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The siphon nozzles out of a torpedo heater work great. '?do=embed' frameborder='0' data-embedContent>> mark

I don't think an XRF will test for carbon, so you'll still have to do a little sleuthing. mark

I buy all my refractory stuff at a local boiler repair place. There has to be a couple of those in your area. mark

Welcome to IFI neighbor. Are the white bass running yet? mark

Paint it blue again. mark

Biggundoctor, It may behoove you to take the cans in and swap them for an equal weight of cast aluminum. Cans produce a lot of dross and the alloy shrinks a lot when cast. mark

You guys covered most of this , but I'll add my .02 anyway. Casting lead is one thing, copper is usually swaged from solid. On top of copper being a pain to cast, any voids/casting defects could be an issue. A 9mm going 1200 fps out of a 1:12 barrel will be spinning 72,000 rpm. Not all that fast in the world of firearms, but a void will throw it off course and a defect could potentially come apart once it leaves the barrel. Plus you would still have to size it so you might as well swage it. Aluminum bronze over 10% starts to get brittle and even lower is still hard as a cob. How would you size it? You'll have the same issue with defects. Zinc is much easier to deal with. casting steel, really? Ap is one thing if you're talking about rifle rounds. There is an unlimited(for now) supply of perfectly legal surplus ap on the market. It's a different story when talking handgun rounds. ap handgun rounds are illegal to buy and sell in all 50 states. You can thank the media for that. Remember the teflon "cop killer" bullets? According to the media the teflon coating allowed it to magically squirt through kevlar. When in reality it merely saved wear and tear on the rifling. Not sure of the legality of manufacturing handgun ap for your own personal use. mark

I would use it like a pickaroon. :rolleyes: mark

If I took a hundred pound ingot of 95-5 copper/zinc to my scrappy, he would shoot it with the xrf and pay me for 95 pounds of copper and 5 pounds of zinc. He does the same when I carry a piece of mystery metal up to the counter to buy it. For example I was there a couple of days ago and grabbed a handful of "stainless" rod for pinning knife handles. When he shot them they were some alloy really high in nickel and going to cost $3 a pound instead of the normal $.75 so I didn't buy it. mark

That's beautiful. mark

Boiling at 572, wouldn't boric acid used alone be gone by the time you reached welding temps? mark

Yessir, I was using it yesterday until the neighbor showed up with some frosty cold barley pops to ring in the new year. Other than the forge itself being too small to do much ornamental work, I haven't had any problems at all. There's not much that can go wrong with a siphon nozzle, unless you leave it in the forge when your done and melt the o ring in it. In the winter I add a pint of diesel to 5 gallons of wmo so it will light easier. one page of wadded up newspaper is all it usually takes to get it burning on it's own. In the summer it will light with a just propane torch. Mark

They don't have blasters so they should be fine. Mark

the only positive thing i can say about my hf "anvil" is that it has a hardy hole. it now resides behind the shop in the weeds. i may put it in the front yard for decoration, but i would have to grind off the "china" first. mark

i get all my refractory needs at a local boiler repair shop. they easier to get along with than the refractory dealers and usually cheaper. plus any broken or partial bags of refractory can usually be had very cheap or free. mark