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Wheel weights

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Well I went scrouging for wheel weights while Ive been out the last 2 days. So far none of the tire places have wanted to give me any weights or tell me what they were being paid for them by their recyclers. So I called around and all the yards here are only paying .05-.08 per pound. Any ways I ran across a shop, they had 3 buckets full when I asked him if i could have sum he said shure then when I went to grab a bucket, he said I could only have a hand full(?), any ways I went right next door and the guy was so nice. I asked him for lead weights for making fishing weights and he said how many buckets you wany? Well I was not prepared, all I had was some plastic bags. So we dumped one container of weights in the trunk of my car in a big bag. He was so nice. I asked him about what they get paind and he told me about $10 for all 3 containers, I only took one, but the largest. Got home and put them in a carboard box in a milk crate and weighed them. 137# I dont need to look for wheel weights for a long time, now to find some soft lead.

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SWEET! 137lbs is a lot. I usually get about 40-50 at a time. Just bring them in the house for a few days to get any moisture out. I've had about 8 out of 10 buckets contain such a trace amount of moisture that I couldn't even see, and dump them in my pot and thank God I was wearing safety goggles. :D I just picked up 58 lbs of pure soft lead at a scrap yard for .30 cents a pound. Mix it 50/50 and it's awesome.

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One of the scrap yards I called only paid 15 centst for soft lead but would not sell me any because of all the lead regs. I found another place and they wanted 40 cents a pound but I was not shure if it was soft or not.It did not seem to scratch to easy. I will look around more in the future. But I now need a bigger pot to mealt all this lead. I was looking for a cast iron dutch oven to do this crude hard dirty lead so I can pour ingots. But I would like to drill and tap the pan for a type of bottem(but really side pour). Also I was at walmart I ran across a mini loaf pan that has 8 cavaties for $3. So soon I will be pouring.

Does anybody know if battery cable connectors or barrery terminals are soft lead?

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When you are melting all those wheel weights, fill the iron pot right up as the lead melts down pretty easy. When the lead has all melted and the wheel weight clips are floating on the top, take a big magnet and hold over top of the pot. All the clips will come out of the pot cleanly with no effort. This makes it easier to skim all the crap off the top. Be careful, wear eye protection and good gloves. Especially when pulling the clips off of the magnet. They are pretty hot!! Good luck and have fun!!

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So far I tried to melt down one pot full and it was very tough as I knew it would from previous experience. I tried to melt again on a BBQ side burner and it is not hot enough so I use a propane torch on the lead itself to get it going. I am going to have to build a furnace to really melt these wheel weights. My pot was about 1/2 to 3/4 full and I could not lift it. I poured 30#s of ingots (qty8) and then still had lead left over. I have seen sone nice berners that I am going to try to scale down and make the furnace.

http://www.prismnet.com/~jrf/SubPics/image593.html

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