Scrap Lead Source

I made up my own sort of little lead smelter. First I made a pot (12"x12"x18" tall) out of 1/8" sheet metal. Then I welded 20 22.5" transport rims with the centers cut out) and cut a 4" hole in the side of the lower one. Took my 10' of flex pipe I had kicken around and shoved it in the hole in the rim and shoved my industrial leaf blower in the other end and duct taped it together. Then I went and picked up a few backs of BBQ charcoal, dropped my pot in the center and filled the charcoal around the pot. Lit it up, turned on the air. Once it was hot I started adding the lead (I got scrap lead from a scrap yard, wheel weights from a tire guy and some other misc sources). Kept adding until the pot was full (removed all the floating steel and other crap) then used a home made ladel (made it out of 3" round tubing, capped on end and put a nice bit handle on it). And then poured it into my pre made and welded 3x3" thin wall tubing with one end capped....filled it up, let it cool and then welded a cap on the other end, painted them up nice and now I have about 1000Lbs of 35lbs individual weights.

Do it outside and its not really that bad, the day I did it there was a little breeze and I didn't smell a thing. Worked slick and was ALOT cheaper to do then buying case weights.

RyanB
 
well I have plenty of suitcase weights I am just looking into other possibilities to make it easier to move. I typically haul all my weights in the bed of my truck to the event and then unload it all and load it all on the front of the truck then when done reverse to get home... just looking for something a little easier than slinging 1200lb of weights out of the back of the truck.
 
most of the tire shops are telling me that they have contracted out people to pick up there weights ..


And they are telling me that the are going to start useing none lead stick on weights
 
Years ago I made some weight bars for my race car, using 1.5" x 3" rectangular tubing. I drilled some big holes straight through for hold-down bolts, and welded tubing into the holes (so the bolts pass through the tubes). I got a bunch of wheel weights from a local tire shop. I made a "lighter" bar by loosely filling it with tire weights (just shaking it to get them to settle). For a dense bar I just held a torch on the bottom of the bar while I dropped the weights in. I just let the steel float around with the lead. IIRC the melted one is over twice the weight of the other one.

Kinda bummed, when I left my last job I had about 150 lbs of lead bricks, which was left to me by a guy who left the company (and he didn't want to deal with hauling them home). I was too dang tired on my last day (after packing up my office), so I gave them away. Dang things are probably still there in the corner of that shop!
 
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