I want some scrap lead for ballast

castaway

castaway

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I'm after some lead for ballast.. about 500kgs or so. Trouble is that the scrap metal merchants appear to be wanting a pretty big mark up.

As far as I can tell they buy it at about £400 a tonne and but want to flog it to me for between £800- £1000 at tonne.

Anyone got a pile of old lead they dont want ?? Reasonable price paid but has to be in the M3-M4 corridor.

Thanks Nick
 
You'll be in competition with the local scrotes!

Might be worth contacting some local roofing companies. They have scrap lead which - presumably - they sell to the local scrappies at unmarked-up prices. Also, anyone recycling lead-acid batteries. By offering a few bob over scrappy prices you might get away with it. You'd have to be prepared to wait a while to accumulate half a ton though.
 
Best of luck!
I have been collecting odds and sods of lead for more than a year now... I reckon it will be another two years at this rate before I have enough to replace the cast iron trimming ballast.
You will, no doubt, get well meaning advice from peeps about scouring round tyre fitters for wheel weights. Dont. They stopped using lead years ago.
Its a similar story with lead shot which is no longer used by the shooters/fishermen.
The market rate for clean ingot lead is around £1.25K per tonne, although its coming down slightly thanks to the drop in demand. Nevertheless the scrappies know what they can get from recyclers for old roofing sheet.
Just seen the post about lead-acid batteries. Research revealed the amount of lead in a car battery is miniscule, a few microns per plate. By the time the battery is exhausted the lead has sulphated off to the point its not worth recovering.
 
Waste Batteries

The typical Lead-acid battery comprises metal grids, electrode paste, sulphuric acid, connectors and poles of Lead alloy, and grid separators made up of PVC. The battery components are contained in a corrosion and heat-resistant housing usually composed of plastic (polycarbonate, polypropylene, or polystyrene).

Component

[wt.-%]
Lead (alloy) components (grid, poles, ...) 25 - 30

Electrode paste (fine particles of Lead oxide and Lead sulphate) 35 - 45
 
Try your local tyre dealers. Mine has a couple of bins full of the old wheel balance weights. they hold on to them till they're full then get the scrap dealer to take them off their hands. If you offer a 10% premium over the scrap price then you are likely to get a hundred kilo or so from each dealer you talk too.

Weights sometimes have a steel bit set into them so you may have to melt them down. you probably will have to anyway so no problem.
 
try your local ATS / tyre dealer for some of the wheel balancing weights they have normally got loads scrap has dropped now . you will have to melt it down to get the steel clip out . good luck
 
Go and ask at your local BT Telecoms depot. We are continually pulling out old lead cables from the ground (if the "extreme travellers" haven't done so already!!)
You may be able to strike a deal there, but it depends who you speak to. It generally goes off for recycling, but you may be lucky?
 
See other post, tyre fitters dont use lead nowadays, elf and safety dont you know, mate of mine owns a big tyre depot, confessed he thought when the price of lead went up that he would do as you say, didnt work, some lead and steel, some zinc and steel, load of hassle, sod it let the scrappy have it for mixed price.
s
 
You and the person who sells you any scrap lead would be in breach of current regulations governing waste disposal laws, scrap metal trading is highly regulated both from a hazardous waste perspective and a legal one.
Whilst the police are unlikely to be bothered if the environment dept found out they would be most likely to prosecute.
 
Phone around the scrap dealers, don't tell em its for a boat and ask first how much they would give for it before you tell them you want to buy.
Have done the same and got a reasonable price, they don't give it away mind.
Also if you bite the bullet and buy now you should find the prices are down.
You could also ask if they have any weights from sash windows, sometimes glaziers bring in a load and they look quite neat in a bilge.
 
Scrap Lead...

I would suggest you make friends with your local Metal Detectorists - there are clubs around, on average a Detectorist collects around 50kgs of scrap lead a year. The only issue is most of it is oxidised white coated from being in the ground, which makes it more dangerous to handle, because the lead oxide dust is easily transferable & inhaled/ingested etc - so you might need to melt it down - preferably outdoors at arms length!
 
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