Whatzit?

My buddy, the Blacksmith, has been waiting 4 months to see me. Along the way, he gathered some belated birthday presents. One of them is a hunk of what appears to be pure lead, but the shape looks a lot like a Civil War-era artillery round. Before I go melting this thing down into musket bullets, I was just wondering if any of y'all have any idea what it might be:



Here's the business end:

Medical radiation isotope holder/shield.

So, could it be radioactive?
You could cast some BP tracer rounds!

44Bro said:

Medical radiation isotope holder/shield.

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You're the second fellow who has mentioned that, and that's the answer I'm going to go with.

The other option was a round for a parrot gun. The general shape is right, but the parrot gun round was not case from lead.

Thanks all!

A big hollow point healed bullet death ray?? Sorry that's all I got.

Yup. I've melted few. They are for low grade isotopes and after they are "expended", the isotope canister is removed and the shield/holder is exposed to the sun for some time until the radiation in the lead has decayed to almost zero.

44Bro said:

Yup. I've melted few. They are for low grade isotopes and after they are "expended", the isotope canister is removed and the shield/holder is exposed to the sun for some time until the radiation in the lead has decayed to almost zero.

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I don’t think sunlight has anything to do with diminishing radiation.
If the isotopes were in their own sealed container, no radiation would transfer to the lead.
The lead shielding is a blocker, not an absorber. The lead ( or any other substance ) cannot become radioactive unless there is particulate contamination leak or deliberate physical attachment of radioactive materials to the lead.

The bombardment of the lead by the rad source causes the lead to become a low level Alpha emitter. Sunlight and heat speeds up the decon process.

Melt it - shoot it, especially on federal owned land even better yet if your shooting it in california.

Used to be in the hospital equipment business. Most every hosp. Imaging dept had some of these around. They are excellent for m/l bullets.

44Bro said:

The bombardment of the lead by the rad source causes the lead to become a low level Alpha emitter. Sunlight and heat speeds up the decon process.

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I used to be an Industrial Radiographer, using Iridium 192 ( and trained on other radioactive materials ) and never heard of that in school or on any of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission exams we had to take.

Just start casting uranium rb. It’ll turn to lead if you don’t mind waiting

Looks like something from Chernobyl

FlinterNick said:

Looks like something from Chernobyl

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INCORRECT!!

Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine!

Do roundballs cast from this material achieve warp speed? Beam me up Scotty.

There's nothing "warp speed " about these isotope containers , as they take a large size lead pot to melt them.

oldwood said:

There's nothing "warp speed " about these isotope containers , as they take a large size lead pot to melt them.

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Yes, I'm figuring that I will have to take the Sawzall to it and turn it into hockey pucks.

Back when most of the excess lead I could get were like 125 lb. pcs. , and smaller , my friend and his gunsmith buddy , puddled the big pcs. w/a gas welding torch. Worked.