Want to learn sand casting using your 3D printer? I can teach you!: paulsmakeracademy.mykajabi.com/joinus

Glad too see you melting metal again.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

it's good to be back at it!

Also glad to see you melting again - looking forward to see what castings you make. It's sick how strong Al's strength to weight ratio really is. I just installed our downstairs long wood handrails and was amazed how light the hardware was.

Do you stack any ingots up for keeps? Also my heart slipped when you said you give that copper to a scrap guy. Copper is so sparse where I am a man would never.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

I stack all the ingots on a shelf (separated by alloy) and use those when i want to cast something. rarely cast straight from scrap, usually make ingots from scrap to remove the impurities.

In a normal Australian summer cold water comes out of the tap at 140F and seat belt buckles brand your hip.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

i can't handle a mild Wisconsin summer. I think australia would kill me. or the animals would kill me. or the sun would kill me. how are you all still alive?!

When I melt cast wheels, I cut them up with a circular saw and a carbide tipped blade. Secure the wheels well, and use lots of PPE. You will get lots of 'man glitter' everywhere.

@zrobotics

2 жыл бұрын

This works, but to reduce the amount of dust you can score the wheels with the saw (or use a grinder & cutoff wheel) but not cut all the way through, and break apart into chunks with a sledgehammer. Just do it on a chunk of wood, not on the concrete, makes a bit of a mess. Although cast wheels are also often die cast, so the alloy probably isn't that much different, but it's still good alloy to use and really easy to break apart.

Nice work Paul! Good see the foundry in action again.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

good to be back!

Cool tongs. I had a accident with my aluminum bronze melt last week because I was using fireplace tongs. I made new tongs with rebar and works great

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

yikes molten aluminum bronze is no joke, i'd hate to drop any of it

@arielkozak

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage It fell on the dirt beside my foundry, didn't really cause a big mess actually. Maybe because it wasn't hot enough or the ground wasn't wet enough

Good to see the tongs preform as predicted, I might take some inspiration from these when I make my own. I think you and I have a similar job, I get a lot of those motors too and have piles of cast Alu and copper waiting to be molten 😋👍👊

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

gotta love perks of a job like that

Thanks for sharing

Hi Paul, I use “lite salt” or potassium chloride to get more of the metal stuck in the dross to separate. There is a surprising amount of metal in that dross sponge. You can get potassium chloride from the grocery store.

"Both imperial and wrong units" made me crack up hahaha

As always love the content brother ☺️ keep up the great work!

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

thanks! same to you!

the scrapguy must be REALY happy with you , the copper gets him about 3,30 dollar per pound if he strips it out of the metal core it might be cost effective to either cut off the copper wire at the top and bottom off those cores on a bandsaw youreself or to melt the copper out of the metal cores and cast them intoo bars and sell those at the metal collecting place

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

I don't want to mess with the wiring when i have plumbing copper, simple as that. And i hope he's happy! He also has to take a bunch of plastic junk off our hands too as part of the deal. You get it all for free, but you have to take it ALL lol

i been getting reasonable results after watching your (and similar) presentations. and thanks. l was wondering if a tongs could use that 45*L handle since all my present tongs are chancy with my smaller crucibles. now i must also brave the mig. also, maybe just pour out the aluminum you want not cast to form flat sheets maybe 3 to 6mm to be cut into brackets or use alumiweld rod to make more complicated parts from cut stock. i find flat pours on cookie sheets can form reasonable weird freeform wall decorations too.

@PaulsGarage

7 ай бұрын

I could pour it out into sheets but the thickness would be uneven and the alloy is wrong. I use a cast aluminum alloy here (a380) which flows well but it's actually kind of brittle. A freeform wall decor would look pretty cool though!

Thanks for sharing you r pour. I would like to see more of your tongs and the build.😎⛏⛏🔥🔥

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

The tong build video was posted about 2 weeks before this one I think. I dont have a link on hand but it should be easy to find

Tongs worked good, once the maker used them the right way!

Your videos are awesome! I just wish I was better at building stuff. These rings are the best ones I’ve seen I thought I could make them but…… Fail. Weird question. How much would you charge to build a set of these? I’m a single dad and didn’t realize how much it was going to cost to actually start melting. I have my crucible. My foundry I built need tongs tho. Lol. Let me know please. Thanks

오늘생일ㅎㅎ 외국인 유투브영상에서 한글을 보게될줄이야ㅎ 반갑네요

Why don't you use the copper wires for casting? Or does the insulation cause problems?

