Hey y'all. New to this forum but not to casting (petro bond). I have found a lot of new stuff on this site already !!! I was wondering if there is anyone out there that could cast a wax I just finished up. I'd be more than happy to pay for the service and shipping. Here is the part. Thanks for y'all's time, Mutt
Welcome Mutt! You are 3 days late. I JUST sprued up some parts and could have added it to some wax trees I was working on.... Only downside, you would have gotten a bronze part! On the plus side, your wax work looks good.
That's my luck. Yeah, bronze would have been awful heavy. This is a air cleaner adapter for a small carburetor. Ive been watching a lot of videos and doing some research lately on this lost wax process. I guess I better start collecting up some new tooling and such for lost wax. Where is the go-to place for whatever I will need to dip the wax in, before coating it with silica powder (and what exctly is that called & where do I get that too)? Can I just use my heat treating oven to do the melt out and the firing of the coating? OR can I just do it like the folks that make jewelry? Seems they just put a small sprue on the wax part, then attach a wax funnel to the other end of the sprue, set the assembly on a removable base of a steel container , pour in whatever it is they pour in, tap on the can for 10 minutes to remove the air bubbles (or pull a vacuum), let it dry, remove the base and fire it and it removes the wax and hardens the mold at the same time, then they have the metal melted ready to pour, and they pour in the metal and let it cool back down. Whatever they use seems to just wash right off in a bucket of water, instead of beating on it with hammer. Y'all's thoughts please >>>>>>>>
Kelly makes parts like that with lost foam. You might look for Al203 in the lost foam forum. You don't even care if you have tiny air leakage if there is any because it is under a vacuum. Lost foam is a lot cheaper to get into than lost wax and it is fun to do.
Yeah, you probably don't want to go lost wax SHELL for something this small. If you must go lost wax and want to do it on the cheap. I suggest getting a small box of ultravest and do it jewelry style. Who knows, you might be the next tiffany. And yes, you can do your dewax/burnout with your heat treat oven. Here is the link for the investment. https://www.riogrande.com/product/ransom-and-randolph-ultra-vest-investment-44-lbs/702314 You should have a vacuum pump on hand to degas the liquid investment and also to suck on the flask to help pull the metal into all of the part. While a professional vac table is out of the question for this one part, a simple one can be made from a sheet of steel, a vac pump and some silicone. PM me your email and I'll send you detailed photos of my 400buck table. (I got mine free) You can make this thing in about 15mins. It's dead nuts simple. I will post photos of it here sometime. I think what they charge for this table is a JOKE.
Hey Mutt! Here it is. I've been meaning to do this for awhile. Thanks for the shove! http://forums.thehomefoundry.org/index.php?threads/vacuum-table-101.1404/
Awesome. I'll see if I can drum up a vacuum pump. I have passed up many at auctions for super cheap, because I had no need for them. I do now. I'll whoop up one of these up and post the progress. I can melt the needed amount of aluminum in my heat treat oven and not even have to fire up the big furnace. My questions are 1) how does the vacuum suck thru the hardened investment? 2) how can the molten metal get thru the hardened investment 3) what size pump is needed? 4) what temp is needed to melt out the wax 5) will that temp also harden the investment properly? 6) What temp should the mold be when pouring the aluminum? 7) biggest question; where do I find a bubble cover?
Yes, 1/4" is pretty much what I have. Investment is porous. Dewax is done around 200-300 degrees and burnout much higher. The schedule cures the investment at the higher end and prepares it for metal. Here is a schedule for you to start with. Try the 8hr schedule for a start. I dont have an exact answer for aluminum temps, that's something you will want to experiment with on a trial piece.
99.99hrs means Infinite. This is the common setting for some PIDs. Now you are getting it. NO VENTS necessary with this investment. The vacuum is applied on the bottom (solid flask with no stupid side holes) and the metal gets sucked into where it needs to go. Ya see segment 4 is hold time. That's where it is waiting on you to dump in the metal 9999degrees is fast as possible. SO that is the rate of heating.
Use distilled water when you mix any investment and follow the instructions to the letter. Just like PoP, you start with your measured water in your container and add the powder. Dust mask is recommended. I prefer to weigh out my materials. For cheap insurance, write down amounts you use, temps and times. This will make doing it next time easier with more predictable results. I learned this lesson the hard way screwing with glass casting.
in the pic of yer vac, with the bubble on, where is the vacuum coming from? Are the 2 holes in the black rubber open to the bubble? Im already working on my version of yer vac
Not sure I follow you. When you degas the wet mixture, you can stick the flask anywhere under the dome as long as you pull a vac inside. During metal pouring, the flask has to sit over the hole to pull vac THROUGH the bottom of the flask thus sucking in the metal. (no dome is obviously used when pouring metal) That help? In picture one, it's just the way I have my silicon cut so I don't close the vac hole off and I can stick the flask in pretty much anywhere. That's why the 2nd hole.
Another question. This investmen I bought says 100g of plaster and 38-40 mml of distilled water. But I read somewhere else that a lot of folks mix the plaster/water by weight. Can someone chime in on this for me?It's a lot easier for me just to water the 2 ingredients next question. At what temp should the plaster mold be when pouring the aluminum in it?
Why not do it a sand casting? I did something similar a while ago. Easy to make a large number once you have the pattern.
you're talking plaster. I cant give much useful info on this. But typically weight and volume are the same when dealing with plaster and water.
