Cast Iron

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A community for cast iron cookware. Recipes, care, restoration, identification, etc.

Rules: Be helpful when you can, be respectful always, and keep cooking bacon.

More rules may come as the community grows, but for now, I'll remove spam or anything obviously mean-spirited, and leave it at that.

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jeade_en@lemmy.world

(Very new to thrifting) Bought a smooth 80s cast iron pan and noticed some silver specks only after getting home. (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by Gullible@sh.itjust.works to c/castiron@lemmy.world

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I’m guessing the finish chipped from the store cleaning the pan aggressively, but poorly, given the recent sticker date. Is that unusual? Gonna refinish it myself this week, as long as this isn’t setting off anyone’s alarm bells.

Edit: gonna head to the hardware store for a lead test kit and magnets this weekend, unless someone can think of a better process. Thanks for the advice, all!

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[–] Fondots@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago (6 children)

Certainly worth testing for lead, but know that most tests you can probably get your hands on are prone to false-positives

And realistically, the risk is pretty minimal. Yes, cast iron is a good choice for melting lead because it can stand up to the heat, but think about it for a second, would a big skillet be a good choice for that? If you're going to be pouring directly from the skillet that's a pretty awkward operation, lead is heavy, the skillet is heavy, and those pour spouts are kind of hit-or-miss when you're pouring something less dangerous than molten metal, and if you're going to be ladling the lead out it's a bit shallow for that operation.

And unless you're melting a lot of lead at one go, that big heavy pan has a lot of mass to heat up before you get to melting temp, it's gonna take you a long time.

It certainly wouldn't be my first choice for a lead-melting vessel is what I'm getting at. Not that no one has used them for that purpose, I'm absolutely sure plenty of people have, but I'd probably be looking for something a little smaller and/or deeper for that purpose if I had any choice in the matter.

[–] OwOarchist@pawb.social 3 points 1 day ago

It certainly wouldn’t be my first choice for a lead-melting vessel is what I’m getting at. Not that no one has used them for that purpose, I’m absolutely sure plenty of people have, but I’d probably be looking for something a little smaller and/or deeper for that purpose if I had any choice in the matter.

Yeah ... but sometimes people just use what they've got.

This certainly isn't an ideal container ... but it's also not entirely terrible, either. It can handle the heat without baking off impurities, and it does at least have those side pour spouts, which makes it better than a lot of containers that don't have spouts at all.

I wouldn't rule it out just because this pan isn't the ideal lead-melting container.

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