What about fumes from hot lead?

[hightime]

know there's a lot of warnings, but often they're over stated. Does lead really go air born, seems unlikely?
I try not to over heat and have plenty of ventilation, a good idea anyways, but just wondering. Your thoughts?

Owen

[Bill in Oregon]

The fumes are only toxic in California.
Kidding.
I try to have fresh air too when casting.

[BrentD]

Lead will start to vaporize at about 900 degrees so you don't want to be too much hotter than ~800F.

Lead may also go "airborne" with dust/smoke that is given off by fluxing, but I am speculating a bit. Just seems improbably that it wouldn't.

Right now my lead pot is heating up and in a few minutes, I'll be headed out to cast about 200 bullets. I try to keep a pretty neat casting bench and I clean up afterwards to minimize any lead contamination.

[Bill in Oregon]

Brent, casting for your BPCR rifles?

[mikld]

Agree with Brent. At normal bullet casting temperatures, lead does not "vaporize". A lot of the "warnings" are from ignorance, or just "Chicken Little" thinking. Politicians ("...for the children".) and extreme tree huggers are largely to blame and very little scientific proof has been brought forth on the subject. Just use common sense and you can cast bullets for the rest of your life and not go insane and die a horrible death (don't stand with your face above your pot doing deep breathing exercises).

[Griff]

know there's a lot of warnings, but often they're over stated. Does lead really go air born, seems unlikely?
I try not to over heat and have plenty of ventilation, a good idea anyways, but just wondering. Your thoughts?
Owen

Yep, lead can vaporize, but since it doesn't boil until it reaches 3,180ºF, what is vaporizing at those lower temps is the oxidation that lead forms quickly and easily upon exposure to air. Lead oxides are hazardous, can be absorbed thru the skin, and easily inhaled when heated... Once you "fluxed" the lead, the impurities (oxidation and other particles not mixed with the molten lead), are borne away in that dark cloud of carbon... Once that is done, there are few fumes at the optimal casting temps. But, as you may have observed, immediately after fluxing, your meld is nice and silvery bright... but after a while it becomes duller... This is the top layer of lead in the pot oxidizing... starting the process of impurities being put into the lead again... The lead oxide fumes ARE dangerous... hence the need for ventilation.

At least that's my understanding of the science.

[madman4570]

http://www.oem.msu.edu/userfiles/file/A ... -10-09.pdf


http://www.gcelectronics.com/order/msds/112.pdf

http://www.gcelectronics.com/order/msds/268.pdf

[Sixgun]

Everyone here posted excellent reference. Like others here, I have been heavily casting since 1974 so I guess I learned a little over the years. Like Griff said, while fluxing, all kinds of stuff starts floating in the air. Even when breaking the sprue, tiny invisible pieces of lead go flying all over. The trick is to not eat lead and don't let the fumes go directly in your face or your clothing. So unless your Polish or are somehow related to Obama, this feat is not too hard to accomplish.

When casting, take precautions to the different ways that lead can enter your system. If you stay aware, you will not grow that extra leg that I did. Keep a neat working area, wear a heavy apron, and my #1 precaution is to have a strong fan sucking everything away from me. I'll open a window from the other side of the basement for cross ventilation.

The fan in this picture came out of a huge heater that used to heat my in-laws butcher shop. This baby has the power to suck Griff's KW tractor through that little window.

After casting the best way to clean up is to vacuum, keeping that vacuum cleaner designated for your lead play.

I get my blood tested every five years or so for lead and it comes up as a high normal. Considering I handle the stuff almost everyday, that's not too bad.------6



I remove these little fans from microwave ovens or old desktop computers. You mount them on a few pieces of wood and run them next to your casting furnace. They do 2 jobs......keep the fumes out of your face and will keep your moulds cool so you can cast much faster.. Looking at my first picture shows a couple of these little fans.

[BrentD]

Brent, casting for your BPCR rifles?

Yup. After tomorrow, I'll have enough for all the silhouette through the end of the Raton Nationals.

Next will be the lever gun bullet casting. Many fewer, lighter, and in double cavity moulds so that will go very fast in comparison.

