Metal Casting Zone

What did you get for a new pot?

i was lucky i found a piece of 4 1/4 inch steel pipe at the scrapmans 15 inches long. i cut 6 1/2 inches off it and welded a bottom onto both of them. ive been using the six inch one today and have melted 2.9 kgs per pour. at that rate im tipping i will be able to melt 4 plus kgs in the taller one. a big jump from 1.2kg pot! surprisingly it only took 10 minutes longer to melt 2.9 kg as to the 1.2 kg. total melt time including scalping and reheat 40minutes for 2.9kgs! im quite happy with that.

Well, I lit it up today... Finally. I pigged some scrap and casted the other base. It is a bit rough, but it will function just the same. I will call it a keeper. It is hard to mould. Thank God I finally got time to start again. The next piece will be the bed. I already have the pattern made. All I need to do is pour it.

that casting is a keeper!! a few good swipes with a good file will clean it up. the file pic is a very coarse heavy file that i found here left by previous people. i tried it one day and now its my favorite file for cleaning up castings both in aluminium and brass. its great for auto putty as well which is handy in pattern making.

Yea. I definitely need to get a good file or two. My best one (still not that good) was lost in my move. I just discovered that today. I cast those motorcycle risers and am still trying to get those cleaned up good. Of course those have to be nearly perfect. All I have been working with is a small file and sandpaper. Long haul, but it's coming.

i also use a 4 inch sanding pad on my angle grinder with a heavy duty sanding pad on it. its very fast but it does scratch! it would be great on your base casting tho. for reference ... how much does casting weigh??? i tend to weigh everything so if i need to recast something i just weigh out enough metal for the job .

It weighs 2 lbs but it is much beefier than Gingery's plan. I just used what I had on hand to make the pattern.

2lb thats with the sprue off???? great! do you paint your patterns?? i didnt at first but after i did paint them they became easier to mold with.

Yea, that is no sprue. I do not paint them, but I may start beacuse that one was aggravating. I did not use enough draft on the pattern either though. You say it makes a big difference to paint them?

at first i tried just oiling them. i got some cheap $2 oil based spraypaint and use that. the first coat raises the grain so you will need to sand it down and apply a second coat. it does make a difference and the paint drys very quickly.