Metal Casting Zone

xlchainsaw wrote:
spraying the oil is best if you can do it! drip feed if you cant. preheating the furnace before oil seems quite vital.im playing around with solid cooking oil at present! plenty of flame but no heat. plenty of smoke and a yummy smell! trial and error dont you just love it!!

Thanks Chainsaw. I found out about heating up the furnace as I got a heat bead fire going and turned on the oil only to put the flame out. Once I got the fire restarted, I made sure the heat beads were well burning then turned on the oil and she took hold nicely.

I also realised that an air gap under the crucible in the burner area assists alot as well.

I melted some scrap aluminium and cast a few ingots. Hunting down more scrap now before my first project. Dad has commissioned me to make him a 20oz sinker mould so he can cast his own lead sinkers for deep sea fishing.

Also I am still trying to come up with a cost effective solution to milling my Bentonite for the greensand. So far I think I am up for about $200-$300 to get the gear to make it up.

2-3 hundred ?? yikes that must be on heck of a muller?
need something cheap ?
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dont spend that cash on just grinding up your clay. hey you will give us casters a bad name!!! we like to get things for the cost of scrap and fuel and if we can get those two things for nothing then thats about the right price!there are two ways that you can make up foundry sand with clay. you can grind your clay in something like what aonemarine has devised or you can use the "slush" method. i used the slush method but the down side is that i ended up with a lot of sand that took months to dry out! give us your thoughts and what you may have on hand but dont spend money!

there is also the two brick method, this is what i did the first time i made up some greensand. put a little between 2 bricks and rub rub rub.... It works, I mean how often are you going to mill clay? heck my first batch is 8 months old and still going.

dont spend that cash on just grinding up your clay. hey you will give us casters a bad name!!!

I like you guys already

aonemarines pic has given me a good idea with some stuff I have laying around.

Thanks!

glad to help out! i look forward to your future projects.