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

yeah the insulation causes a lot of smoke and dross, plus burning wiring insulation is illegal. Just not worth it when i have so much copper pipe laying around

Crucible numbers are specific to the manufacturer. Sometimes it means pounds of brass (smallest) others times it means pounds of aluminum (larger). Then to make things more confusing and not consistent it may be based on some other metal/alloy or even water. Yet that's still not the end of the story; as the numbers maybe in kilograms and not pounds or occasionally the number is in volume (L) and not weight. So general rule kg, or lbs typically of water, aluminum, or brass always depends on manufacturer as there's no true industry standard.

The ven diagram of our interests is just one circle lol. I got a sawmill.. you should get a sawmill. It’s a hoot.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

sawmills look pretty awesome, i don't have the space for one though. or a supply of logs

@zell9058

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage bummer, as far as logs I just tell tree crews to drop them in my yard and I get loads for free.

Man, I'm jealous! I've had the worst time finding aluminum. I was going to use pistons. I want my own Gingery shop!

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

Pistons can be cast or forged, and some of the cast ones are hypereutectic (those are the best ones to get!) Just be sure to know what kind you get

@cryophile

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage I have a lot of cans, but as we both know, pure aluminum is not good for machine parts. Si is prohibitively expensive now. I'm working on a furnace lined with refractory and kaowool. Maybe I can get it hot enough to melt steel.

Could you tell me what brand of scale that is? A dual scale looks really handy.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

It's a "smart weigh dual platform kitchen scale" and I got it on amazon

@kleinisfijn

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage Thanks! Found it and ordering one.

Yeah my furnace burner doesn’t work unless it’s not like over 10 psi it doesn’t stay lit it really low temperatures it Hass to be really high for it to actually slide itself

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

home made burners are sketchy like that. Gotta get the design right, or better yet just get a commercial one. Those weed burners work really well, though they run a bit rich

@aprilblanco2307

2 жыл бұрын

Yeah I’ve been having problems with my furnace burner staying wet and it has gone out a few times and the furnace has filled up with propane without a flame that kind of made me kind of nervous

@walter2990

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage I use the "weed" burners exclusively in my 2 beer keg foundries. My solution to them running "rich", was slowly increasing the size of the air holes. The final size of the holes is about 30% larger. I'm comptemplating building a shroud around the burner, to allow me to add a forced air system. My existing set-up is fine for melting alum, but it struggles to melt a #10 crucible of copper or brass. It provides plenty of temp (2200*F+), but you still need enough BTU's to melt copper or brass.

Sweet stack buddy! Now let's see ya melt that copper! :D

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

not sure if this little burner could handle copper temps but i know for a fact that old burner still can! 🔥

Why don’t you use the copper in the motors?

@mevk1

2 жыл бұрын

these days the copper windings are often aluminum with a copper plating only, and not very good for casting

Looks like the tongs worked pretty good, not as good as you had hoped though? That melt should really condense the amount of space the motors were taking up. You don’t want to melt down the copper for something you might need in the future?

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

The only issue i had was basically the fullness of the crucible. With it full to the tippy top, i can't tip it much before metal just comes dumping out. Also the weight, though manageable, is about the upper limit of what I feel the tongs can handle. If i want to use that even bigger crucible, i'll probably want to make another set with more substantial handles.

@johnmccanntruth

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage that makes sense. I didn’t quite understand if you were having an issue or not…

Success!

That's a cool scale! What model/brand is it?

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

"Smart weigh dual platform kitchen scale". I got it primarily for glaze chemicals, some of them half a percent is a huge difference and I do 100g batches. This scale has the resolution of 1% of a gram, so that's nice

Have u ever thought of useing a ribbon burner your foundry would get a lot hotter with way less propane used run 7 pounds instead of 15. Love watching ur videos would love to see u make one👍

Wild to see someone uninterested in the copper and magnets, but interested in the aluminum.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

i have other copper sources, no need to mess with insulated wire

So are you saying you have no flux to give? 🤣

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

Exactly! Nailed it.

