My Lead Melting Setup

I must report that I took BattleRife up on his generous offer and borrowed the unit.
It works every bit as good as expected. As stated, best way to get started, if the pot is empty, is to melt a small batch and get a puddle going. Once you have some molten in the bottom, it keeps ya going between adding, skimming and pouring. I did about 350 pounds of WW( which is a tenth or less of what I have here), which is a full time job if you have to pack the weights from a ways away like I did. But again, works great, the burner works very well and utilizes less propane than I had anticipated.
I took the liberty of fashioning a wrench, made from a socket, for the pour-plug, with a double handle so you can exert all the force you ever need without it being in the way of the mold while pouring. And an ice-fishing-hole scoop I had makes a perfect tool for skimming the clips and dross I found, also for adding wheel weights instead of dropping them in and risking a splash.
All told, an excellent unit, and with his kind permission I intend to do another batch before I return it.
 
Yup, very generous of OP to lend out equipment. Finding lead/ww these days is not so easy in my hood.
 
@OP would you mind sharing some details on the burner?
I'm planning on building one like yours but am going to make it NG so
it can be hooked up to my BBQ gasline.
 
bertn said:
@OP would you mind sharing some details on the burner?
I'm planning on building one like yours but am going to make it NG so
it can be hooked up to my BBQ gasline.
Click to expand...

As discussed in the opening post, it's a Reil burner and full plans for them can be found at https://www.abana.org/ronreil/design1.shtml#Reil

The designs will not work with household natural gas lines as they require high pressure (at least 5psi) coming from the fuel jets to draw air into the mixing venturi. Household natural gas and low pressure propane are regulated to 7 inches water column, which is something like 0.5 psig. You will need external blowers to get the air moving with pressures that low, and very large fuel orifices.
 
Bertn: I made my own pot and burner assembly that was about the same size as the one shown in the early 80's when lead was plentiful and ended up giving it to my shooting range for them to use. I have since made another one that I mounted in an old Coleman stove so when I get a bit of lead then I use a cast iron pot to do the small amount that I need done. As far as the burner goes the easiest way to get hooked up to NG is find an old Hot Water Heater with a cast iron burner head and use it. They have the correct orifice already installed and all you need is to hook up a bbq quick connect with a reducer to the 3/8" outlet size and bob is your uncle. Just hook it up to your bbq line, open up the turn off valve and adjust the valve to the proper flame size and away you go. Never run out of propane and about 1/4 the cost to run. If I get time in the next couple of days I will take some pictures of it so you can see what I am talking about.
 
hunter64 said:
Bertn: I made my own pot and burner assembly that was about the same size as the one shown in the early 80's when lead was plentiful and ended up giving it to my shooting range for them to use. I have since made another one that I mounted in an old Coleman stove so when I get a bit of lead then I use a cast iron pot to do the small amount that I need done. As far as the burner goes the easiest way to get hooked up to NG is find an old Hot Water Heater with a cast iron burner head and use it. They have the correct orifice already installed and all you need is to hook up a bbq quick connect with a reducer to the 3/8" outlet size and bob is your uncle. Just hook it up to your bbq line, open up the turn off valve and adjust the valve to the proper flame size and away you go. Never run out of propane and about 1/4 the cost to run. If I get time in the next couple of days I will take some pictures of it so you can see what I am talking about.
Click to expand...

OP, Thanks for pointing out the link and sorry for not reading the first post completely...

Hunter64, I already have a waterheater burner hooked up to a quick connect NG flex hose.
Don't have a valve or regulator in between but playing with the shut off ball valve on the fixed gas line works to get a good flame going.

From the picture it just looks like the burner used by the OP has a bit more "juice" then my water heater burner so that made me curious.
Guess it does not matter that much, it will just take (a bit?) longer for the lead to melt with my (only 40.000 btu) NG burner.
Like the fact that it's cheaper to run on NG but downside is that I will be forced to stay within about ten ft of the house :(
 
bertn said:
OP, Thanks for pointing out the link and sorry for not reading the first post completely...

Hunter64, I already have a waterheater burner hooked up to a quick connect NG flex hose.
Don't have a valve or regulator in between but playing with the shut off ball valve on the fixed gas line works to get a good flame going.

From the picture it just looks like the burner used by the OP has a bit more "juice" then my water heater burner so that made me curious.
Guess it does not matter that much, it will just take (a bit?) longer for the lead to melt with my (only 40.000 btu) NG burner.
Like the fact that it's cheaper to run on NG but downside is that I will be forced to stay within about ten ft of the house :(
Click to expand...

Actually you can go up to 30' from the house legally, lol. Yes it will take longer but on the up side is the fact that you can adjust the flame to what is needed and get the lead to no more than 700 Deg. F to ensure that no zinc is inadvertently missed and mixed in with the good stuff. To high of heat can get you in trouble if you miss a zinc WW.
 
