sagacious

That's an excellent question, and the answer can get sort of complicated, because lead from an unknown source might have just about anything in it. However, let me answer your question as simple and practical as possible. The floaty, shiny sludge you're seeing is commonly encountered when remelting scrap lead ingots, and very often with ww lead ingots and battery lead. Lead wire is usually poured from reclaimed battery lead (that was supposed to have that gunk removed, but that doesn't always happen). The 'impurities' in a lead alloy will migrate to the top, especially right after the batch of lead has just melted. You may notice this more often in a bottom pour, or anything that doesn't heat the lead really super hot. The tin component of the alloy will rise to the top and oxidize fairly quickly. Antimony (in hard lead alloys) doesn't actually like to mix with lead very much, and will form a frothy sludge. Any dirt particles that can be 'wetted' by lead will rise to the top and join the sludge party. Plus, there's usually other stuff in scrap lead that you might not expect is in there. Some of this stuff can be a real pain. Very teeny-tiny amounts of aluminum, calcium, and copper will form oxides or intermetallic compounds with lead, and will float up into your sludge. Those impurities will decrease the 'fluidity' of lead, and prevent the lead from filling-out the mold cavities. Years ago, I had some lead that was comtaminated with a tiny amount of copper. Didn't want to pour well, and made for large shrinkage cavities. Anyway, it's nice that stuff floats to the top, since it makes it easy to skim off. By skimming off the sludge, you'll remove much of the impurites. Then, by fluxing the metal, you'll remove most of anything else that might cause problems. (Note: by skimming off the sludge, you're also losing some of your good lead that's mixed up with the crud. Unless you suspect there might be a lot of really problematic impurities in your lead, fluxing alone usually removes the impurities without losing any lead.) First, and do this outside, flux the melt with a small amount of paraffin wax. Say, about a marble-sized chunk for 10lbs of lead. It will melt, and smoke, and will eventually flame up. While it's melting, stir it into the lead, and scrape the sides of the pot. Stir it in good. Then skim off the black powdery gunk that remains, dispose of it safely, and start pouring. Some folks flux with sawdust (no, really, it works!), and it does a good job of binding to, and removing the impurities that really louse up the pourability of lead, plus its free. With sawdust, just go throught the same process as above. Commercial fluxes are also available that work great, and don't smoke. Hope this helps. Good luck and be safe!

You don't even need to add anything to your ww alloy, as long as it was properly fluxed wheen you first melted it down. Pure lead has a BHN hardness of 5, hard lead (ww lead) is about 12-- but you can easily "heat treat" ww lead to a BHN hardness of 30. That makes for a quite hard, and tough, alloy. Read and understand the article below, and you should have what you need. It works. http://www.lasc.us/HeatTreat.htm Hope this helps, good luck!

I know this isn't really what you were after, but I agree with Vodkaman. It ain't broke, and doesn't look like it needs fixing. If you want to exhaust your curiosity on a jointed bait, make one from scratch. That's a far better way to learn what you're trying to learn, and allows you considerably more latitude to experiment. I suspect that you'll also enjoy the process much more, knowing that you don't risk ruining the action and artistry of a beautiful piece of fishing gear-- and you can retain your glide bait as a model to guide your progress. Good luck, and good fishing!

Good job! Vodkaman beat me to the punch with the lead/tin phase diagram. As shown, it takes a lot of tin to reduce the melting point of the alloy-- about 40%. A little bit of tin will reduce the melting temp, well, a little bit. Be careful with unknown lead alloys. Some contaminants can really louse-up the pourability of lead, or cause it to have large shrinkage cavities, etc. Occasionally those contaminants cannot be removed by fluxing or be easily negated by dilution. Treat unkown/unproven lead alloys with caution: Melt some and do a few test pours before you drop it in with a bunch of your "good" lead. As Hawnjigs noted, it's good practice to keep your different types of lead alloys seperate. Hope this helps, good luck!

Very nice! Could use swivels for the belly eyelets, too. Can't wait to see the finished bait!

