Plumber's lead for Minies.

[WCJ]

Hello all,

My question is for anyone that has used scrap plumber's lead for casting minies. I have used it in the past and have cut off the soldered seams as it is harder than the lead used in the main part of the piece. What I want to know is is this necessary or will the smaller amount solder really not make a lot of difference as to the softness os the lead for shooting purposes?

Thanks,
Walter

[jonk]

Depends a lot on pipe diameter, how many bends there are that are soldered, etc. In short, how much pure there is to the tin content. And, for that matter, if the pipe itself is absolutely pure. While I am a firm believer that minie lead has to be absolutely as soft as possible, I know some guys go 40:1 without problem, and on older pipe, the solder is probably 50/50. What I'd do is cut some off and weigh vs. the pipe's weight, and if less than 40:1, just melt it up and see.

[Maillemaker]

The number one consideration for precision shooting is repeatability. Everything from shot to shot needs to be as consistent as possible - the firearm must return to the same mechanical state it was in, and you must have the same percussion cap, and the same kind of powder, and the same amount of powder, and the same weight of bullet, and the same bullet material. If any of these things change in between shots your precision will probably suffer for it.

If you are going to dabble in unknown alloys, you really need a hardness tester if you want to know for certain what you are working with. If I was going to dabble in different or unknown alloys, I would try to at least batch my bullets so that all of the bullets I make have the same alloy composition, and segregate those batches for competition use.

Now you always reach a point in these discussions where someone will question whether some particular variable "really matters". Maybe not. I don't claim to be a very good shooter, and certainly there are lots of people who have been doing this game a lot longer and a lot better than I have. But I've been shooting N-SSA competition for 3 years now and I've taken home a medal at every skirmish I've gone to. I shoot nothing but 99.9% pure lead from Rotometals, with a BB-sized piece of tin in the pot to help with mold fill-out. I also weigh my bullets and discard those outside of +/- .5% from average.

The proof of the pudding, as always, is in the eating. Serve some up and have a bite and see how it tastes! :)

Steve

[gmkmd]

I know it's just anecdotal, but a team member of mine had this very issue. He always shot great, but had a sudden and severe deterioration of accuracy. He had just cast a batch of Minie's from a lead shower liner. Someone pointed out the issue of the soldered seams to him. He cast a new batch with lead in which he removed the soldered seams, and everything went back to normal.

[Joe Plakis, 9575V]

I look at it this way.... why try to re-event the wheel???? Soft lead has worked for hundreds of years, so why wonder if you can leave the seams or joints on.

In the past 2 months I have melted down close to 2000lbs of lead pipe, and some of it had seams and joints. I always put those pieces off to the side, and allow them to just pile up until I have enough to fire up the log-splitter to cut the joints off, and try to salvage as much of the pure soft lead. At the end of the melting process I melt down all the pieces with joints and find out how hard it is and then mix it up to a consistent hardness for henry and carbine rounds.

So in the end, keep it soft by all means.

[Mike Rouch 07791]

I agree with Joe, keep your junk lead separate from your good soft lead. It will make you an unhappy shooter if you get the hard lead in your musket.