Had a friend want to copy an old cast iron bracket. It was pretty small and I was nervous but he asked for it in aluminum. I need to try it in iron later. I really like learning to cut to a parting line. I added an open riser to insure the tail filled, I poured it a little hot and the back side is not the best finish but no major disasters.
It does look good, but would look better in iron LOL Im kidding of course, but brass or bronze would be a treat
I wasn't going to mention that, but...........now that you have broached the subject................yeah...........iron .
On the subject of iron.... Because that piece has such long and thin sections, and I would have been pretty leary of casting that piece in iron prior to a month ago. But since modifying my runners to be more "Pruhakka-compliant," I have learned how surprisingly well iron will run through rather small passages. I look forward to seeing your iron results. Betcha it works just fine. It might fill fine with no added Si, but 1.5% FeSi to your melt couldn't hurt. Nice work on the aluminum! Denis
I was prepared to do it in iron but not while my visitor was standing there watching. His intention is to paint them anyway, and he suggested aluminum. As it was we started this after a long day of visitors, lost foam casting, and some forging to make a bracket and handle for a four post lift release button. We molded, cast, and he was on his way about 45 minutes after starting. He left a broken one so I do plan to make an iron one, and maybe a couple of bronze ones. Nice little casting. The finish on the original is exceptional, like investment, but it has rough gate connections that look like sand casting. by the patina I'm sure they are old. He found them in the crawl space of an old house.
When I tried casting a copy of my hardware store cast iron doghooks in aluminum, I had problems getting it to fill because it's quite a thin casting. Made me think thin castings might actually be easier to fill using iron than Al, assuming you can get it to pouring temperature. Never tried for CI so far though, so that is all just speculation. Jeff
Maybe I'll give it a try, I do have an extra crucible that came with the used kiln I got a while ago... Need to build tools for it first though. Jeff
How hard can it be if an old man in Oklahoma can do it? Where? Oklahoma. Where's that? Flyover state. Oh.
There are actually two of you if memory serves: I believe Dallen (YouTube's SUPERDAVE257) is based in Oklahoma too. I don't have any cast iron scrap to melt, or any upcoming projects that call for CI... Maybe I can think of something. Might be interesting just to see if I could pull it off. Jeff
