Bullet trap ideas for recycling lead

[stephen m weiss]

I just tried out using a wet 13" dia x 4 ft long pine log shot into the end this last weekend. It took hundreds of rounds without letting any out from subsonic 223 to full power fmj 308's. It is the best of the designs I have tried. No lead oxide or dust to poison me, no maintenance requirements for hundreds and hundreds of rounds. The bullets pretty much knock out the center 3" dia so it will split up easy whenever I decide to harvest. As noted, the majority will just fall out and can be picked up. I do wonder how much lead dust will be created. I will put down a plastic tarp to spit it up on so all that can go into the fire and get reduced. I am satisfied.

[cephas53]

Last spring made a box and filled with wood. This was out the back of the garage for load workup and casual plinking. Cleaned it out and smelted down today. Got a tad over 83 lbs. Thanks for all the ides.

[snowshooze]

Good idea on the log, maybe just burn them out.

[snowshooze]

My buddy showed me a design where the collector funnel fed into a chunk of 6" pipe, off-center and angled...whereupon the bullits would be directed, spin down the inside of the pipe decelerating as the went... and would eventually make it to the sand pit tray which would finish them off and allow for easy removal.

[stephen m weiss]

My buddy showed me a design where the collector funnel fed into a chunk of 6" pipe, off-center and angled...whereupon the bullits would be directed, spin down the inside of the pipe decelerating as the went... and would eventually make it to the sand pit tray which would finish them off and allow for easy removal.

That design is on here somewhere. The pros to that are being able to accept a huge amount of bullets in a short time and rapid collection. The cons are much of the lead is turned into lead dust, about 50%. That coats the area and blows away in the wind. Much is instantly oxidized, so smelting is a beast. Those are used in indoor shooting ranges. Of course steel core ammo will tear them up, even if no penetration occurs. Another con is high cost. welded fabbed steel is $20/lb and those run several hundred pounds.

[clytle374]

Here is what I came up with. It's 1/2" AR400 plate, bolted to a 4' pump housing. Currently setting on a 1/2" steel welding table. Not sure what the housing is made out of other than it is well over 1" thick, 700lbs, hard, easly to weld on type of stainless. Shows no damage from 9mm or 45 hits.

[pretzelxx]

They used big drums like that to make an indoor range at the house of ordinance in fort Lee. Sort of. They're probably 5x larger or more since you can shoot a 50bmg into it. Its a wonderful design! It will probably last you two life times of shooting

[Don Fischer]

WOW, long thread! I've never had a bullet trap. Always used a dirt back stop and dug out the dirt when done and sifted it thru a screen. Haven't had a good back stop like that in year's but do have a gravel pit near by. Nowhere near as good, tears up the bullet's to much and get a lot of stuff not usable and loose a lot of bullet's. On those steel traps they are talking about, how do you move them around? Or do you set them in one spot and leave them?

[clytle374]

I have to borrow a friend's skidsteer to move mine.

[Czech_too]

The club which I belong to does not presently have any means of trapping bullets/boolits. Berm mining isn't allowed so it's strictly picking whatever you can off of the ground. I've had an idea that I've been 'trying' to push to collect at least some of the lead. The club could make some $$ and those willing to do the smelting could get some work party credit. This would be used only for pistol cartidges. I'm not an architect or draftsmen by trade & I need a ruler to draw a straight line so be gentle in your critiques. What do you think, will it work or is it just another hair brained idea?

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[NavyVet1959]

What do you think, will it work or is it just another hair brained idea?

You need to work on your angles. The image you posted would result in the projectile exiting the container.

[Czech_too]

I'm just kinda kickin' this around right now, but what if it was recessed into the ground maybe 6" or so, then the front plate angle could be changed or continue the curve on the front arc some so that it directs the bullet back into the curve or have the front plate overhang the curve on the front so as to stop anything from exiting as it goes around?

[NavyVet1959]

I'm just kinda kickin' this around right now, but what if it was recessed into the ground maybe 6" or so, then the front plate angle could be changed or continue the curve on the front arc some so that it directs the bullet back into the curve or have the front plate overhang the curve on the front so as to stop anything from exiting as it goes around?