In the above case, the problem isn't with the lead. Wheelweight lead should pour those 2-1/2oz jigheads just fine. I've poured an almost infinite number of them-- never have any problems........... honest! That's all I use any more, straight ww lead. Attack the problem this way: First, when pouring larger jigs, you should always warm up those larger jig hooks. Place them somewhere at your pouring setup where they will warm up a bit-- not "hot", just warm them up a bit. This is especially true if you pour during the winter season. Second, vent the mold at the location of the barbs. Just make a slight scratch on one of the mold halves, from the tip of the barb to the edge of the mold. Don't worry, this will not damage your mold in any way. That tiny 'vent' will allow air to escape as lead fills in. Many (most?) molds are not quite perfect as they come from the manufacturer, and need a little tweaking. Doing these things should make those 2-1/2oz jigheads pour without problem. Consider also that your sinker molds may have looser tolerances than your jig molds, and thus may effectively have more venting. If you can pour 2oz sinkers with ww lead, you should be able to pour 2-1/2oz jigs with the same lead, yes? Now, if you said you had problems pouring 1/16 or 1/8oz jigs, I'd say "OK". But you shouldn't have any problems pouring 3/8oz or larger jigs with ww lead, and using good technique. So, the problem likely isn't being caused by that lead, and you should be able to resolve your pouring issues by tweaking your molds and your technique. Unlikely, and even if so, it's unlikely to be an issue anyway. Wheelweight alloy varies all over the scale, and has also changed over time. No doubt different manufacturers use different lead formulations for different wheel weight applications. Once a 5gal bucket of ww's gets melted down into ingots, and then mixed again in the pouring pot, the lead alloy gets pretty well mixed up, and differences in exact alloy composition become quite miniscule-- if noticeable at all. I wouldn't get too set in your ways thinking, "Wheelweight lead is too hard, and too difficult to pour!" If it can be melted, I've poured it. I've run into some sticky wickets, but wheel weight lead isn't one of them-- by a long shot. However, each lead alloy behaves a bit differently, and sometimes requires a slightly different technique. Try this: Gradually increase the percentage of wheel weights in your melt-- you'll learn to work with straight ww lead, and soon you'll wonder how you ever had any problems with it. Wheel weight lead actually has a lot of advantages-- it's commonly avaiable, often free, and it was made to be cast into small objects. Finding pure lead can be difficult, and expensive, and it won't hold up to rocks very well at all. While I know some may disagree with me, I've poured literally tons of ww lead, and know of what I speak. However, I suspect there are a lot of folks working with straight ww lead, but not spreading the info on pouring it. So remember, you heard it here first! Yes you are correct, adding a small amount of tin will usually reduce the surface tension and increase fluidity, and make the lead a little easier to pour. It will also slightly reduce the melting temp, but remember, the melting temp of pure lead is considerably higher than ww lead, so that may be of limited benefit. Adding a little tin can help pouring in difficult molds sometimes, and I used to add a very small amount of tin myself on occasion, but it's not mandatory and you may eventually choose to skip the tin and save that cash for something else. It's one of those little tricks to save for a day when things just ain't a-goin right. Hope this helps. Good luck, and be safe!

Yes, that's what pure lead does when you heat it up a little too hot. There is no "additive" in soft lead, as a matter of fact, any metal that can be added to lead, will make it harder. You cannot add anything to make lead softer-- anything you add will either make it a little, or a lot, harder. "Pure" lead is soft, and alloyed lead is "hard" lead. Lead can be very sensitive to alloy additions. A very small change in the composition of the lead alloy can change the way it acts, such as not oxidising as readily at higher temperatures-- just as you have noticed. I pour large jigs for use in saltwater, and they take a lot of abuse from rocks. Soft lead won't cut it, so I use straight wheel weight lead. If the mold is gated and vented properly, straight wheelweight lead pours very well. Hope this helps, good luck!

Sure 18/lb, but look at the view you guys get with your solder! Yeah, $9.49 is not too bad , eh? I had been paying about $12/lb, then I found some for $10/lb, and now just under $10. And this, when it seems like all other metals are getting more expensive! Just pays to keep your eyes open... Hawnjigs is spot-on about the potential for lead in pewter. If you need 100% "lead free" stuff, you'll have to bite the bullet, and save your yardsale pewter for something else. Talk about valuable antiques! Hey, if I can melt it down, it's a gonner lol! I've found some old artifacts from shipwrecks on the coast here, and if I can make lures out of 'em, that's what's gonna happen. I just figure that I found it in the sea, and it'll probably end up back there soon enough!

Just a friendly head's up: Linotype is indeed very hard, as compared to virtually any other lead alloy, but it pours extremely well. The alloy was designed to fill-out small type letters and reproduces detail like nothing else. I got several hundred lbs from a printer friend, and I'd take any more I could get my hands on! Linotype is about 85%, or thereabouts, the density of pure lead, but the exact alloy can vary. You can subsitute it for 'regular' lead, and as Hawnjigs said, in real practice you won't really notice the difference in weight. You can make jigs poured from wheelweight lead very hard by dropping the just-poured hot jigs into a 5gal bucket of icewater. They will take a few days to reach maximum hardness, and of course, having water around lead raises safety issues that must be addressed. Adding tin to wheelweight lead doesn't increase it's hardness. It's a common misconception, and I did it for a long time myself. It actually decreases the hardness a little. I can expound on any of this, if anyone wants more info. What a little tin will do, is increase the fluidity of the molten wheelweight alloy, and can make pouring a little easier. Take care, and good luck!

