Bullet trap

[RBHarter]

Let's see if you have 1 . No not the burm ,that's OK for you guys with a range on the back step.

Last spring I aquired some steel plates during the NV Get Together. 18 and 22 inches at about $10 each . I thought I had two 22 inch and an 18 turns out I had just 1 and 3 at 18.

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Here you can see the 18 x 1/4 in a 16" truck tire with the 3 point bolts tight against the bead . I placed a piece of 1/2 OSB on the outside to hold the side wall flat and act as washers for the bolts .

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I added a kick stand but I don't know if it will be needed when the plywood backer board is put on the front face . I intend to run it down with 2" screws through the bead but I may need a longer screw to hook the 1st bite .

The 1/4 inch plate should take all that the BP revolvers can dish out over Labor Day weekend and the larger 22 " in the low profile 20 in tire has been proofed at 100 yd with steel jacketed LS54 GI 30 -06' loads so I expect it'll stop the 6.8 SPCII ,223, and all the other cast bullets I want to throw at it .

I guess I should disclose total cost for 4 traps will be about $45 even with the steel plates they shouldn't be much over 50# ea for the heavies.

[Steve]

Looks like a great way to recover the bullet metal. Thanks for the idea. But won't your wife want the tires back on her car?

[RBHarter]

The 16s were take offs my Dad left and the 20s the tire shop was too happy for me to take . I'm still sporting 31x10.50 -15s on everything. ...... Olds cool .

[Ranch Dog]

It looks like it will work, good idea !

[Steve]

The area under our plate racks is covered with bits of lead from the cast bullets. The cast bullets seem to pretty much breakup when they hit the steel.

I am going to put one of these together and place it with the plate racks mounted at about the same angle that the plates are setting. The majority of the bullets shot at our steel come from Two Alpha Bullets so it will be a good source of metal for me.

The memory banks in my head seem to be harder to get information from for the last 20 years. Seems like I remember bullet metal requiring something added when remelting it. Any bullet experts here know if that is the case?

[62chevy]

The memory banks in my head seem to be harder to get information from for the last 20 years. Seems like I remember bullet metal requiring something added when remelting it. Any bullet experts here know if that is the case?

I believe folks are saying to have the lead tested for hardness if not hard enough the have it zapped to see whats in there and add whats missing.

Hope that makes sense.

[RBHarter]

Typically, based on several lost months spent reading @ Castboolits, tin is the biggest loss of alloy . But if the base is tin rich to start there's no reason to add any more . I sort my range metal and pour a few bullets from the melt pot just to see if it will pour . If it does there's generally no need to fix it. I haven't run my own trappings much without having other stuff in with it so this is sort of new ground for me.

[mikld]

Many times, recovered "Range Lead" is fairly soft, from lots of jacketed bullet cores, cast bullets, and .22 rimfires. Home testing bullet hardness is fairly easy and several testers are available commercially (I use a Lee tool). Tin can be added to the alloy to add hardness and often alloy with a higher content of tin and antimony is mixed to harden up an alloy. Linotype is often used to make a "Range Lead" alloy much harder. Also many alloys can be "water dropped" to obtain harder bullets (bullets dropped right from the mold into water to cool them quickly). Bunch of different ways to harden lead alloy, but there are other ways to make bullets shoot without leading a barrel. A good read; http://www.lasc.us/Fryxell_Book_Contents.htm