A few days ago, I posted asking for advice/insight on the possibility of converting the left over slag from casting back into pure lead. Well today I had a few hours with nothing to do so I thought I'd give it a try.
To start off, this experiment was in no way scientific. I didn't have access to a scale, thermometer, etc, just the simple tools I had on hand. Everything was eyeballed and a good deal of guestimation was applied. The tools I used were a stainless steel pot, small propane foundry, clay graphite crucible, cast iron mold, hammer, and a bucket.
I began by heating up the slag I had collected in the pot. I strained off whatever residual pure lead was left, and continued to heat the oxide until it became a uniform dark red powder, which turned a bright yellow as it cooled. Next I crushed up some lump charcoal and began pouring equal amounts of oxide and charcoal by volume into the crucible.
Unsure of what temp I needed, I just set the propane regulator to max and cooked the mixture for ~45mins, stopping about 20mins in to add more charcoal. After a bit of poking, I could tell there was liquid in the crucible underneath the coal. After pouring and straining out the left over coal, I ended up with this small ingot. Not whole lot, but enough for a few more .65 cal balls. I also ended up with quite a bit of extra charcoal, so I may have either used too much or didn't heat it long enough.
For reference, I conducted this experiment on my dad's farm out in the country with no nearby neighbors and used a respirator the entire duration. I figured this may be of interest to some people here. Was this economical? No. Was this safe? Not really, but nothing fun is ever safe
To start off, this experiment was in no way scientific. I didn't have access to a scale, thermometer, etc, just the simple tools I had on hand. Everything was eyeballed and a good deal of guestimation was applied. The tools I used were a stainless steel pot, small propane foundry, clay graphite crucible, cast iron mold, hammer, and a bucket.
I began by heating up the slag I had collected in the pot. I strained off whatever residual pure lead was left, and continued to heat the oxide until it became a uniform dark red powder, which turned a bright yellow as it cooled. Next I crushed up some lump charcoal and began pouring equal amounts of oxide and charcoal by volume into the crucible.
Unsure of what temp I needed, I just set the propane regulator to max and cooked the mixture for ~45mins, stopping about 20mins in to add more charcoal. After a bit of poking, I could tell there was liquid in the crucible underneath the coal. After pouring and straining out the left over coal, I ended up with this small ingot. Not whole lot, but enough for a few more .65 cal balls. I also ended up with quite a bit of extra charcoal, so I may have either used too much or didn't heat it long enough.
For reference, I conducted this experiment on my dad's farm out in the country with no nearby neighbors and used a respirator the entire duration. I figured this may be of interest to some people here. Was this economical? No. Was this safe? Not really, but nothing fun is ever safe