Question do you mind if we do a video chat one time like if you were to do a video chat with you to then you can meet us in person

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

sorry but i don't video chat. A stream is about as close as i get

Nice tongs. Surprised you’re not stacking Copper ingots.

the 8 is the volume. so may have one that is bigger with thinker walls but same volume.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

i'm not sure about that, the bigger on is about big enough on the inside to fit the entire smaller 8. i'll have to test it out though

@chrisvclements

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage could also be manufacturer discretion of what will safely hold that volume of molten metal.

I can tell you a scary story about water quenched ingots.

Volumetrically speaking, 4 kg is about a litre and a half (Britishish spelling for no apparent reason) of aluminumium. :)

But... the copper! You just give it away?!?

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

Yeah, the copper is all covered in varnish and wrapped around that magnet. Melting it would be similar to melting cans. Lots of surface area loss to oxidation, lots of extra crap to burn for dross. I'd rather not mess with it and just use pipes

@awldune

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage Yeah I get it. It is also pretty labor-intensive to get the wire out. I do love a good copper melt though

In Victoria Australia it is definitely illegal to use fireworks yet for about a week around New Years, every year you hear them going off... that's not just on New Years... it's for days either side... because why just break the law when you can break the law and show you have no sense of chronology?

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

why are they illegal? is it the fires or the people who blow their fingers off?

@cpoco

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage I think the law was introduced due to a bunch of people basically getting seriously injured, they changed the law when I was very young so I don't really remember. But now it's just as valid to have them be illegal due to our tendency to have very dry,flammable landscapes around the same time people are firing them off with no concern for where the incendiary debris may land.

Merica!

me commenting from 2minutes in... wondering what's on the shirt!!!!!

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

It's korean, says its my birthday today. Its not my birthday, I was just wearing that shirt

@drewfausett5388

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage i don't actually LOL very much, but i just did.

I thought a number 8 crucible held 8 lbs of aluminum

@zrobotics

2 жыл бұрын

Or possibly 8 lbs of brass, or 8 lbs of lead. Or possibly 8 kg of aluminum, brass, lead, etc. Oddly, I even saw a crucible that was rated in lbs of water for sale online once. It's really just a manufacturer specific number. That being said, easy way to figure out how much it will hold is weigh how much water it will hold, then use that and the density of aluminum to figure out how much aluminum the crucible will hold.

That sounds more like a 38 special

I've got a big bucket of dross now.... interested to find a way to refine it.... just for funsies.... searching for a good flux.

@walter2990

2 жыл бұрын

You can use very dry salt or borax for Flux. Several YT videos showing how to use it safely. Be safe!

There are A8's and #8's. Seems like one of those means 8# of aluminum, maybe the #8 since it has the # in the name? That would mean the A8 holds 8kg of brass. Or something. I used to know this.

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

i used to know that too lol at least I thought I did. Then i ended up with 2 crucibles of vastly different sizes both marked "8" from the same supplier. Now i'm confused haha

@swdweeb

2 жыл бұрын

Seems like I did a video on this. Of course I got blasted for doing division in the video. :-D According to the fine people over at PMC Supplies "The Kg designation is factored using brass. The # designation is actually the crucibles capacity in pounds of aluminum. For example a #6-8Kg crucibles is designed to hold up to 6 lbs of molten aluminum OR 8 Kg of Brass."

@tobhomott

2 жыл бұрын

I remember your video Perry. Just not everything you said in it... So to sum up?: -#8 means 8 #'s of Al. (nailed it) -8kg means 8kg of brass. -A8 means it is not bilge shaped and holds 8 somethings of something. -B8 means Bilge shaped and holds 8 somethings of something. -"something(s)" above refers to between 2 and 4 different things Or something. 😁

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

Interesting thanks! Still not sure why i have an even bigger one also stamped with an 8 from PMC, but im not too concerned

@swdweeb

2 жыл бұрын

@@tobhomott Yep, you nailed it. 😄😄 I've only used the dual number crucibles so I didn't go so far to ask what things like an A8 hold.

why not keep the copper and have a side business selling cast alibronze figurines?

@chrisvclements

2 жыл бұрын

ya, thats alot of copper to just give to a scrapper

8oz crucible

@PaulsGarage

2 жыл бұрын

That would be pretty tiny!

@jamesheald567

2 жыл бұрын

@@PaulsGarage i said oz. my bad, I mean 8lb. (for aluminum only)

Wrong Units ... LOL