Glad it went ok but man its still so weird to see you do boil-outs. How long does it take 5g to boil? I'm guessing an hour? Lot of propane for that I'm betting. Sounds like a crazy flight. Glad I don't have to fly through storms and fight other pilots haha.
That's a good idea Jeff, it'd be easy if I could find another aluminum pot the same size. I don't want it any wider that's for sure. I priced out some taller pots last night and the prices get steep real fast the taller they get.. Maybe it's time to think about a small oil drum. I could load it full of bricks to cut down on the volume of water I have to boil. The wax ends up at the top anyways. Zap it takes about 20mins to get it to a boil. I don't even know how many gallons that pot is. It's 16" x 12" it's probably close to 8gallons. Now there is math problem. Water temp starts at about 75 and ya gotta raise 8gallons to 212. I agree, it is disconcerting to plunge all that hard work into a pot of boiling water. This is only the second time I've boiled shells and if I get my texture, I'll be sold on it forever. These three shells had 6layers and a couple more just around the cups to beef them up. Each shell takes about 10mins to boil. Ya know it's done when ya quit seeing wax come out from the cup. Then ya know for sure it's empty when the kiln doesn't smoke out the neighborhood! The weather is pretty much the worst part of this job. Ya gotta be really careful when dealing with storms. Pilots are weather junkies, we have to be. Many have minors in meteorology. Students are funny, they will spend hours on the computer to take a 10minute flight to the practice area. Ya want to know what the weather is? I'd tell them to go the F outside and look up!
I think what Zap was getting at is just get some thin aluminum plate and roll it to match, then weld the round seam and long seam. That weather took a good friend's like several years back just east of Dallas. He was commuting to Hobby weekly and got caught coming home Friday night. A safe conservative pilot.
If I tried rolling some aluminum, I'd make a pig's ear of it. It'd be easy for me to hack the bottom off another pot and extend mine. I went at this with a torch. She cracked in a few spots. No surprise there. The thing is over 2ft long and an inch thick. Too much area to heat with a single weed burner. I got it to the work bench in one piece so I should be able to patch it and press on. Sorry to hear about your friend Andy. Flying is some risky stuff and Texas storms are brutal
Porch light is in the kiln. Stinking like hell, must not got all the wax out. No surprise. Hi tech around here. I'm more like broken crayon functional. No time for pretty, that's for retired old farts.
There is lucky and there is good. I'll take Lucky anyday. My dad would have said seeing this.... "You must live right" More photos in a bit. Still breaking out. Everything looks like a winner for now... (for the guy that doesnt cast metal)
Here is some more shots. No video, sorry. Shells in the kiln. About 1600 degrees here and finally stopped stinking up the neighborhood. Windows cooling down.. about 10mins after pour. Windows on breakout. Anyone know why I get a real light grey surface? (Richard) It knocks right off with a brush. I've got no porosity at all. Beautiful metal everywhere. I think it has something to do with the shell. Glad it goes away easily. This is the mount that covers a junction box. Still cant believe this came out. I had it sitting in the aluminum pot. My pressure cooker is no more. Bronze melted a hole through it. 3dollar garage sale find. Oh well. Crazy the sprue had a leak just above the parts I needed. I pored the shell to the top. Waited a second, looked good and dropped in an ingot for the next melt. That's when I looked back at this shell and the bronze was disappearing in front of me. No way could I try to top it off with a cold ingot in my crucible. I said shit happens and pressed on.
Thanks Jeff. I'm still not sure why the crack and leak happened. The crack was buried in that rats nest of sprues. I wonder if I had it strapped to my dewax frame a little too tight? Sucks I couldnt see it after dewax or I would have patched it. Oh well, live and learn. Amazing that I'm not losing detail by boiling the shells. Remarkable really, this stuff is water soluable.
Outstanding pieces, especially that roof top (way too cool). You could sell those for like miniature kiddy troll doll houses or something. Edit: Cast toys use to be a really big thing. .
Funny you say that Pat... I must confess, inspiration for the whimsical comes from watching some of the crazy craft channels on YT. You gotta see what this one lady is making in her spare bedroom. It's a gnome home. All told, she's probably got about 300bucks in this thing. All tin foil, masking tape and paper towels saturated in glue. She's pretty crafty and knows how to mimic tree bark much better than me.
The tree bark comment reminds me, the model railroad/tanks and tabletop miniatures-gaming hobbyists have figured out tons of good tricks for modeling and sculpting miniature terrain and buildings, which you might be able to adapt as well. That's where I got the idea for using boxes made of Lego to cast my plaster coreboxes in, but if you look around a bit you can find a thousand tutorials for making tiny trees, rocks, buildings, etc., that look super realstic. Jeff
Oh man that came out great! I started orientation so I missed the casting posts. I think the grey is from pouring on the hotter side. When I pour at 2200 to 2300 I get a black finish, when its poured at 2150F its grayish and at 1800 F it's a bright shiny finish with no scale. So now the windows. Hmm I think that will be the tough part.