I heard that tale too about lead fumes.
Look up the properties of lead.
620 degrees or so to melt
3,000 degrees or so to vaporize and get in the air to inhale.yea, not happening on your puny little furnace.
what you smell is the 'trash' that is burning off of the lead, and most think that is the lead fumes. It's not.
my wife had the same argument when we started a family. Fortunately I could get her to think logically about what she was concerned about. I promised to keep the mess to a minimum and outside and wash my hands when done. Washing hands and keeping clean is the biggest help of anything.
Exactly.
I started casting bullets in the early '70s. "Pure" lead for muzzle loaders and wheel weights for my centerfire pistols and rifles.
Then in the mid '80s I started competing in ATA registered Trap shoots, shooting up to 1,000 12 ga shells per week, and the cost of shot got to the outrageous cost of over $5 per 25 pound bag, so I started making my own shot. Wheel weights made the best shot and was hard enough for my 27 yard handicap loads. For about 15 years I was making about 700 pounds of shot each year.
I do my lead smelting outdoors and my shotmaker is in the garage which is well ventilated with one large door and the side door open.
For the past 30 years I have done my bullet casting on the bar in my 1,000 sf trophy room with it's 14 ft ceiling. I've never worried about lead fumes, because I've known that my casting and lead melting will not get the lead hot enough to vaporize. Last week I cast 13 pounds of .38 bullets and 17 pounds of .44 bullets.