Thread revival time....

This thread convinced me it was time (way way overdue) to build a smelter so spent the last couple of day doing that by cutting up an old outdated propane bottle and modifying a tiger torch a bit ....basically spent $ 4 on fittings for the torch and ten min with the cutting torch and I was done. Works admirably, did two 30 lb batches of cww in about 15 min each.

The only thing I haven't built yet is the "bottom pour" spout...My question to Battle or anybody that has used his outfit is: does the threads on the bolt in the "valve" stop the flow or is there a sort of "needle & seat" affair inside the coupler fitting.
 
fingers284 said:
... the "bottom pour" spout...My question to Battle or anybody that has used his outfit is: does the threads on the bolt in the "valve" stop the flow or is there a sort of "needle & seat" affair inside the coupler fitting.
Click to expand...

The latter. I had a friend with a lathe clean the threads from the end of a bolt, and machine a very wide chamfer. The hole in the wall of the vessel is also chamfered, and the two chamfers mate together. Doesn't leak a drop.

Valve%20bolt_zpsmibkphnh.jpg
 
Thank you . I built one similar to that on my first attempt but the piping I used was too small (1/8 pipe thread) and a little too long and far from the torch...it froze off before the stream got to the end....so back to the drawing board today built a whole new pot with a similar outfit that Lyman uses in their bottom pour pots (even used the rod with the tapper cut on the end of it from an old pot)...3/8 piping and shorter with a lot steeper drop, try er out tomorrow.
 
Tomorrow came and went....with some "tempered" success, made up about 80# of pure lead ingots (from some old roofing sheet lead) until the spout froze off again, think I will have to keep a bottle torch handy to heat up the spout periodically.
 
Good afternoon all. I have been melting and re-purposing WW into a more suitable product. On a small scale. BattleRifle are you still in Edmonton? I have a large reserve of WW and have been melting a couple 100lbs. as needed. Is your set-up still available? I am also sending a PM.
 
After a summer touring around central Alberta the melter has come home to me. Thanks to the guys who borrowed it and took such good care of it, and even contributed to improving it (I'm pretty sure I never painted the base!) Based on what I have been told this contraption has turned 2-3 tonnes of scrap lead into ingots over the course of the last 12 months and it is absolutely none the worse for wear, in fact it seems to be better than ever.

As this experience of lending out the machine and meeting fellow nutters has been nothing but positive, I want to emphasize that the offer remains open. Anyone who wants to use it, promises to look after it and pledges to get it back to me may make use of it.
 
BattleRife said:
After a summer touring around central Alberta the melter has come home to me. Thanks to the guys who borrowed it and took such good care of it, and even contributed to improving it (I'm pretty sure I never painted the base!) Based on what I have been told this contraption has turned 2-3 tonnes of scrap lead into ingots over the course of the last 12 months and it is absolutely none the worse for wear, in fact it seems to be better than ever.

As this experience of lending out the machine and meeting fellow nutters has been nothing but positive, I want to emphasize that the offer remains open. Anyone who wants to use it, promises to look after it and pledges to get it back to me may make use of it.
Click to expand...
Good style Sir, good style.
 
BattleRife said:
As discussed in the opening post, it's a Reil burner and full plans for them can be found at https://www.abana.org/ronreil/design1.shtml#Reil

The designs will not work with household natural gas lines as they require high pressure (at least 5psi) coming from the fuel jets to draw air into the mixing venturi. Household natural gas and low pressure propane are regulated to 7 inches water column, which is something like 0.5 psig. You will need external blowers to get the air moving with pressures that low, and very large fuel orifices.
Click to expand...

You were right on the external blower and orifice, thanks for the advice.

I got my NG burner working great and gave the big melting pot a good workout last night by melting 400 lbs of lead (at once!) and pouring it into delicious pie ingots.

Great I idea to share your pot with fellow gunnutz so hereby my offer to share my natural gas pot to guys in my area, Stratford ON. (Sorry, not to newbies with zero feedback...put too much love into making it so you need to have some sort of track record.)

It has the quick connect NG connector, 110v water heater blower with a fan speed controller, bottom pour through a gas shut off valve (the old style with the conical brass inside and no plastic seals), rebar tripod legs and an aluminium "skirt" to block wind and improve efficiency.
Also used a thermometer to check the temperature of the melt.
I have not done the gas meter reading this time since the furnace in the house was on but melting the first batch of about 150 lbs of ww used about 3 cubic meter NG, so that's less than a buck in gas.

Shut off valve works great. Need to have a torch handy because lead solidifies if you take too much time dumping the ingots out of the mold.

Pics are not great since it was dark already but here are some:

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low flame

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high flame

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lead pie
 
nice work on getting everything together in such an efficient package. thanks for the pics and posting
 
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