Had some weird problems casting yesterday. Suddenly started getting unfilled base edges. I don't know why and I couldn't seem to affect it much. Tried all the normal tricks and nothing seemed to help. Got a little of that today too, but then it quit and now I'm back to casting like normal.

[Ray Newman]

Directly behind my casting pot is a bathroom exhaust fan mounted to a wood frame with the bottom of the fan housing level to the top of the pot. Attached to the fan is a 6' length of dryer house to move the fumes outside and away from the casting area.

When I cast, the side door is open, so the fan creates a draft to pull in fresh air and exhaust the fumes via the dryer hose

Works very well.

[Sixgun]

Had some weird problems casting yesterday. Suddenly started getting unfilled base edges. I don't know why and I couldn't seem to affect it much. Tried all the normal tricks and nothing seemed to help. Got a little of that today too, but then it quit and now I'm back to casting like normal.

Probably ran into a bit of zinc in your batch. I know, after casting for a million years, that if something comes up, there's only one process of elimination left.......the batch. Because of all of the different stuff that's in wheel weights today, I make sure I flux and flux and flux.

I'm glad that I have what I have in the wheelweight department........a lifetime supply and more.......as today's wheel weights are not worth processing. I sure as hell ain't going to spend the money for certified 20-1......my last name ain't DuPont.----6

[BrentD]

Probably ran into a bit of zinc in your batch.

Well I don't think so, it was the same batch that I used today and the time previous. And all of it is from virgin lead imported directly from the Doe Run smelter and pure tin that I bought from John Walters. I'm pretty confident in the metal. I must have been doing something different - I just can't seem to figure out what it was.

[92&94]

Molten lead has such a low vapor pressure that I think the risk from lead fumes is indeed vastly over-rated. Same goes for flux fumes, though that does get more complicated, and heck, they're nasty in their own right so I avoid breathing them anyway. Precautions like pot temp and ventilation are always a good idea, but care should be taken not to let them distract from the more serious risks.

The biggest risk to a caster for chronic lead exposure is from getting it on your hands and clothes. Unless you are absolutely obsessive about washing hands and wearing a disposable jumpsuit while casting, you're bound to have slightly elevated lead exposure. Even if you wash up and change right after a casting session, there will be some on the doorknobs and light switches you touched in between, as well as the room where you changed.

[Blaine]

There is always those nitrex mechanic gloves at the Auto Parts store....

[Ray Newman]

Blaine is onto something about the Nitrex gloves. A few years ago, I bought a box at Harbor Fright (AKA Harbor Freight). I keep finding more uses for them and the gloves hold up very well. Not very expensive and with the discount coupons found in magazines, the price is even cheaper.

[hightime]

Thanks for the common sense responses.

Any word on the end to lead wheel weights?

Owen

[M. M. Wright]

Like 6 and Griff I've been casting for most of my life. Some decades more than others but always some. A couple of years ago I had my GP run lead levels in my blood along with my lipid profile since they were drawing anyway. Results said I was normal. Well, my lead levels anyway.
At one time I had a huge smelter and linotype ingot mold that I ran to feed a Magma casting machine. Tons (literally) of lead wheel weights and linotype alloyed for bullets. I made sure I had good cross ventilation most of the time. Lead, as we use it, is pretty inert.

[mikld]

Mr. Wright's post reminded me that I ran a Linotype machine in college for mebbe a couple semesters. Directly in front of me was a keyboard and about 2' to my left was a huge melting pot. I believe it was that close for the operator to keep a watch on the melt level. I sat within two to three feet of a whole bunch of melted lead for 4 to 6 hours a day. I don't think I'm too crazy and I'm still alive...

But this was way before lead became EVIL

[765x53]

This thread begs the question: If lead is bad for you, why is zinc good for you?

If lead causes violence and aggression, it must be a vital mineral for the survival and evolution of the species.

[BrentD]

This thread begs the question: If lead is bad for you, why is zinc good for you?

If lead causes violence and aggression, it must be a vital mineral for the survival and evolution of the species.