Brass

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John Hasler
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Re: Brass

Post by John Hasler »

Harold_V wrote: Fri Dec 14, 2018 5:05 pm Interesting to me to read that lead is being eliminated over a large portion of our environment. If memory serves, there are no lead smelters remaining in the US. Indications are that in time, and it may not be very long, lead will be as difficult to deal with as mercury.

There are times when I wonder if, maybe, we are overreacting to some of the things the world is doing these days.

H
There is a complete lack of any sense of proportion.
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neanderman
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Re: Brass

Post by neanderman »

liveaboard wrote: Fri Dec 14, 2018 7:21 amIt's the same story with lead here in the EU; tin/lead plumbing solder disappeared from the shelves 15-20 years ago, replaced by 'silver' solder.
I think the EU did this before the US did.
Ed

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liveaboard
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Re: Brass

Post by liveaboard »

Hunters here in the Portuguese countryside are still blasting lead shot all over the place.
People complain when it lands on their roof.
There was a push to force a change to steel shot but it didn't pass into law.
Lead is also still available for roofing [flashing strip], fishing weights, and so on. It's not a restricted material. Yet.

I walked into a pharmacy in India once, and the owner was repairing a medical manometer of some sort, and had mercury rolling all over the place. Working bare handed and without gloves. "You know that's poisonous, right?" I asked him.
He just shrugged. He knew, he was a pharmacist.
I talked to a guy repairing an oil bath welding transformer with oil up to his armpits. "Does that oil have PCB's in it?" I asked him.
"Yes!" he said, "And it's great for burns, just rub it into the skin."
A car battery shop was melting lead and casting it into battery plates. Fumes everywhere.
"Everyone said it will kill me but look, I'm still here!" the shop guy told me happily.
I wonder what happened to them all...
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neanderman
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Re: Brass

Post by neanderman »

liveaboard wrote: Sat Dec 15, 2018 7:02 amI wonder what happened to them all...
They can't tell you. They're mad as a hatter!
Ed

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John Hasler
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Re: Brass

Post by John Hasler »

neanderman wrote: Tue Dec 18, 2018 1:52 am
liveaboard wrote: Sat Dec 15, 2018 7:02 amI wonder what happened to them all...
They can't tell you. They're mad as a hatter!
The hatters were boiling off the mercury in unventilated spaces and doing it 10 hours a day 6 days a week.
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neanderman
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Re: Brass

Post by neanderman »

John Hasler wrote: Tue Dec 18, 2018 9:09 am
neanderman wrote: Tue Dec 18, 2018 1:52 am
liveaboard wrote: Sat Dec 15, 2018 7:02 amI wonder what happened to them all...
They can't tell you. They're mad as a hatter!
The hatters were boiling off the mercury in unventilated spaces and doing it 10 hours a day 6 days a week.
Along with the Daguerreotypists.
Ed

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earlgo
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Re: Brass

Post by earlgo »

In regard to the lead issue: In my 70 some odd years I have cast thousands of lead bullets from wheel-weight material, using an open lead pot in my basement or garage. (I competed in an outdoor pistol league.) Remember when you could get it for the asking? I contained lead, antimony, arsenic and some other not so nasty stuff. About age 60 or so, I underwent a number of blood tests and asked the doc if they would check for lead levels while they were at it. They did and the first doc who I asked said he didn't know how to read the test results. The second doc said that everything looked normal to him. So either neither doc was willing to tell the truth or there is nothing to it for OFs.
I also remember pushing around balls of mercury in the HS chem lab. It is fun to play with.
So far, no ill effects.
--earlgo
Before you do anything, you must do something else first. - Washington's principle.
John Hasler
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Re: Brass

Post by John Hasler »

Lead metal is toxic if you eat it or inhale lead dust or lead oxide dust. It isn't a contact poison. Its vapor pressure at 700K (that's about 100 over its melting point) is about a billionth of an atmosphere.

Mercury metal is also not a contact poison. The vapor is toxic if inhaled but it has a very, very low vapor pressure at room temperature. It's not a good idea to eat the metal but people have attempted suicide by swallowing large amounts of it and didn't even get sick.

Some mercury compounds are extremely toxic, but then so are some carbon compounds.
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GlennW
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Re: Brass

Post by GlennW »

Harold_V wrote: Fri Dec 14, 2018 5:05 pmThere are times when I wonder if, maybe, we are overreacting to some of the things the world is doing these days.
Maybe?

Radium watch dials were banned decades ago, but tobacco products are available everywhere.

They just need to tax lead and all would be right again.
Glenn

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Harold_V
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Re: Brass

Post by Harold_V »

GlennW wrote: Sat Dec 22, 2018 9:30 pm
Harold_V wrote: Fri Dec 14, 2018 5:05 pmThere are times when I wonder if, maybe, we are overreacting to some of the things the world is doing these days.
They just need to tax lead and all would be right again.
Sadly, that appears to be true. Money fixes everything, or so it seems. It even seems to lower the value of the life of journalists, if you get my drift.

Frankly, I miss the "good old days" when, as a kid, I could go to the local pharmacy and buy the required chemicals needed to make black powder for the model cannon I'd machined from a piece of automobile axle, using my almost useless model 109 Craftsman lathe.

H
Wise people talk because they have something to say. Fools talk because they have to say something.
John Hasler
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Re: Brass

Post by John Hasler »

I would not be able to buy gunpowder ingredients at my local pharmacy not because of any laws but because they are no longer part of the pharmacopoeia. I could easily buy them locally, though, or order them on the Net.
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rudd
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Re: Brass

Post by rudd »

An elderly engineer I have great respect for and I were discussing the current anti-lead regs. He asked me a couple questions.
Did you used to fish when you were young? Yes.
What did you use for weights? The clench on blobs of lead on the line.
What did you use to clench them on the line? I bit them, just like everyone else.
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