Please Pour With Caution

IN2DEEP · Feb-09-2009, 09:28 PM

Since more guys are gaining interest in making their own leadheads, I want remind them to please be careful!

While pouring hot lead in one of my molds tonight, the lead reacted to either some moisture or the mold being cold and blew back out the fill hole and went as high as my forehead. Got on the chest and sleeves of my jacket. Adhered to the surface and melted the vinyl.

Please wear safety glasses. Skin will grow back, but your eye sight may be unrepairable.

Scott

Bigfish69 · Feb-09-2009, 09:49 PM

Fuck bro,,,for the love of god where leather.

69R

IN2DEEP · Feb-09-2009, 10:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bigfish69

Fuck bro,,,for the love of god where leather.

69R

I was wearing leather... on my hands
...and safety glasses over the eyes.
I'm usually just wearing a short sleeve T-shirt except it's damn cold out tonight.

Bigfish69 · Feb-09-2009, 11:54 PM

Oh my,,,,Vinyl can melt to your skin, leather does not. Just be carefull buddy.

May i suggest a full face shield and heavy clothing if you donnt want to spend the bucks on leatheres.

I had a explosion happen to me one time and luckily i fell backwords and it just sinjed my hairs on my eyes and nose, didnt have a mustache back then. Anyway it can be very dangerous, take all precations.

69R

Capt. G · Feb-10-2009, 02:34 AM

Fuck, looks like you got hit with some shrapnel from a Taliban home made road side bomb.
Good advice, what your wrote.
Most know that you should never have any water in your mold, or even moisture for that matter. However, in this case, since you seem experienced, and were cautious enough to wear safety gear, I suspect it was not moisture that got you. Any impurity, or foreign material in your mold cavity will cause the lead to react in a not so friendly manner. One thing I do before pouring, is whip out the mold cavity with a rag and acetone (99% grade). This will remove any unseen foreign material (ie dirt) and if there is any moisture, the acetone will evaporate that as well.

For those who have not had the unpleasant experience of having a wad of molten lead splash on the back of your hand, don't do what your instincts tell you do do--and remove it right away. If you do, you will remove a lot of skin/meat that sticks to the lead.
Always keep a bucket of cold water near you when you pour lead (or even plastic), and immediately dip your hand in the bucket of water. The lead will cool immediately, and then when you remove it, you will not incur as much damage as if you rip it off immediately.

DenisB · Feb-10-2009, 03:56 PM

Absolutely spot-on advice "G"
If you havn't experienced the molten metal on skin as a newbie ...........its a hell of an instinct to resist not getting that metal off there.

You will only do it once & see the damage you do...........then the advice will stick in the memory .

Take the advice first up & keep that bucket of water handy . When its part of your molding routine you will remember what its for when the time comes............and it comes for most who do much molding.
The other danger time is when you add more lead to the pot to melt ,or you are playing around with lead alloying mixes.

I started pouring my own sinkers as a 7-8 yr old & as a dumb kid did some pretty dumb stupid things.
Learn't a lot of things not to do real quick............the hard way...........luckily no lasting damage.

Then I did the stupidest thing of all I decided to become a metallurgist & play with things that are way hotter than molten lead for nearly 20 yrs.

Jan from Humbol · Feb-10-2009, 08:23 PM

Scott I always warm my molds by placing them near the fire while the pot is melting, had the same thing happen and still have the scars.

One_Leg · Feb-10-2009, 08:39 PM

Scott, I am glad you're ok. When are we going trolling again?

Have you made any downrigger weights?

IN2DEEP · Feb-10-2009, 10:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by One_Leg

Scott, I am glad you're ok.
When are we going trolling again?

Have you made any downrigger weights?

1.I'm OK, thanks
2.When they allow boat launching at DVL again
3.No

laguna tuna · Feb-11-2009, 08:34 AM

First post.

Great thread.

I was pouring lead for the first time.
Was melting down old sinkers, I added a 8 oz sinker to a pot of melted lead.

After about 5 seconds there was a loud pop and I was hit with lead, 3rd degree burn on my hand.

Air pocket or moisture in the new sinker I added.?

Scared the shit out of me.

Any advice melting down old sinkers?
I was melting down old torpedo sinkers with an eye at each end.

Jan from Humbol · Feb-11-2009, 02:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by laguna tuna

First post.

Great thread.

I was pouring lead for the first time.
Was melting down old sinkers, I added a 8 oz sinker to a pot of melted lead.

After about 5 seconds there was a loud pop and I was hit with lead, 3rd degree burn on my hand.

Air pocket or moisture in the new sinker I added.?

Scared the shit out of me.

Any advice melting down old sinkers?
I was melting down old torpedo sinkers with an eye at each end.

NEVER EVER ADD SINKERS TO A HOT POT!!!!

OK, now I'll stop shouting

Here's the reason why, sinkers especially big ones sometimes have voids you can't see and when they are used on deep drops the water which is under a lot of pressure will fill the void and stay there waiting for you or I to melt it.

Here's what happens when you dump a cold sinker into a hot pot of lead, it gets encapsulated with fresh solidified metal, the sinker starts to heat up, water turns to steam, builds up pressure and explodes the shell of new metal throwing shit everywhere.

I had a 5# rock cod lead do the same thing and it was no fun.

What you need to do with sinkers is add them to an empty cold pot then put that on the burner and let them melt down, you will see the steam escape safely. One other safety tip never attempt to melt car batteries due to the acid, the fumes are real bad for you.

DenisB · Feb-11-2009, 10:30 PM

Agree with you about the issue of water in the voids possible in sinkers/lures that have been used. Its something newbies are unlikely to think about.
The main issue is that it goes into an empty pot............doesn't have to be cold.

The other No-No is never pour excess lead or the dross off the top onto concrete or stone etc
the moisture in there does a similar thing causing the concrete / stone to spall .
that goes off like a little bomb too, with some very sharp shrapnel.
............ and it leaves divots in the floor etc.............
tip it out onto a metal plate or into a metal container spaced off the floor.

A good idea is to get some angle iron and make some simple molds for holding excess lead at the end of your pouring sessions ..........or when you need to melt down some used lead. A simple triangular shaped open-top mold with angled ends is real easy to tip out the solidified lead ready to go next pour .............and you make the length of that mold to suit going straight into your pot.

Having quantities of net leads being recycled out of my commercial fishing gear, when I have time I melt it down in potloads and pour it into angle iron molds so I have it safe to add to top up the pot in my jig & sinker making sessions, so I don't have to empty the pot to use the recycled sinkers/lures etc during a session.

When I am using Alumininium or zinc diecast molds to make sinkers / lures I don't even try to make a good product first up. after cleaning them I just pour molten metal into the open mold halves and let it solidify & repeat that a couple of times to heat the mold up to operating temp. Those solidified bits go straight back into the pot .
Then when you close the mold up and pour you get a good product every time.
If you are using an RTV Silicon mold you don't have to worry about that step.