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Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

so this is where you can post any art related type things! i bet you couldn't have figured that out for yourself, huh! "I" still needs uppercase you dummy - oh yeah!? fight me!
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Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

So I finally fired up my Devil-Forge for the first time today, tempered my graphite-clay crucible, and melted down a couple dozen empty aluminum cans to cast my first ingot!

Not sure if it was just my propane tank freezing up or if it's just super low, but I was only able to get a 17oz/roughly half a kilogram ingot out of it. Left a ton of aluminum slag over for the next time I melt (hopefully soon, depending on how much work there is this week).

Check it out! :pal:
first-ingot.jpg
first-ingot.jpg (178.91 KiB) Viewed 7115 times
Australian 50-cent piece for size comparison
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Rixithechao »

:rao:

out of curiosity, have you made momiji's sword and shield before?
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Peliptia »

aah⚟ thats super duper neato✧゚so you could make like a real gold bar⁇ just from like scrap from stuff that contains real gold❢

im amazed how people can just make stuff⚊it sounds silly but that ways but i really mean it₊˚* really great work🎔
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Rockythechao wrote: 4 years ago :rao:

out of curiosity, have you made momiji's sword and shield before?
Can't say I have! That'd be a super neat project, I'd like to eventually get into blacksmithing too if I can get good enough with just casting and pouring. Blacksmithing is a totally different set of skills I'd like to have, too :pal:
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

I think this might be my largest ingot yet. Think I'm finally getting the hang of this, at least to much more a degree than I had a year ago. Just need to (finally) get some more molds, green sand for casting, crucibles, and better lifting tools and I should be able to make more than just loaves of metal

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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Rixithechao »

loaves of metal
please tell me you’re going to get a bread mold

though hopefully not a mold on your bread
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Rixithechao wrote: 3 years ago
loaves of metal
please tell me you’re going to get a bread mold

though hopefully not a mold on your bread
I could! Though if it were to be an actual loaf size there's no way I could easily cast that considering I'm stretching it with my #8 crucible and 100oz mould already!

...though a 2-burner 2-tank 20kg furnace would be a pretty sweet thing to have. Heck I could melt cast iron with one
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Made more ingots this morning. Getting pretty low on aluminum to melt
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The one on the bottom would be larger but my tank started to freeze over so I could only get so much melted before I had to do a pour
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My total collection of ingots so far. Not a huge amount, but I'm getting some good practice :pal:
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by thatguyif »

So what do you intend to do with the ingots?
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

thatguyif wrote: 3 years ago So what do you intend to do with the ingots?
Hopefully melt 'em down into other things, need to get green sand/petrobond sand casting supplies and maybe a 3D printer for that though. In the meantime it's just nice to have a ton of aluminum cans in a convenient bar form
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Rixithechao »

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Delightful Adventure Enhanced is out now!

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There's an official ASMT Discord server! Check it out to discuss Demo games and follow their development! thread, invite link

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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Despite feeling pretty under the weather today, I went ahead and did something super dangerous! I melted copper and made my first copper ingot using new supplies today.
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It's surprisingly heavy, weighs probably at least a few pounds. Has a lot of flaws, but I wasn't able to get the copper as hot as I'd have liked. Need to exchange my propane tanks
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Made more ingots this morning despite how windy it's been.
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If anyone's ever wondered what molten copper looks like, I tried to take a photo. A bit tricky to do over an active 2000-degree F furnace
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by BobisOnlyBob »

that's pretty fuckin' metal 🤘
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by cheez8 »

Those are actually really pretty! I didn't know ingots could look like that :0
Are those first two also copper?
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I don't really get it but okay
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

cheez8 wrote: 3 years ago Those are actually really pretty! I didn't know ingots could look like that :0
Are those first two also copper?
Yup! Well, probably about 95-98% copper, if I had to guess. Probably still has a bit of impurities (zinc, tin, trace elements of whatever else, plus the borax I used for this melt).

I'm not 100% sure what the dark red areas are, my guess would be impurities or something like that. Since I tried to use borax on this pour, I think it might be responsible for the neat glaze on parts of the ingots.

Might have to sand these down and see if I can get a mirror finish, for that I'll need more tools though
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Oh, I haven't updated this in a while.

Made a tin ingot in my oven recently
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I discovered something new, too. Since I live at a relatively high elevation, I need to use less gas pressure and have the furnace choke open less. Learned that by overheating and over-oxygenating the crap outta these two copper ingots:
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With that knowledge in mind, I managed to melt and refine my sterling silver ingot for a 3rd time, and it came out *super* nice this time
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Also been experimenting with reverse-electroplating silver plated silverware. From a couple dozen pieces managed to refine a tiny drop of pure silver
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by BobisOnlyBob »

Awoo wrote: 3 years ago overheating and over-oxygenating the crap outta these two copper ingots
I love this thread and your work but these scorched ingots just put me in mind of the infamous Ea-nasir:

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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Smibbix »

BobisOnlyBob wrote: 3 years ago that's pretty fuckin' metal 🤘
Hahahahah... Metal... Hahah...

This thread is super neat though. I've been rather interested in the topic of metallurgy lately, coincidentally. Are you able to alloy?
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Smibbix wrote: 3 years ago
BobisOnlyBob wrote: 3 years ago that's pretty fuckin' metal 🤘
Hahahahah... Metal... Hahah...

This thread is super neat though. I've been rather interested in the topic of metallurgy lately, coincidentally. Are you able to alloy?
Thanks!

I'm sure I could easily alloy things already. Pretty sure I have on accident already, considering my sterling silver bar somehow has zinc in it. (guess that's what I get for using the same crucible for several things)
Went to a local coin shop that has the ability to tell what things are made of and apparently it's about 1-1.5% zinc
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Did a ton of melting this weekend
Re-melted my tin stockpile and some new scrap I obtained. Made it into smaller ingots to more easily make bronze with it:
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more scrap copper, though it's at least partially bronze since I used the same crucible as the tin and there was some left in the borax at the bottom
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melted a ton of scrap sil-foss brazing rod scrap that I've gathered from my work. They're probably around 10-15% silver, mostly copper
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and finally around 5 ounces of 91-92% sterling silver
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Re-melted the drop of silver I made some time ago
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Now it's a tiny ingot
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Also melted more precipitate that I've gathered from the same silver source. It's tiny, but still pretty neat
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by thatguyif »

Awoo wrote: 3 years ago Also melted more precipitate that I've gathered from the same silver source. It's tiny, but still pretty neat
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If you're not the ingot, you're part of the precipitate (...or something)
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Argumentable »

This is rad. I have no interest in this stuff but I love seeing it and seeing that you've got a hobby for it. Keep it up
I'm on Youtube andTwitter and Discord so say hi to me on there cause I don't really post here also I have sigs off so I can make my sig as ugly as I want and it won't bother me this is my sig btw
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Re: Awoo's Metal Casting Extravaganza!

Post by Awoo »

Haven't shared any images in a bit, but I made these last week or so. They're 95+% copper
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Smaller ingot turned out a bit like Swiss cheese on the bottom, if I had to guess it's because I didn't stir the metal when it was molten
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Made these this morning from the remains of a bunch of silverware I stripped the silver metal from using reverse electrolysis
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Fairly certain that it's cupronickel (the same metal alloy that US dimes and quarters are made of). It poured just like copper, thought it was brass until I used a wire wheel to clean them up
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Argumentable wrote: 3 years ago This is rad. I have no interest in this stuff but I love seeing it and seeing that you've got a hobby for it. Keep it up
Thanks!
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