Old,old lead shot, dust is dangerous

[Pat Dugan]

I was given 2 bags of no7.5 shot,
May be 30 yrs old. I opened the bags and covered in gray dust.
I was told that dust is oxidized from the shot and contains arsenic.
I went outside and poured into plastic bottles and sprayed orange furniture
Oil into bottle and now reloading
Fine. Lemon furniture oil works also
It is so,so thin, it does not gum up shot, hence no dangerous dust.

I was also told to just add graphite
To the shot, but I figured the dust
Could still get airborne

Hope this helps someone

[Paul Harm]

I'm 72 now and have never worried about lead dust or fumes when pouring lead bullets. It's nice to see you're being careful Pat, but I wouldn't worry a whole lot about lead dust from shotgun shot.

[Frank Srebro]

Not to be contrary here but I would worry no matter what my age. Any lead compound, an oxide/carbonate in this case, is a source of elemental lead. A good friend who reloaded for years was having health problems and a blood test confirmed a high level of lead. Now, I don't know how he was handling the lead pellets or keeping from breathing the dust when pouring into the shot container, etc. His solution was to stop reloading immediately and nowadays he shoots as much as previously but with factory shells. Just sayin …..

[Paul Harm]

And my friend, who is 78 years young, had his blood tested for lead levels 20 years ago. It was high, and the government found out and started calling him asking why. Guess they wanted him to bad mouth reloading or casting bullets. He finally got them to quit calling by saying when he was young he ate paint chips that fell off the wall. He's still kicking and reloading. I'm not saying not to take any precautions, but I'd think just turning your head when pouring shot in the reloader would suffice. Same with molding bullets - a small fan pushing the air away from your face would do.

[Dean Romig]

Hmmm.... When I was a toddler I used to gnaw the window sills in our old house because the paint tasted sweet.... I guess there's an explanation for everything.





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[Robert Brooks]

We use to collect old wheel weights and melt and cast jig heads,maybe that is the reason I got old so fast! Bobby

[charlie cleveland]

i too have been around lead all my life from paint to wheel weights to shotgun pellets..it made me old fast too wish i hada known this 60 years ago....i would be 10 years old and out hunting with that stevens double barrel 410 again....reckon theirs some kinda stuff to reverse this ageing thing...i just got back from a 3 hour drive to memphis tenn to see the doc and they did not have any youth serum....charlie

[Richard Flanders]

I bought a bag of shot at a show for cheap that was all white when I opened it. I poured it into a small bucket of water, let it soak good then agitated it a lot until the white stuff abraded off then poured it onto a cookie sheet I no longer use for cooking and let it dry in the sun for a few days. Wasn't sure at the time if the white stuff was arsenic or lead oxide, but perusing my references just now I see that there are no real lead oxides listed but there is an arsenic oxide, arsenolite As2O3, that occurs as white bloom or crust, so that may be what you see on shot. I wasn't aware that shot contained arsenic though, so other options are a hydrated antimony oxide - stibiconite. Shot likely contains tin but there are no tin oxides listed and I don't think Sn is easily oxidized. Bismuth also occurs as an oxide - bismite, but it's yellowish to greyish-green. There aren't any zinc oxide minerals that don't contain elements that I doubt would be found in bird shot, such as chrome and manganese, but then I'd not think there was arsenic in shot either, so what do I know?? I know I was afraid of that white dust the poofed out of that bag of old shot and wasn't about to breathe it. I wore latex gloves while dealing with the bag and tossed them when I was done. As for the issue of lead vapors coming off a melting pot, the vapor pressure of lead at the 700deg or so that we mold at is so low as to be inconsequential. I know we all get told that it's a huge issue, but according to the metallurgists tables it's not near as bad as we might think. Look it up. It's extremely low, almost zero. Regardless, I always cast my bullets outside on a sunny day with a crosswind. I would guess that the zinc fumes generated when you flux(if your flux contains Zn)the melt might be a much bigger issue than any lead vapors. Wheel weights are another issue, are very impure and can contain everything from Mercury to gold to zinc to you name it. I'd love to hear from our experienced metal guys on this.

[Pat Dugan]

After putting orange oil
Spray furniture polish on shot
In a big plastic bottle , shook it some
Careful not to put much oil
It reloads fine. However
Looking at the shot no dust
But shot not perfectly round, looking close, it is pitted, I guess from the oxidation.
I would never, never fool with something like this again
Pass it on ,on not accept it, its a pain
To get it in shape to reload with.

My advice run from it

[Pat Dugan]

After putting orange oil
Spray furniture polish on shot
In a big plastic bottle , shook it some
Careful not to put much oil
It reloads fine. However
Looking at the shot no dust
But shot not perfectly round, looking close, it is pitted, I guess from the oxidation.
I would never, never fool with something like this again
Pass it on ,or not accept it, its a pain
To get it in shape to reload with.

My advice run from it

[Dean Romig]

And irregular or pitted shot = flyers





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[Frank Srebro]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_oxide

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lead_carbonate

[Paul Harm]

Frank, what's your point ? Everyone knows there's a lot of bad stuff in lead and there's some who would have you believe just handling it is bad for your health.

[Frank Srebro]

No point at all. You gave your opinion in the second post and I gave mine in the third one and added some objective tech data later for those older and younger who may be interested in reading about the reaction compounds when lead is long exposed to air.

[Bill Murphy]

I read years ago that the stuff that comes off shot as dust is not actually a byproduct of the lead, but a coating of some sort. What would that coating be?

[Michael Meeks]

Likely it's graphite.