Lead Melting

[paulrobinson318]

So a simple question as I have my first Lee Melting pot on the way to my house. After I am done for the day, do I leave the lead in the pot and let it dry, then remelt it? Or do I have to pour it all out into ingots after each use, then remelt?

 

[starcraft1]

leave it in the pot allow to cool. WARNING!!! Do Not put cold lead into a hot pot, it could cause a blow-up. This is the last thing you want. The cold lead will cool the pot to fast and lead will go every where. Add your lead when the pot is just starting to heat up. With a Lee pot it's not a good idea to fill the pot completely full, leave it at least 2" down from the top. To full will cause the pour spout to drip. Also clean your pot every 3rd or 4th filling. Use either bee's wax or other cleaners on the market. Bee's wax will smoke, so do it out side. Try to use pure lead and stay away from to much wheel weights have alloys and a ton of dirt and road grime in them and will dirty your pot much faster.

[cadman]

I leave all my lead in the pot all year long. I never clean my pot unless I have real problems. I too clean my lead with bee's wax. Best way to do this is light the fire and then slowly mix the lead. Letting it smoke, will juist make a lot of smoke.

[starcraft1]

I leave all my lead in the pot all year long. I never clean my pot unless I have real problems. I too clean my lead with bee's wax. Best way to do this is light the fire and then slowly mix the lead. Letting it smoke, will juist make a lot of smoke.

I use to do the same until I had a drip problem and drained the pot and found a half an inch of sand type grit in the bottom. This didn't do the pour spout any good. I have a much larger unit now and we buy lead in much larger amounts( 1 ton + at a time). We still melt the lead and clean it prior to final pour. You'd be surprized of the amount of crap that comes out of it. I think if your buying small amounts in 1 lb. ingots you should be fine for quite awhile.

[Jig Man]

I leave all my lead in the pot all year long. I never clean my pot unless I have real problems. I too clean my lead with bee's wax. Best way to do this is light the fire and then slowly mix the lead. Letting it smoke, will juist make a lot of smoke.

Same here.  Except I use paraffin wax instead of bee's wax. 

 

I have to add lead if I am doing several large jigs.  I have never had a problem adding lead to a hot pot.  I do hold it with pliers and slip it into the pot so I won't burn my fingers.

[smalljaw67]

As others have told you, just leave it in the pot, I'll give you some other tips to keep in mind. Moisture, that is what will cause an explosion, 1 bead of sweat in to a mold cavity caused a blow up that if I wasn't wearing safety glasses, well I don't want to think what would have happened. To get started pouring with your pot, put the lead you are going to melt inside the pot and turn the thermostat to 5 and place you mold on top of the pot, this will melt the lead slower but it will do so in a manner that will cause any moisture on the lead to evaporate before the lead melts so it will be fine, plus with you mold on top, it will be heated so that your pours will come out better right from the start as you have to have a hot mold otherwise the lead freezes to fast and you end up with an incomplete pour.

[dopey]

Guess I'm the weird one I'll pour until the pot is empty or drain and have been since the one's I had in the 80's, but that's my preference.  I had never fluxed lead till I saw the thread on Tackle Underground - I use old pieces of Yankee candles that my wife wanted to throw out and it smells better when I'm fluxing it!!LOL  

[paulrobinson318]

leave it in the pot allow to cool. WARNING!!! Do Not put cold lead into a hot pot, it could cause a blow-up. This is the last thing you want. The cold lead will cool the pot to fast and lead will go every where. Add your lead when the pot is just starting to heat up. With a Lee pot it's not a good idea to fill the pot completely full, leave it at least 2" down from the top. To full will cause the pour spout to drip. Also clean your pot every 3rd or 4th filling. Use either bee's wax or other cleaners on the market. Bee's wax will smoke, so do it out side. Try to use pure lead and stay away from to much wheel weights have alloys and a ton of dirt and road grime in them and will dirty your pot much faster.

I ordered soft lead ingots from ebay for it, that's what i'm supposed to do, right?

[starcraft1]

That's a good safe start, kinda pricey thou. Check out your nearest scrap yard. They should have some sheet lead for sale. !/8th & 1/4" is what you'd want. Melt it down outside or WELL VENTILATED area in a pot big enough to put on a turkey burner (hope you got the idea on that), Coleman type camp stove. Any dirt or grime will either float to the top to be scraped off or fall to the bottom. Go to your local thrift store and get some cup cake tins to pour the melted lead into also pick up a steel gravy ladle. Steel is best but alum. will do. Let them cool and the disk are the right size to put into your lee pot (either the 10# or 20#) I'm not sure about your scrap prices, but I'll bet you it's a lot less than E-bay and no shipping cost. You'll be surprised how far 20 lbs. of lead will go.

[smalljaw67]

I ordered soft lead ingots from ebay for it, that's what i'm supposed to do, right?

 

What you got is fine and I saw some decent prices on ebay. In the future if you find yourself pouring a lot you can go to Rotometals and buy 55lbs of pig lead or 5lb ingots and it is 99.9% pure lead, of course the more you buy the more you save. They now sell bags of reclaimed shot which is very cheap and a good deal, the only problem is you don't know how much antimony is in it but for the price it is hard to beat.