LINOTYPE & PURE LEAD QUESTION

[74man]

When the lead plant back east got closed down, a neighbor gave me about 60 lbs of wheel weights, I melted them down and cast ingots of them. Then I had a chance to get some Lino Type (about 40 lbs) and did the same thing with them, melted them down and cast them into ingots. Now they have been under my work bench and I can't tell the difference in the bars of ingots. Is there any way to tell the difference between the pure lead ingots and the lino type ingots? Does one weigh more than the other? Do I have to do a hardness test, like a brindle test or something like that? Is there a simple way to tell the difference between the two? Thanks for the answers.

 

[ArchAngelCD]

First off wheel weights are not pure lead. They usually come back as between 10 & 12 BHN.

The Linotype is extremely hard, about 22 BHN.

You can probably tell which is which with your fingernail. You will easily tell the difference in hardness.
Give it a try and please let us know if you can tell.

I would not waste the Linotype by using it as is to cast bullets unless you are casting high speed rifle bullets. You can mix it with the wheel weights for a hardness of 16 to 18 BHN for use in magnum handgun bullets or use the wheel weights as is for .38 Special, 45 Auto and bullets used like that.

I hope this helps a bit...

 

[Highland Lofts]

I buy & sell a lot of lead, over two tons so far.
I bought two different lead testers so I can have an accurate BHN number.
For only around 100 pounds of lead buying a tester isn't feasible.
I have different grades of lead melted into ingots and will see how to check them another way and let you know.

 

[243winxb]

A thumb nail is my method to check hardness. If I can mark a bullet, it's to soft.

Pure Rotometals Linotype will be lighter in weight.

My 44 bullet test with different alloys. Weights ranged from 259.5 grs to 238.9 grs.

 

[Hooda Thunkit]

Drop an ingot on the concrete garage floor.

Edit: drop so that a corner of the ingot hits first.

The wheel weights will thud, the linotype will clink.

 

[Docendo Discimus]

Drop an ingot on the concrete garage floor.

Edit: drop so that a corner of the ingot hits first.

The wheel weights will thud, the linotype will clink.

Yep

 

[bullseye308]

Drop an ingot on the concrete garage floor.

Edit: drop so that a corner of the ingot hits first.

The wheel weights will thud, the linotype will clink.

Came here to say that. They will sound different and the Lino will not deform and may break.

 

[hdbiker]

Poke them with an awl, you should be able to tell the hardest ones

 

[Bwana John]

You can use the hardness of different drafting pencils to determine the hardness of your alloys.

https://forum.castbulletassoc.org/thread/dhccking-lead-hardness-with-drawing-pencils/

 

[74man]

This is to Hooda Thunkit,-- I dropped them on the garage floor and they all rang, not a thud among them. I Think that is because when I would melt a 4lb pot full of wheel weights I would cut a piece of tin solder about 12" long and then after that melted in, I would pour the lead into the ingot mold. That is what a reloader told me to do. Do you think that that is why they all went clink and not thud? TO 243,-- I also used my thumb nail and I could make a mark, but I also made a mark on all the ingots. TO BIKER,-- I took a scribe and scratched them, all of them seemed the same. I took an automatic center punch and made the same depth punch hole in all the ingots, they all seemed to be the same hardness even though I know some were all wheel weights with about 12" of tin solder added and some of the ingots were Lino Type. Is there any way besides buying a metal hardness tester to make sure they will be good for bullets?

 

[RetiredUSNChief]

Another problem here is the composition of wheel weights themselves has varied over the years/decades. Some more modern ones are low lead alloys, some simply used differing amounts of alloying metals as the market prices fluctuated over the years and decades. It's not as if there's any real technical specification somewhere which says "wheel weight alloy shall consist of the following".

Well...outside California, anyway.

Your neighbor's supply of wheel weights could have been gathered over a significant number of years, meaning there would be a variety of alloys present. And even a few modern wheel weights mixed in with older ones could significantly affect hardness.

 

[Hooda Thunkit]

@74man - cast em and shoot em. Don't overthink it.

I had thought that you melted the different alloys separately; kept the wheel weights 'pure' and the linotype in separate ingots. It sounds more like they are all mixed.

Don't worry about it. Shoot em up.

 

[74man]

When I did the Wheel Weights into ingots, I added about a 12' piece of tin solder to a 4 pound pot of melted wheel weights. I melted the Lino Type and poured them into ingots but I don't think I added any tin solder. I am not sure to make my bullets out of them or not, don't know that they will hold up in handgun calibers. Would it be ok to pour them, although I don't know which ingots are wheel weights or lino type?

 

[Highland Lofts]

If you powder coat them with a good quality material you shouldn't have any problems.

 

[lightman]

Either will hold up at handgun velocities. How big is your smelting pot? Will it hold all 100 ingots? If so, melt them all together.

This is the reason that I started stamping mine with steel stamps.

 

[Carl N. Brown]

Linotype is very very hard.

Linotype is 4% Tin, 12% Antimony, and 84% Lead.

Blending one part linotype + one part pure lead gives a 2% Tin, 6% Antimony and 92% Lead alloy that is said to be good for casting bullets.

Supposedly linotype bullets are so hard that they shatter on impact with large bones and thus are too brittle for hunting unless alloyed with pure lead..

