Making Leads

How to make leads for fishing

ALWAYS MAKE LEADS OUTDOORS - TRUST ME, YOU DO NOT WANT LEAD POISONING!!!!

Things you will need.

Gloves
Your chosen mould
Some lead (obviously)
Some wire loops for the eyes
A stove
An old pan
A spoon
A bucket of water
A mould clamp (or a G-clamp)

Goggles are also a good idea as the lead can sometimes spit. However as long as the lead is kept dry this shouldnt happen.

Getting Started

First of all you will need to melt the lead down. Im using some lead strip which i simply "feed" into the pan. This can take a while at first until the pan gets up to temperature.

Dont put too much lead in the pan, the less there is the easier it will be when pouring, so dont get carried away. You can always add more as and when you need it.

Remove the impurities

Once you have the amount you want to start with you need to discard all the impurities which will be sitting on the surface of the lead. So carefully using an old spoon scrape the surface to gather the waste to one side, and remove.

You will then be left with shiny liquid lead in your pan, dont worry about getting it all out, but try to get a good amount out of it.

Setting up the mould

Leave the pan on the stove otherwise the lead will set again very quickly.

Next take your mould, clamp and two loops. I am using a ron thompson bomb mould to make 3 and 4 oz leads. And the loops are these which you can buy for about a couple of quid a bag, however you could also make these yourself using stainless wire.

Clamp the mould up but with a little slack so you can get the loops into the holes, add the loops and tighten the clamp right up.

Now normally the first go will be rubbish, usually only half filling the mould before it appears full this is simply because the mould is cold. You can either accept it and have a duff run then start properly on the second cast or simply hold the mould in the pan to heat it up.

Making your first lead

Now you are ready to make your first lead. BE CAREFUL!!! Bear in mind that the melting point of lead is 327.5 Degrees C (apparently!!) So the pan is at least that hot!!!

Carefully pour the moulten lead into the mould until it is right to the top.

Leave it a few seconds to allow the lead to set properly then USING GLOVES unclamp the mould and take apart the two halves. At this point the mould will be VERY hot.

Hopefully you should see something like this....

Chuck the leads into a bucket of water to cool them down a leave them till the end. (dont put the mould into the water, try to keep it hot) Now you simply start the process again, but with the difference that the mould will be hot.... so a little more care is needed when inserting the loops.

Once you have made enough leads you can now turn off the pan and start to tidy them up.

To remove the excess lead from the funnel simply twist until it breaks off. Some tidying may be required around the loop this can be done with a pair of cutters. Chuck all the excess lead backinto the pan for next time.

The end result, a pile of cheap leads!!!

GEMINI LEADS

When making geminis you are usually making biggish leads so for this reason you need to get the lead hotter before starting to pour. Otherwise you will end up with a few false starts, and only half fill the mould before the lead starts to set.

Here i am using an adjustable gemini mould. Whcih can make leads between 3 and 8oz (i think) To make anything between 3 and 7oz you need this thing...

Set the mould up as below, screwing the bolt in to the required size.

The wire part of the lead sits inside the hole of the spacer, and the adjusting bolt sits against the flat part.

If you want to make 8oz leads, simply remove the spacer, and screw out the bolt all the way...

The wire now sits in the grooves you can see with the loop being at the tapered end of the mould.

So i am making 8oz leads and have set up as above. I have got my lead hot enough, my mould has a wire in it, and is clamped up, and im ready to pour.... the outcome should look something like this