Bought two tires

[CrustyFN]

for the wife's car and they came with a free full five gallon bucket of WW's.
I wanted to let everybody know that they told me their supplier told them that all of the new weights will be steel or plastic. There won't be any more new lead weights. Bad news because West Virginia is usually one of the last States to change anything.

[reloader28]

I didnt know they were making plastic weights. Must not weigh much.

[the rifleer]

Yep, i recently got about 30 punds of wheel weights and saddly only maybe 1/2 of them are lead. the others must be steel, whatever they are they don't melt with a propane torch. its kind of a bummer, but i cant complain because they were free...

[briandg]

There will come a day when lead in firearms is pretty much banned. You can see it happening in little ways. how long will it be before most of the major hunting states forbid lead in hunting ammunition? Lead shot?

Indoor ranges are already in a bind from lead in the air, and all it's going to take is a determined push for lead bans in indoor settings to become law.

I live in a former lead mining region. The feeling about lead here is that it is just barely preferable to HIV. The EPA went through this town, and dug up yards a foot deep and buried the topsoil as toxic waste. A town very near here was bought up and closed down. Seriously, it is a genuine, modern day ghost town. Empty buildings, and NOBODY HOME, because of lead in the soil.

Expect things to get a lot worse...

[chris in va]

It's easy to 'ban' something, really. All you have to do is spread propaganda that a material or device is 'bad' for the environment, so your neighbors start voting to get rid of said item. No need to directly make something illegal, just make it look evil in their eyes.

[noylj]

I remember years ago the EPA went through a lead mining town and found high levels of lead in the soil and wanted to close the town. The town went and got lead blood level tests and they were below the national level and well within the "safe" zone. I guess they just weren't eating enough soil.
The first rule should always be--is there proven harm. Instead the first rule is--what regulations can we create to justify our existence?

[riverwalker76]

Luckily I'm still getting 2- 5 gallon buckets full of Lead only wheel weights each week. The supplier says that he doesn't plan to switch to zinc or steel anytime soon. So far I've only found 20 pounds of zinc and steel in my buckets out of 800 pounds of wheel weights.

[TXGunNut]

EPA did soil samples at a battery plant one county over several years ago. Where did they obtain the soil samples? From the company's onsite shooting range!

[zxcvbob]

They got rid of the lead in gasoline. Rather than declare a victory and go home, they have to find new problems (even if there really is none) to justify their existence. And if they put pressure on gun owners in the process, that's just gravy.

[DiscoRacing]

Ive still been finding some here.... they are becoming scarce tho... I have around 600 pounds or maybe a lil more... If at all possible..we(casters) need to try and reuse and/or recycle our cast bullets if we are to have cheap lead for our needs. I made a 1/4 thick steel backstop for our pistol targets and we have remelted at least 200 pounds in the last year.

[riverwalker76]

Originally Posted by DiscoRacer

Ive still been finding some here.... they are becoming scarce tho... I have around 600 pounds or maybe a lil more... If at all possible..we(casters) need to try and reuse and/or recycle our cast bullets if we are to have cheap lead for our needs. I made a 1/4 thick steel backstop for our pistol targets and we have remelted at least 200 pounds in the last year.

That's a good idea. I've contemplated building a sand dune backstop on my property. It can't be that hard. All I would need would be a few railroad ties ... one on top of the other for front, back, and sides. Then around 6 tons of sand at around $7 a ton. I could use more if needed since the delivery truck can hold 25 tons.

In my opinion ... that would be the cheapest backstop I could think of. Basically, it's just a big sand pile with railroad ties to keep most of the sand in one place. Lead recovery would be a piece of cake!

What do you think?

[DiscoRacing]

we used to have six or eight layers of 2X6 boards... it works pretty well.. just change them out when they got full...then now we have a piece of coal mine conveyor belt to staple to... and a 1/4inch thick steel plate behind...the conveyor belt is nice to make sure the bullets dont ricochet back.

[riverwalker76]

How would the wood hold up to .30 cal and 45-70 loads?

[DiscoRacing]

that I dont know about...we only shoot pistol at ours... but I do shoot full load 44 magnums at it... six layers will hold up for about 2 months shooting twice a week. makes alot of toothpicks..and yields plenty of reusable lead.

[teeroux]

No wheel weights I guess I will have to start digging up the berms at the range.

[m&p45acp10+1]

My former roomie came through with a 5 gal bucket full yesterday. I melted it down this morning before it got to miserable outside. Cost of the bucket I got was a 5 gal bucket with a 12 pack of iced down Bud Light at closing time at the tire store that my former roomie works at. They even picked all of the riveted steel, and obvious zinc weight out, there were no tire stems or trash in the bucket.
I was having a hard time getting them for a while, due to a guy coming in buying them to make counter weights for his modified. He was paying $10 for the bucket full. Well it seems that ice cold beer at quiting time when it is hot works better than cash.