Back in the 1970s I bought a .45 caliber Hapkins & Allen Buggy Rifle from a co-worker at Kingsport Press. We were converting from Linotype typesetters to the RCA Videocomp (Rudolf Hell Digiset) electronic typesetter, so scrap linotype was salvagable.

His muzzleloder, .45 cal, came with a .45 bullet mold, and a lot of cast .45 caliber linotype bullets. I quickly found out that .45 bore muzzleloading rifle needed a .44" diameter buller and about a .013" lubed patch to load easily. Loading a .45" Linotype ball in the .45 Buggy Rifle (actually a carbine) required using a waxed felt over powder wad and using a mallet on the ball starter. Lot of work. I quickly switched to .44" commercial lead balls and pillow ticking patches.

 

[mdi]

You won't get a BHN number bur the fingernail and drop test will tell you which ingot is hard and which is softer WW alloy.
An easy (cheap) way to get an approximate BHN;

 

[GeoDudeFlorida]

I took an automatic center punch and made the same depth punch hole in all the ingots

Then they're all the same. An automatic center punch will deliver the same pressure, the same depth, the same strike, everytime no matter what you're punching with it. That's pretty close to how a Brinell tester works. I've used mechanical RC and BN testers for decades, including in the inspection cages of aerospace shops, and the real test is the diameter of the crater left by the punch. Get a 10x magnifying glass and look at the crater next to a machinists scale. If they are all the same diameter, edge-to-edge then they are all the same hardness. I can't tell you what hardness they are, just that they are all the same. From what you've posted, I'd say you don't have two different alloy, you have two different recollections of how those alloys were made. Could be wrong...

When I did the Wheel Weights into ingots, I added about a 12' piece of tin solder to a 4 pound pot of melted wheel weights. I melted the Lino Type and poured them into ingots but I don't think I added any tin solder. I am not sure to make my bullets out of them or not, don't know that they will hold up in handgun calibers. Would it be ok to pour them, although I don't know which ingots are wheel weights or lino type?

Castem, checkem and chootem! Don't sweat the details. Cast them using a known mold. If they drop at the weight the mold maker says with a specific alloy, then that's what they are. If they're lighter, then they hove more antimony or tin; if they're heavier then they have more lead. Either way, load them using a starting load data, and shoot em.

 

[denton]

Clamp a small steel ball between two ingots, and tighten the clamp. The ball will leave a dent in both ingots. The one with the larger dent is softer.

 

[tightgroup tiger]

Then they're all the same. An automatic center punch will deliver the same pressure, the same depth, the same strike, everytime no matter what you're punching with it. That's pretty close to how a Brinell tester works. I've used mechanical RC and BN testers for decades, including in the inspection cages of aerospace shops, and the real test is the diameter of the crater left by the punch. Get a 10x magnifying glass and look at the crater next to a machinists scale. If they are all the same diameter, edge-to-edge then they are all the same hardness. I can't tell you what hardness they are, just that they are all the same. From what you've posted, I'd say you don't have two different alloy, you have two different recollections of how those alloys were made. Could be wrong...

May be bottoming out on all the ingots so they all look the same. Too much spring pressure for lead. Good concept though.

 

[tightgroup tiger]

74 Man, if you poured pure Lynotype into ingots there should be no problems telling which are the hard ingots and which are the soft ingots, between WWs and Lynotype. If the lynotype ingots sound the same when hitting concrete as the lead ingots, then it has already been alloyed before you got it.
If you bought these as Lynotype and poured them as such, then there should be enough difference to easily tell which is which by any of the methods said above.

 

[GeoDudeFlorida]

May be bottoming out on all the ingots so they all look the same. Too much spring pressure for lead. Good concept though.

Hmmm.. you're right. I was thinking it would crack pure Linotype or at least leave a differently shaped crater since the two metals have different densities but, yes, it could be striking to a finite depth and moving slowly enough not to crack the Linotype. I'm still thinking probably they're the same alloy, or really darn close, but an assay using a water bath to check the density would be the next step and that's kind of hard (for me) to describe in a forum post.

 

[Thomasss]

I'm surprised you can still find Linotype. I helped salvage out a couple machines back in the 1970s and that equipment was obsolete back then.

 

[J-Bar]

Redneck hardness test:

One ingot in each hand. Hit ‘em together hard so they make contact on an edge. The big dent is the softer ingot.

The nice thing about this method is you can rank every ingot in your inventory in relative hardness without using additional equipment, and get some exercise to boot!

 

[Bazoo]

Well... first off you won’t scratch either ww or Lino with a fingernail. You won’t scratch Lino hardly with an awl. WW though can be scratched with an awl. That’s the way I’d test. Either an awl or flat blade screwdriver.

Also the sound test works. On concrete, drop the ingots from about 6-8” and there will be a distinct ring to the Lino ingots.

Adding 12 solder to a 4 pound pot is a lot of tin and should get you into the 3-4% tin range for those ingots.

I wouldn’t shoot the Lino except for rifle bullets at high speed or mix it and make an alloy.

WWs make excellent pistol bullets with no alloying. Both for an automatic and a cylinder gun.

If all else fails, you know how much metal you started with, so you could mix it all together and cut it with pure, using an alloy calculator to get the right mix, and get it down to approximate Lyman #2 alloy. You can’t go wrong with that.