Melting Lead

A bit OT but as you are all engineers What is the melting point of lead? If I melt it are the fumes poisonous?
What is the best vessel to melt lead in?

Colin Jacobs wrote:
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327.5 ?C (600.65 ?K, 621.5 ?F)
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Titanic?

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interesting but do any one know anything about melting ally and using it with moulds??

steves-place @ www.bigun.serverbox.org wrote:
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http://www.backyardmetalcasting.com / http://www.abymc.com / http://www.dansworkshop.com/Aluminum%20Foundry.shtml
Try a google for "Lost foam casting" "Backyard Foundry" etc

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thanks m8 greatly appreciated :)

steves-place @ www.bigun.serverbox.org wrote:
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No probs - I've just spent a month researching the very same thing.
I've just finished my first furnace[1] - will be doing my first melt tomorrow if it's not raining.
[1] Photos later. It's a ceramic chimney post surrounded by concrete in a 25l metal bucket. Tuyere is a 9 inch length of 2" scaffolding pole. I've made the lid out of another (10L) metal bucket filled with concrete. Crucible is a stainless steel 4" pipe with 1/8 steel plate welded to bottom. Oh, and the charcoal is home made - fill (another) 10l metal bucket with blocks from a stripped down pallet, punch 4 holes in lid with a nail, throw in garden incinerator, leave until cool (overnight)

BigEgg wrote:
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Sounds interesting.
Does anyone have any links for UK suppliers of furnace materials, eg castable ceramics, blankets, ITC-100 and so on?
Any sources for electric heating elements? I want to make a small electric 2800 F/ 1550 C furnace, maybe 6" dia by 9" high inside.
It's also got to be argon filled, any suggestions?
I've been googling for such, but any UK sources seems to be lost in the flood from the US.
Thanks

Peter Fairbrother wrote:
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ITC-100 can be obtained from Scarva Pottery, http://www.scarvapottery.com/opencontent/default.asp?itemid 1&section=PRODUCTS
With VAT+carriage it works out nearly £40 a pint, although a small amount does go a long way...
For castable refractory materials and other foundry products, I use John Winter in Halifax http://www.johnwinter.co.uk /
There are many more suppliers, but I use JW because they do a really low carriage charge (it was a tenner+VAT carriage for 3x25kg bags of 1650 castable recently).

Peter Fairbrother wrote:
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If you use google.co.uk there is a radio button that allows you to search "UK only", alternatively add "UK" to the search.

Duncan Munro wrote:
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Ouch ..
Is it as good as they say? And do you know the maximum working temperature? That's information that's _really_ hard to find.
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Sounds good.
Does anyone know of a supplier with an online catalogue though? Any other suggestions for suppliers?
Any sources for heating elements?
Thanks very much.

BigEgg wrote:
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Yes, I clicked that button. I tried adding "uk".
I also tried adding "VAT" or "price" or "online catalogue" other such search terms, and looking for particular items, even those of a similar type, whose names would be unusual and wouldn't include so much dross, f'r instance "molybdenum disilicide" - but in this case my google-fu was weak, and I only got a few not-very-good hits. Any suggestions?
Regards all,

Colin Jacobs wrote:
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The fumes shouldn't be poisonous, unless it's painted, lead is only harmful when ingested, and even then mainly only to children
Lead will melt on the kitchen stove in a pan, but you are probably better off waiting until your other half has gone out :.))
Easiest way:- a large ceramic plant pot in a (larger) bucket of soil or sand. Put an empty baked bean tin in the centre of the flower pot, fill around with charcoal. Light, wait twenty minutes.
If you can feed an air pipe into the bottom and blow air in from a hairdryer, it should melt inside of five minutes - 20 minutes will melt aluminimininimimum.

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Sorry, but that's not true. Lead vaporises very easily and the fumes are toxic. The vapour is absorbed into the blood via the lungs and has a cumulative toxic effect because it can not be expelled by the body. As a chemist I would never have melted lead without the protection of a fume cupboard in a laboratory. Colin won't have that available so it is best done outdoors and remaining upwind.
Cliff.

On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 17:54:11 +0000, BigEgg wrote:
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This is false.
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Highly dangerous - the lead will stay in the room (if not the whole house) for a very long time.
If you want to shorten your life it is anpleasant way of doing it, the worst thing about lead poisoning is the unseen damage it can do.

On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 16:52:28 GMT, "Colin Jacobs" wrote:
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Google is your friend: http://www.chemicalelements.com/elements/pb.html
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Google is your friend: http://www.environmentaldefense.org/pressrelease.cfm?ContentID 40
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Something not made of lead? An old iron saucepan? Slightly OTT, but again, Google is your friend: http://www.plumbworld.co.uk/1028-0000

On Sat, 26 Mar 2005 16:52:28 GMT, "Colin Jacobs"
Colin,
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Maybe not the last word in vessels, but I reclaimed all the lead cable sheath from rewiring an old house years ago by chopping the lead into bits and melting it in a Heinz Beans tin on a Primus stove. You can easily shape the tin can into a good pouring shape, and I used simple wooden moulds to make ingots which I still use today as weights.
Jim.

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On it they heated the lead in a Wok over a wood fire until melted, but over the lead as it heated was an upturned metal funnel joined to a length of plastic pipe, which was coiled though cold water to let the lead fumes condense on the inside of the pipe. The pipe and water had to be above the level of the fire to allow the hot fumes to rise. HTH Anthony

Thank you to everyone for these tips. I can rely on the panel to answer any questions I may have. Cheers CJ
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