It averaged close to a #5 BHN. These spent bullets were almost 100% .22 rim fire.
This worked out very well. I can add Linotype etc. to get the BHN, I need.

 

[hdwhit]

edwardware wrote:
...watch out for the tinsel fairy.

I don't cast, so this warning was lost on me. Can you please explain?

Thanks.

 

[ReloaderFred]

I just finished up smelting a little over 2,000 pounds of recovered bullets two months ago. About half was mined from the berms at our range, and the other half was purchased at .50 cents a pound.

Out of that, I ended up with approximately 1,600 pounds in 10 pound ingots, which is the perfect size for my 40 pound casting pot, and my 80 pound Mark 6 Bullet Master. There was just over 275 pounds of copper jackets, which I sold to the recycler for $1.80 a pound as #2 Copper, since the price of copper is down at the present time. There was also about 50 pounds of steel and copper washed jackets, and I only got .04 cents a pound for those, but at least they go back into the supply system and not into the ground.

When smelting recovered bullets, fill the pot and then turn on your heat source. This will bake the moisture out of the bullets and they'll melt down just fine. Do this outside, and use sawdust for fluxing. My pot holds about 200 pounds of bullets, but I don't like to work with over about 150 pounds at a time. Here is where I should mention to make sure the platform your heat source is mounted in is strong enough to hold that much weight. The thought of a couple hundred pounds of molten metal flowing across the floor/ground, will certainly give one pause to reflect on the results.

When adding more reclaimed bullets to the pot, you can put a layer of about an inch of sawdust on your molten alloy, and then add the bullets to the top of it. This allows the heat to bake the moisture out of the newly added bullets. There will be lots of smoke from this, but it will smell like a campfire if you don't use some odorous wood for the sawdust. Oak sawdust smells good, as does pine.

You'll need ingot molds, and the types are endless, depending on the size of your casting pot. For most home casting pots, one pound ingots are about ideal, though you can go to two pound ingots and still be ok.

I could go on and on about this subject, but this should give you an idea of how it's done. This last batch of recovered bullets yielded a BHN of 12, which is perfect for most handgun applications, and some rifle uses, too. I've pushed a 420 gr. bullet of Bhn 12 to 2,200 fps in my .45-120 Sharps without any leading, but this is because of several factors that I won't go into now, since it's off topic.

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[ReloaderFred]

I don't cast, so this warning was lost on me. Can you please explain?

Thanks.

The "tinsel fairy" is a slang term used by some casters to refer to a moisture induced explosion of molten alloy. It can be quite violent, and the lead can resemble tinsel where it lands.

Hope this helps.

Fred

 

[edwardware]

I don't cast, so this warning was lost on me. Can you please explain?
Thanks.

The "tinsel fairy" is a slang term used by some casters to refer to a moisture induced explosion of molten alloy. It can be quite violent, and the lead can resemble tinsel where it lands.
Fred

Yup. Recall that water expands ~1700 times upon boiling to steam, and a bath of molten lead will boil a droplet almost instantly. Water on the surface of a lead bath will boil vigorously, but if you have a droplet submerged in the lead it will boil and fling the lead everywhere on its way to the surface.

 

[X-Rap]

My backstops are for whatever bad times might come down the line. Until then, money in the bank.

 

[Walkalong]

Yup. Recall that water expands ~1700 times upon boiling to steam, and a bath of molten lead will boil a droplet almost instantly. Water on the surface of a lead bath will boil vigorously, but if you have a droplet submerged in the lead it will boil and fling the lead everywhere on its way to the surface.

Yep, even a tiny bit of moisture under the lead will blow out the lead. Not only does it expand to 1700 times its self in volume, but the velocity it does it at is tremendous. I don't remember what that is though. When it is flashes under molten lead, the lead has no choice but to be blasted skywards.

 

[berettaprofessor]

Thanks, some great info here!

 

[kingmt]

One thing to watch out for is smelting plated bullets. If there isn't a hole in them I've had them swell & start spraying lead once the jacket cracks.

Of course I've had them swell & just push the rifling back out. Those I ran through my sizer & loaded. They made good bullets.

 

[blue32]

OP, don't let tales of the tinsel dissuade you. Every caster gets burned sooner or later. My first was a fresh sprue wedged between my low cut sock and the tender skin on my ankle. Boots would have prevented that. Safety glasses and gloves will prevent most mishaps.

 

[Arkansas Paul]

I've scraped a few pounds of bullets out of our berm here and there. I cut it 50/50 with clip on WWs and it is fine.
Nice way to get some free lead.

 

[hdwhit]

Thanks to everyone who explained the "tinsel fairy".

 

[berettaprofessor]

OP, don't let tales of the tinsel dissuade you. Every caster gets burned sooner or later.

No real worries. Part of the reason about asking is just wanting to know what could go wrong before I leap. I understand the dangers and I'm a pretty careful guy normally (to the pont where it's a family joke)...I'll be sure to wear eye and hand protection and probably will buy a leather apron.

 

[Stevenvalleyky]

There is a YouTube video by a guy called country boy prepper that shows him digging lead out of berms to the completed rounds for 6 cents per round. Might be worth checking out.

 

[Ledhore]

Range lead is what I use for all pistol calibers and 7.62x39. I currently have over 2,000 lbs and get from my range for free. Its generally a mix of about half jacketed and half commercial hard cast and casts great. Fit is more important than hardness in most cases and I am able to run plain base cast 162 grain bullets from this mix up to 1600 fps in my 357 lever gun if I use 296 powder, with no barrel leading. Ak47 runs around 2200fps with aluminun checks, with zero leading as well. Just don't overheat the lead in case any zinc ends up in the smelter.

 

[Catpop]

-----Just don't overheat the lead in case any zinc ends up in the smelter.

Good point here in using a thermometer and keeping smelt temp below 850.
Catpop

 

[jmorris]

I actually go after a good rain, the dirt on the surface of the berm is washed down into the bay and the bullets ready to pick are right on top.

Even find some keepers every now and again.

Like these two that hit head on.

I have a "test" mold that I throw a couple of bullets with, with jacketed bullets in the mix they almost always drop a little heavy. Mix in a little Linotype until they are dropping correct and pour into ingots and stamp.

 

[TooTall350]

A good friend of mine puts a large piece of wood on his shooting range. I`m not sure how long he shoots into it ,but when it starts getting bad he splits it up. He then recovers the lead from his wood stove. I`ve never seen this done but I`ve shot the log. Always thought it was a good idea.

 

[jmorris]

I always thought that one of the portable traps at Jerry Miculek's range would be neat to have. Put a burner under the snail part of the trap and another pot to catch the lead as it poured out the end.