Heavy metal - SOLVED

[Bruce Dickinson]

Hello all, this is my first post. I just received my Tosoro Cibola a couple of days ago. I was out behind my garage tonight and found this. I am curious as to what type of metal this might be. Being a former worker at the steel mills in Detroit, i am somewhat famililar with metals. I know it is not iron and I do not believe it is lead. I also do not think it is steel as the ease of marks I made on it while digging (beginners lesson learned). My settings were this. I had the threshold set around 3 o'clock, the sensitivity at 9 and the discrimination set to near max (98%). If my luck would be so good it would be a bar of cruedly smelted silver but i seriously doubt it. It was four inches down and I had a solid hit on the detector. The specs are this, 35 lbs., 3" high, 3.5" wide. Even if it's just scarp metal it is a hefty find. Any information or input would be highly appreciated. Thanks.

 

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[Bruce Dickinson]

Re: Heavy metal

Well I just did a discrimintion test with a bunch of lead from my tackle box and was able to discrim it out. So I do not believe it is lead. Could be steel but I don't think so.

 

[Charlie P. (NY)]

Re: Heavy metal

Lord knows. Could be tin, zinc, antimony, bismuth, plumbers solder (96% tin & 4% silver). This is when a detector with a digital # readout is handy. Even if you can discriminate out sinker size lead you may not be able to "hide" a bar that big from the detector. It's calibrated for coin-sized objects. Not in-your-face 35# bars.

Can you scratch it with your thumbnail?

 

[ashleysflyr]

Re: Heavy metal

Look up the hardness test online. I don't know if you are familiar with the test, so I will describe it. It involves the metal and several other items made of metal (paper clip, penny, iron nail, etc) and you either scratch the matal, or you use the metal to scratch the item (I can't remember, been at least 10 years since I last tested) and that will narrow down the type of metal (lead scratches far more easily than iron, etc) and may even tell you exactly what the metal is. Other than that, it may give you a better description to post on here for the EXPERTS that have probably already figured out what the metal is, and what it is used for whilst I was typing...

~Tom

 

[Bruce Dickinson]

Re: Heavy metal

I can't scratch it with my fingernail but it does scratch easy with a butterknife. I will take it to a scrapyard tomorrow and see if they can tell me.

 

[Bigcypresshunter]

Re: Heavy metal

My guess is lead. Let us know what they paid for it (35lbs.) if you sell it.

 

[mike63]

Re: Heavy metal

looks like a big lead bar  for melting down! have you tried to see if a magnet sticks to it?

 

[chipveres]

Re: Heavy metal

The weight is consistent with a lead bar of the pictured size; so lead gets my vote.

Chip V.

 

[Tony in SC]

Re: Heavy metal

If it's not lead then it's probably babbitt, used to make bearings. Soldering alloy wouldn'd normally be in an ingot that bigg. Tony

 

[Bruce Dickinson]

Re: Heavy metal

I have to agree with it probably being lead. Going to scrap yard today. Will keep ya posted. Thanks for input everyone.

 

[Bruce Dickinson]

Well I took it to a scap yard and they said it was lead but might have other alloys in it. Gave me $17.00 for it. Not bad for a backyard night time find. Thanks for all your input.

 

[robfinds]

Hi used to work in the steel mills in Sheffield England. I used to roll stainless steel coils on a z-mill.

Good Hunting
Robert.