Short answer: yes, it's good lead. But you DO need a lot to make a ball.
I weighed the strips once - something like 0.5 grains. I figured it took several hundred to make one 0.535 RB.
Long answer:
I used to collect it from my old dentist. Problem was they just put the bitewings in trash bags with their latex gloves and used paper towels. I'd spend 2-3 hours pulling out the lead sheets from a disgusting mix of all that used crap (covered with dried saliva and chewing gum from the dental assistants).
Not only was it way too much work, but I worried about 'catching something' from the crap.
So I stopped getting it. I never asked if they'd be willing to pull out the lead sheets for me, but I've since switched to another dentist and have a supply of 50 or 60 pounds of lead and do far less shooting than I did even just 3 or 4 years ago so don't go through it as fast as back then.
AND, perhaps more importantly, I recapture all my lead (well, when I hit my ball stopper) from the range. I usually recover about 80% of what I shoot, and it only takes a few minutes to plow through my cardboard box stuffed with magazines. The returns are diminishing, of course, but it's actually considerably more efficient than pulling lead sheets out of bitewings.
Topic: How many use dental x-ray lead? (Read 1070 times)