Pete, You should try pouring a small quantity of tin before you invest in a larger purchase. As noted in a previous reply, it doesn't pour like lead, and can sometimes be finicky to deal with. Your hardware store should have rolls of lead-free solder. A 1lb spool of solid "lead-free" solder wire (97% tin, 3% copper) costs $9.49 at my local harware store. It will make very shiny jigs and is harder than soft lead. Melt down about 1/2 of the spool, and see how it pours for you. If it goes OK, you may not be able to find a better deal than that for tin. Also, if you have a keen eye, and can spot items made from pewter, check yard sales for old pewter pots, bookends, decorations, etc. I've found quite a lot of pewter this way, and pay less than a $1/lb, usually much less. I just melt it down into ingots and set it aside for special-purpose projects. Pewter pours like a dream, is lighter than lead but fairly hard, and generally makes for a bright, shiny jig. Good luck, hope this helps!

More reflective would indeed be hype. Less reflective would not be hype........ but who's gonna market their baits as less reflective and hope to sell more? Not too many companies. I have caught a lot of cloudy day steelhead on hammered spoons, though. And you're right: Much of what they throw at fishermen is pure hype. Just gotta make sure you're not biting everything they toss at ya!

Aside from personal preferences, the practical difference between hammered blades (or spoons) and smooth blades is that hammered blades reflect less light than smooth blades. Some folks will go to hammered blades on cloudy/dark days-- but do whatever works best for you. I used to fish mostly hammered blades, and caught plenty of fish. Now I mainly use smooth blades, because I want maximum flash for the conditions I fish-- or maybe it's just personal preference. This is just another 'tech tip' to add to your bag of tricks for when you think a slight change in presentation might pay off. Hope this helps. Good luck!

Yes, as I'm sure you know, some companies are using the nickel-titanium "superalloys" to make spinnerbaits that 'snap-back' and don't require tuning, and others use different alloys marketed as "tuneable titanium". As always, the devil's in the details. Titanium can be a bear to work with, as Vodkaman noted with his hole-drilling tribulations. I've worked with both titanium and tungsten, and it can indeed be a real chore. Patent or no, tungsten spinnerbaits doesn't seem like a much easier prospect. Maybe we need some other exotic metal lures. I've got some exotic metals lying around, maybe I'll whip-up the next new fad: the niobium-wire spinnerbait! Now don't try to scoop me on this!

Yes, of course. For discussion purposes relative to patent law, the "materials" we're concerned with here are chemical elements-- such as iron in a steel alloy, titanium in a nickel-titanium spinnerbait frame, or tungsten in tungsten alloy spinnerbaits. When the first tungsten filament lightbulbs were invented, they were patented. The "material" wasn't patented per se, but the use of it in lightbulbs was. The only restriction (that I've seen) of the use of the word "tungsten" as applied to spinnerbaits is the line of Tru-Tungsten® spinnerbaits. Has anyone else seen any tungsten spinnerbaits that show trademarks, patents, or restrictions?

Quality Assurance/Quality Control

Not sure if the use of tungsten in spinnerbaits is patented. The ones on the market are expensive-- but it's unclear if that is due to perceived novelty, manufacturing costs, or a higher retail price that covers licensing royalties. Is there a manufacturer out there that says they sell "the original tungsten spinnerbait"? What materials aren't on the periodic table? You got it right-- it's the novel use of the material to 'improve' an existing product; for example, the use of Ti wire in a spinnerbait. Heck, Leo Szliard patented the nuclear chain reaction, how crazy is that? That's a fundamental behavior of matter...

No question: Use the Caswell clear as a topcoat. It offers the best bond to the extreme chrome powdercoat, and is very tough. Beyond chrome, you might consider powdercoating a few spoons with their pearl white powder. It's very bright in the water under any conditions, but has the soft, pearly color of a real baitfish. Chrome-- real or powdercoat-- doesn't have the same 'brightness' on cloudy days, or in dark or deep water. I've coated jigs with chrome on one side, and pearl white on the other-- and that color combo gets bit very well. Would be a good color combo for spoons too. Good luck!

