Monday, May 3, 2021

fire and metal...

My largest cast to date...which is why my pour was pretty sloppy. I wasn't used to handling this much molten metal and didn't have the crucible close enough to my pouring targets. The Harbor Freight knife has a stainless steel blade and hollow aluminum handle and weighs 1 pound. The casting came in at just under 2 pounds. Vertical casting into clay or stone molds was the primary way that weapons and tools were made during the bronze age. I made this mold in petrobond - an oil-bonded and pre-mixed moldable clay/sand mixture that I ordered from PMC Supplies via Amazon. My alloy is 91% copper and 9% aluminum. I recently acquired 100 pounds of copper ($40) and 15 pounds of aluminum (FREE). That should be enough to keep me busy for awhile...

3 comments:

J J Power said...

Well done, John.

Brian said...

Very nice, cleaned up and polished looks great.

Guy Hodges said...

As usual, Well Done! Pattern makers are few and far between these days. Your casting came out very nice and polished up great. Looking forward to seeing more.