Seeing I'm STILL waiting on slurry, I decided to keep poking along. Feels like forever since I've gotten to pour some hot metal. Lost wax work isn't at all like sand casting. It's slow going and time consuming. Unlike you sand guys, ya can't go from pattern to metal in one day when running wax. Just the way it is. I have been working on a what I think is a cool little unique porch light. This is a pentagon. 4 of the side lights will have glass inlaid in them and the back is solid for mounting reasons. The peaked roof was a bit of a faff and I'm still putzing with it. Glass came in today, it's coe96 waterglass. So no casting needed on this. I'm going to cast the window pieces individually and try to slump glass through the 4 holes to give an outward bubble appearance. That will come down to heat and timing in the kiln. After that, the sides can be welded together and attached to the roof permanently. Anyways, take a look. Nice and simple is the idea. Hope I captured it. (their yellow glass sucked so I choose amber to be a little different)
Man I really like this. The roof texture is great. Looks super professional. How do you plan to slump the glass out of all the windows? Will you do one at a time or are you planning to heat them all up and spin the whole thing?
Yeah, gotta do them one at a time then weld it together. If only I could spin it at 60mph inside my little kiln....
Haven't tried again. Busy on other stuff, and some advice I got indicated I needed to chill it quicker so I need to set up a double nozzle to hit both sides at the same time. might as well try to break one with too much air to establish boundaries. And I may not be able to hit it with too much air. I do like playing in the sand box, as you describe it. Make a pattern, ram it up, pour, and do it again in twenty minutes if you don't like the results. My #openersopen was a one morning effort. Time is money? Not for me but I do like fast and sloppy.
That's my only real complaint with lost wax. Molasses slow. Slower than my UPS Next Day slurry delivery mailed out on last Thursday and I still dont have it on Sunday slow. Cant get much slower than that!
Thanks.. Windows ready for shell. Hope to hell this works. I want to run boil out for dewax on this one.
Yeah that spruing is going to work perfectly. You won't have issues with it. I've got 1 or 2 coats left on my octo. I'm winning the shelling race! You gotta catch up!
Jason, if you fit some cast vertical shutters on each corner of the light, only one colour would be visible from a given angle and it could be used as a navigation aid when coming home late at night.
That's a good idea Mark. I live under final approach and I can pick out my house at night. It's the only one in my neighborhood with gas lights. Fire is very distinct from regular light when viewed from the sky. Oil rigs out here in west texas burn off some kind of obnoxious useless gas. You can see them from a 100 miles away. More sprue work. Another candidate for my crawfish pot.
I heard some of the foundries in the Southern Australian states were able to get low grade gas for almost free from oil refineries, delivered to their door via tanker truck. They were melting aluminium so not too hot, but even then some batches would almost refuse to burn from too much CO2.
I grew up next to a huge refinary (Shell Haven) and the flares were immense to watch as a kid. It was always said if they ever went out run like ***** Why do you use a different wax for the sprues? Is it cheaper or easier. (Or just a different colour)
The red wax is softer and very sticky compared to the brown stuff. It has a lower melting point too. Theory is, it will melt first and get out of the way so the brown wax has a path during dewax. At least this is how it works in my mind. I REALLY miss the yellow stuff I had. It was given to me by an artist that was dying from cancer. Every time I would visit him, he would give me a small handful of the yellow stuff. I offered to buy the box off him, but he refused and said it kept me coming back to visit him. Sadly, Roger Allen died this year. https://tinyurl.com/y5anwe7e He was a super nice guy. I tell my neighbors the same thing, if my house is ever on fire, call me and run the other way.
Exactly.. these are thin pieces with weird shapes. Last time I cast something flat, it worked but cracked a corner during dewax. Not taking any chances here.. no mold.
