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Cutting Lead Bars

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I have a bucket of saw dust and lead mixed together in the shed for about 6 years now. I can only guess it was from a hospital x-ray room getting built. It was given to me with several other buckets with good lead in it. One of these days, I will scoop it out a little at a time and dump into a bucket of water so the lead sinks and the wood floats to reclaim the lead. And before someone on a platform tells me, yes, I do know to make sure it's water free/dry before melting. I do care.

 

If proper precautions are taken, I see no issue with cutting lead with a saw. Don't do it myself, probably will not ever do it. I know people that think we all are crazy for pouring lead, period. We learned to handle it right to minimize the hazard. Myself, I would not care to hear from one of them that "You just don't care".  Proper precautions can be done for this method, and those that use them really do care. :yay:

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I have a bucket of saw dust and lead mixed together in the shed for about 6 years now. I can only guess it was from a hospital x-ray room getting built. It was given to me with several other buckets with good lead in it. One of these days, I will scoop it out a little at a time and dump into a bucket of water so the lead sinks and the wood floats to reclaim the lead. And before someone on a platform tells me, yes, I do know to make sure it's water free/dry before melting. I do care.

 

If proper precautions are taken, I see no issue with cutting lead with a saw. Don't do it myself, probably will not ever do it. I know people that think we all are crazy for pouring lead, period. We learned to handle it right to minimize the hazard. Myself, I would not care to hear from one of them that "You just don't care".  Proper precautions can be done for this method, and those that use them really do care. :yay:

 

I'd just put that sawdust lead mixture in my smelting pot and burn the sawdust out.

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Well, I certainly wasn't trying to be little anybody.  I just wanted people to understand that throwing lead dust in the air with a saw is not a good practice when handling lead.  Breathing lead dust has got to be worse even than eating or drinking when handling lead. 

 

Unfortunately I've had friends who's children where slowly lead poisoned over time because a slimy drinking water company used lead solder in their storage tank.  The company is justifiably out of business permanently.  The amount of lead from that was insignificant compared to the amount of lead dust that could be sucked into your lungs when buzzing through a block of lead. 

 

On top of that lead poisoning is slow.  It can take years, builds up in your system and does all kinds of damage. 

 

Working with lead is relatively safe if you use safe practices, but in my opinion using a power saw to buzz through it isn't one of them. 

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The RCBS Pro Melt Pot that I've been using for a couple years now handles the 5lb bars from Roto Metals without having to break them down.  I still had to break down some larger lead block I received.  Sold off all my Lee pots.  If my RCBS pot ever has a problem I'll pay the extra for another one.  No more Lee pots for me.  

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Sorry to revive an old thread but I've been looking everywhere for ideas how to cut down unwieldy chunks of lead into manageable sizes without creating a lot of hazardous conditions.  I have access to a 600 to 800 chunk buried in somebody's back yard where taking a chainsaw or cutting torch would be a problem since she has dogs running around we don't want to poison.  I already have several large chunks that are clean enough to use in my bottom pour pot but too big to fit in it and the whole propane fire dipping process is something I'd rather avoid when I can - that's why I bought the Lee pot in the first place.

I've been wondering if anybody's ever tried making a functional heavy duty hot knife out of plate steel or an old machete and an arc welder?  Early Lincolns actually had a low current setting for thawing frozen pipes.  It seems there ought to be a sweet spot somewhere on my arc welder where I could clamp either end of machete or lawnmower blade and the resultant short circuit should get it just hot enough to slice through lead without blowing up the welder. 

Am I nutz or might this work?

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You can try it, but of all the people that I have talked to, the easiest was to cut it on a band saw with a course teeth. People have tried propane torch, ax, scroll saw, table saw and hand saw. All of these processes were way to slow. Unfortunately the easiest is to take it to a big melting place and have them pour manageable ingots. But I'm sure that that is costly. The problem with anything that cuts fast and generates heat will gum up the blade and get the blade stuck in the lead. I have heard of chainsaw as well but that was apparently dangerous. With that said my only answer is slow and steady. That is why I don't like to get big chunks of FREE lead. How the heck are you going to cut it and if you do how much time are you going to spend cutting and maneuvering it. Cheaper to buy small pieces. Good luck and let us know how you make out.

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