The pewter shown here was purchased recently on an outing to the thrift stores in my area.
I thought I would show you my process for processing and creating ingots for use in future projects.
When Looking For Pewter
When I am on the hunt for pewter the first thing I do when I locate a potential piece is to look for a pewter mark. Most pewter pieces have a mark.
Processing the Pewter
I use a small bench top band saw to break down larger pieces.
Important
When processing the pewter please wear eye protection.
I work on the pieces until they are small enough to fit into my melting pot.
Piece that are too large to fit into this small saw, I use a hammer to flatten them so that they will fit.
This is the same piece pictured above. They have been processed to fit into my melting pot.
The Pot
This is the melting pot I use to melt my pewter.
It is a Lee Production Pot IV. It will hold 10Lbs of lead and has a bottom pour spout.
I got mine here:
Lee Precision states in their manuals you should not melt pewter in their pots, so take that as you may. I don’t know why, but it has been working for me for a couple years.
This particular pot has modified. The temperature is controlled with a PID and a thermocouple mounted on the underside of the steel pot near the pour spout.
Here is my Universal PID project write-up:
Melting the Pewter
I set the PID to 600 degrees Fahrenheit. Once it comes up to temperature, I start feeding in the processed pewter.
I continue to feed giving each piece a chance to melt.
I continue until the pot is about 3/4 full.
The Pour
One the pot is about 3/4 full I pour a set ingots into my mold.
Here I am using a Lee ingot mold. I purchased mine here:
I continue the melting and pouring process until all the processes pewter has been melted.
Conclusion
This haul yielded me just under 10 Lbs of pewter ingots.
I will be using these for some future projects I have planned.
The video of me processing the above batch of pewter.