Smelting Lead ~ Furnaces/Melters
Posted: 30 Dec 2015 08:55
I've been really searching and watching for a smelter to so that I could start rendering down the amount of lead alloys I have on hand into ingots. I've been using a propane "fryer" with an assortment of pots but I find that it really wastes a lot of heat.
I looked at some commercial setups but they are quite expensive. Here is an example, the small DynaForm Soft Metal furnace. The smallest handles 160# of lead, which is probably too much at a given time for me to work with but I received my quote yesterday and it is $5,000!
Saw one of these on eBay a couple of weeks ago, after watching for a year, it was spent in every stretch of the imagination but they still thought it demanded a high price, several thousand dollars.
The trouble with most furnaces that I've looked at is that they don't provide a "tap" to deliver the molten metal. Most require that the melting chamber be removed with steel tongs and then poured. That really makes a mess with small ingot molds and is quite dangerous actually.
I sure wish an outfit like Lee made a gas fired casting furnace, something that would handle 30 to 40 lbs of lead at a time and provided a tap that didn't tip the furnace or require the use of a ladle for removing the alloy once melted.
I have bought a small smelter as I described, from an estate sale on eBay, that a machinist had made for his use. I did the calculations from the provided dimensions and it should handle about 28# lead alloy at a safe level in the pot. It was only $40, don't know why no one can't provide something like this at a reasonable price point.
I do not use my Lee casting pots, I do not want the foundering debris in them as it has caused problems in the past and I just don't think electric heating elements has a quick enough of a recovery.
I looked at some commercial setups but they are quite expensive. Here is an example, the small DynaForm Soft Metal furnace. The smallest handles 160# of lead, which is probably too much at a given time for me to work with but I received my quote yesterday and it is $5,000!
Saw one of these on eBay a couple of weeks ago, after watching for a year, it was spent in every stretch of the imagination but they still thought it demanded a high price, several thousand dollars.
The trouble with most furnaces that I've looked at is that they don't provide a "tap" to deliver the molten metal. Most require that the melting chamber be removed with steel tongs and then poured. That really makes a mess with small ingot molds and is quite dangerous actually.
I sure wish an outfit like Lee made a gas fired casting furnace, something that would handle 30 to 40 lbs of lead at a time and provided a tap that didn't tip the furnace or require the use of a ladle for removing the alloy once melted.
I have bought a small smelter as I described, from an estate sale on eBay, that a machinist had made for his use. I did the calculations from the provided dimensions and it should handle about 28# lead alloy at a safe level in the pot. It was only $40, don't know why no one can't provide something like this at a reasonable price point.
I do not use my Lee casting pots, I do not want the foundering debris in them as it has caused problems in the past and I just don't think electric heating elements has a quick enough of a recovery.