There's the rub. No way to reclaim the tungsten for use in lures. It cannot be melted by any simple, practical means. Melting it wouldn't do much good anyway. The tungsten used for fishing lures is sintered from a mix of tungsten powder and other metals. This issue has been covered before, but just for the sake of arguement, if you could recover enough tungsten to make a run of lures for sale, you'd need to have it re-processed into powder (or traded as scrap for powder). Then you'd need the presses, sintering ovens, and associated machinery to form the powder into lures. That would cost over $10,000. Tungsten fishing gear costs so much....... because tungsten is just expensive to work with. It's a minor miracle that lead is so cheap (or free!), easy to melt, soft enough to cut, easy to work with, and fairly corrosion resistant.

Bruce, The best gun range to get scrap lead from is a trap/skeet range. The small lead shot falls out of the sky sorta like rain about 100-150yds from the shooting line. It can be scooped up and sieved out of the dirt/gravel quite easily. You can get a lot of lead this way from a trap range. A friend of mine used to occasionally recover the spent shot from a local trap range, and used it to pour an almost uncountable number of 2.5lb salmon weights. When he moved, he had to sell off the lead ingots from his shot-mining efforts, since it was easier than moving it. The lead he sold off totalled over fifteen-hundred pounds. I myself have melted down a whole lot of range lead. I guess each range is different, but if most of the ammo being fired are cast lead bullets, you get a lot of free, good-pouring lead for your efforts. If most of the ammo being fired is jacketed, there is gonna be a fairly high percentage of jacket scrap to deal with-- and the lead recovery can be disappointingly low. If you have a 22-only range in your area, especially if it's an indoor range, you have a gold mine...... err..... a lead mine, on your hands. However, since most centerfire rifle ammo is jacketed, you are unlikely to get a good recovery for your efforts at your rifle range. Hope this helps. Good luck!

Counting-empties is correct-- the wax-based lube on the bullets will smoke a lot if you melt the bullets. If you do melt them, be sure to do it outside, and not in your workshop or garage. However, topping-off your hot Lee pot with a handful of lubed bullets isn't the safest practice-- you risk lead splatters and the wax lube will also flame up. Either melt down a potful of bullets and pour it, or put the entire batch into a larger pot to melt down and then pour ingots for your Lee pot. I pour many thousands of 45cal bullets each year. If you got them at a suspiciously low price, then you probably got what you paid for-- good lead for melting, but probably poor quality bullets. Dimensional problems, leading, inconsistent bullet weight, poor accuracy, etc, are likely reasons for bargain-basement bullet prices. If you find someone who's really hankering to buy 'em, OK then-- caveat emptor. But if you don't want to pass on what is likely to be a serious headache for a reloader, the best bet may be to just melt 'em and turn the lead into fishing lures. Bullet lead, generally, pours well. I've turned countless 5gal buckets of lead from my local shooting range into jigs and sinkers. Good luck, and be safe!

As others have noted-- if possible, sell the shot and buy scrap lead for melting instead. However, just for the sake of general information, shotgun pellets are completely safe to melt down. Yes, most shot does indeed contain a tiny amount of arsenic as a hardening agent. But once arsenic is added to a lead alloy, it is completely chemically-bound and cannot be separated. It will not "cook out" when you melt the lead, and it cannot cause you any harm. I know that just the word "arsenic" makes people scared, but in this case there's no need to panic. Most tire weights are poured from an alloy that also contains a small amount of arsenic. It's not gonna get out to cause problems. Sometimes it's possible to recover used shot from trap ranges, and occasionally you see it offered for sale as scrap lead. If the price is good, buy it, as it pours very well. So, for those who may have used shot to melt-- no worries! Hope this helps.

I think balsa is more likely to get chewed completely to pieces and destroyed, than just getting waterlogged. However, it will get pretty waterlogged if it gets chomped-on real good. Since you'll be working your bluefish baits fast anyway, buoyancy is perhaps less of an issue. Consider making them out of something hard, like oak, to give 'em something to really chomp on. You'll still get killer teeth marks for sure, but more mileage for your efforts. Good luck!

Good idea. Paint the inside with white enamel paint, caulk/seal the joints, and you're set. No need to line it wth plastic, and installing a drain (pvc tube with cap) is simple.

No worries, mate! Didn't come across as sarcasm at all. Just saying that I think we all appreciate the results of your brainstorming. What I meant was, "Don't stop thinking and looking at problems the way you do." All viewpoints and ideas are universally helpful-- and what might seem complicated to one, may inspire a simple solution for another. Very often, it seems to me that your ideas and methods are actually very simple, very practical, and very useful! I enjoy reading and learning from them. Cheers and three beers!

Just as long as that "hot pot" has cold lead in it. If you put it in a pot with molten lead, you may not have time to walk away before bad things happen. Been there, done that............ and had to clean up the mess too! Do it the safe way, every time, and there'll be no worries.