Don't recall perzactly when I started scavenging wheel weights from the local tire shop, maybe 8-10 years ago. First batch was all lead, as was the second. About 3 years ago I grabbed another load and found some that were zinc and did not melt (thank you Lord!). It wasn't a lot of them, maybe 2-3 pounds. Picked up another batch yesterday and began the melt down.
The initial load was a 5 gallon bucket heaping full. Broke that down into a couple of 3 gallon buckets, lit the fire and jumped into the deep end. Knowing there were some ferringees in the mix I sorted a fair bit. Started noticing that a large number had symbols not seen in the past. Fe, Zn etc. Easy to sort that. Much to my surprise many of the stick on weights were so labeled. I pulled out the horseshoe magnet and got serious. End of day 1 I wound up with about half of the first load converted to ingots and about 2 gallons of trash....and 80# of ingots. I was astounded at the volume portion changes. I reckon that living in Small Town, USA does not make one immune to progress.
Get 'em while you can lads, they are fading away.
