What's up guys! It's that time of year where I'm starting to get the itch to get back into metal working again.
Now, I went on Amazon to order a new clay graphite crucible,
but apparently I ordered the wrong one because this thing is absolutely massive and way to big for my mini metal foundry.
So i thought today might be a good opportunity to try making a larger metal foundry with a large metal pail
and some proper refractory materials so it lasts a bit longer.
Now you could get a big bag of refractory cement and mix it up and cast it the same way we did with our plaster and sand mix,
but today i wanted to try using kaowool
This stuff is a very flexible, ceramic mat, and although it looks really flimsy, really fragile, and looks like it'll go up in flames
it is extremely temperature resistant.
In fact, it is so well insulated that if i fire up one of my blowtorches and shoot it straight at it,
I can hold the other side without feeling any of the heat penetrate into it.
So here's the basic idea for today, we're going to take this metal bucket, we're going to line it with kale wool
drill a couple of holes so our propane torches can fit down inside it,
and then line the top of the pale with insulation so it can sit on top as a cover
the goal of today's experiment is speed, convenience, and a brand new metal foundry that can handle
extreme temperatures and thermal shock. Let's get busy.
Now i should be wearing a mask for this. But I'm going to cut very slowly and very carefully and take a risk.
Now when dealing with Kaowool there are a couple of things you do need to know. This stuff is extremely fibrous. When you start cutting it'll put a kaowool dust in the air that is very very bad for your lungs.
You can see i used a pair of scissors to cut the kaowool in a circle about 2 inches in diameter wider than the lid itself
the thinking hear is that it will give us a little more room to cram it down into the lid so it holds in place a little bit better
will see if that is really the case
humm it actually looks like that is gonna to work
ha ha hu
just gunna pad that down a little bit more press it into place
and i think we may be in business
there we go got the lid all pressed in to place
so lits move on to lining the bucket next
so here's what we've managed to do so far
we have lined the lid with kaowool
we've lined the bottom and the sides of our steel bucket
and we've cut off some more refractory material and shoved it down the bottom to act as the base for our crusabull
at this point all that is left to do is drill some holes
so lits drill some holes
there we go
exciting new guys as our foundry is ready for operation
we've got two holes in the sides that our propane torches can fit into
you can see i've made the little blocks hear with a grove in the middle
that is designed to hold the propane torches off the ground and in position
if you look down in side the foundry you can see the two torches are at opposite angles
and it is designed that way so when we lit this thing up it will create a swirling hurricane of fire that will git this thing roaring hot
at this point we are pretty much ready to start melting down some mettles
but theres one thing we need to two do first and that is to temper our clay graphite crucible
So lets recap some of the things that we learned here today.
We found that you can take any steel container, line it with Kaowool
and instantly make a high temperature backyard foundry.
We also discovered this stuff is easy to cut and extremely lightweight.
This entire contraption weighs less that 10 pounds.
We also learned that Kale wool is toxic if you breathe it in
so you do want to be wearing a dust mask if you ever try cutting it.
And its extremely itchy if it makes contact with your skin, so its a good idea to wear long sleeves.
That's pretty much it for this project guys and i'm very excited to see how well this thing preforms in future metal casting experiments.
and i'm very excited to see how well this thing preforms in future metal casting experiments.