In the above drawing, the curve needs to be continued since as it is currently drawn, a bullet following the curve is going to hit the upper angled piece of steel that leads into the curve, only to ricochet back outside to probably hit the lower angle piece, to then ricochet back towards the shooter. Now, with that many ricochets, the bullet is going to lose quite a bit of energy and will probably not be too dangerous to the shooter if he is not too close, but do you really want to figure out from trial and error what is the definition of "probably" and "too"?

It's easy to draw up a trap like this and plot possible bullet paths, but the collisions are not perfectly elastic, so whereas a bullet might hit an angled piece of metal at a certain angle, it will ricochet at somewhat of less of an angle. The bullet composition and shape affects the reflected angle, so it's going to be difficult to predict with absolute accuracy. Plus, after the first ricochet, the bullet is going to be deformed in a relatively unpredictable manner, so subsequent ricochets could be even more problematic to predict.

[Bentracin]

Has anyone tried making a trap out of hardplate such as AR400 or AR 500 ? Where I work we use it for fabricating wear plates on anything from heavy equipment buckets to steel mill parts. The stuff is plenty hard, resists abrasion and does not like to deform either. I made some cutting edges and teeth for a bucket on my small backhoe last year and they look like they day I made them after going through rocks and sand. I imagine it would stand up to the most punishing of loads.

Next time I do some shooting I will give a scrap piece a torture test and post the result.

[NavyVet1959]

Has anyone tried making a trap out of hardplate such as AR400 or AR 500 ?

Both steel targets and personal armor are made with AR500 plates. There's plenty of YouTube videos of people shooting at AR500 plates.

[NavyVet1959]

There was a discussion on reflection angles / ricochets back in September.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...=1#post1850706

i remember MythBusters doing an episode at one time where they were dealing with ricochet angles. I think they started out with mirrors and a laser, but when they fired the round, it was not conforming the the theoretical reflection angles. The reflected angle was always less than the original angle in their tests and they had to compensate for it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ujDksc1ZOc

That video does not show all of their tests though.

[markinalpine]

Why doesn't this thread appear in the Forums-General-Classics & Stickies Forum?
http://castboolits.gunloads.com/show...recycling-lead
Mark

[jacksonsmith]

I wonder how deep a box filled with crumb rubber would have to be to stop a 9mm at 7yards. For that matter any other typical defensive round .357 magnum out of a 3 inch or less barrel etc.

[NavyVet1959]

I wonder how deep a box filled with crumb rubber would have to be to stop a 9mm at 7yards. For that matter any other typical defensive round .357 magnum out of a 3 inch or less barrel etc.

The problem with any of the bullet deceleration media types is that if you shoot the same place enough, a void can develop which could eventually lead to you shooting through your bullet trap. Each of the types of media act differently with respect to how they fill in voids. Some have got around this by periodically rotating the bullet trap so that the media falls and is more evenly distributed. Some have put a heavy steel plate at the back of the media container just in case it makes it that far.

Have you read through the entire thread? There's a lot of posts from different designs and people using other media types. Crumb rubber is a good compromise of weight vs effectiveness. Sand is very effective, but is a bit heavy, especially if your bullet trap is more than just a 5g bucket.

[DeadWoodDan]

After following and thinking about this thread some, thought it would be a good idea to attempt it. The thoughts of being able to reclaim my lead was very interesting to say the least. I had an old trailer with not top and access to purchase "scrap" steel at scrap price so when the material presented itself I started collecting.

Last month I finally finished and couldn't wait to try it out. First was some mild 38spl loads using unique and commercial cast 158gr boolits. Used both Rossi .357 Lever action and S&W M15. Picture of the reclaimed lead in the bucket was what we got back shooting from 20-50yds. I knew I wasn't getting 90% but was more concerned with function.

Next I used my Mauser 30-06 and "the load" of 13Gr Red dot at 50yds using Lee C309-200Gr. Shot ten rounds and checked the bucket to my disappointment; mostly dust and not much of it. Troubleshooting began, first thought that my alloy was too hard (knew I mixed Linotype by accident) so went back and made some more boolits with WW alloy. Second attempt resulted in same, a lot of dust and no fragments.

I have found a supply of rubber mats 3/16"-1/4" thick. I am going to mount them on my removable plywood and see how many it takes to slow projectiles down enough and get some of my alloy back.

My main goal was to use this for everything from 22lr up to my 50cal inlines / 20-200yds shooting and recycle as much lead as possible. Good thing I have a nice open space to shot from.

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