Sil-bronze Sink!

I could get totally trashed sitting in the seat of that thing making airplane noises with the ladies partying in the back! Then I could show them why we call it a cockpit! (flight deck for the neutered males and under 30 crowd)
If I ever make there, I'll get you a shirt.

 

I hate casting really thick stuff
I poured a 2inch thick slug of bronze so I can turn it into a tail piece for the drain and got this. WTF? I did video it so I'll have to review and see if I can spot what happened during the pour. I can fill it in with the tig torch and be okay, but it still pisses me off.

 

Odd thing... I cracked the shell on dewax and patched it. Turns out that's the side with the defect. Wonder if oxygen got in there... The color difference should be a flag too I guess

 

Any possibility wax seeped into that crack and didn't burn out? Wouldn't take much to leave you with that nice bubble. (Clutching at straws here)

 

1700 degrees F for 30mins? I doubt it. I opened the kiln once after about 15mins and had a HUGE FLAME from the O2 hitting the burning wax. Almost lost an eyebrow... again!

I was able to layer on the bronze and machined it overnight. I'm slow, but It came in on dimension. I shot video and learned real quick a plastic tripod isn't worth a damn hanging off a lathe. I really need to make something for that.

 

That turned out sweet! Nice job

 

Nice finish on your piece. Nice looking chips too. It looks like you got what you needed in the end. That defect is counfounding but its proximity to the repair is probably no coincidence. Was your mold sprued or open? I can't tell for sure from the pics. This stuff takes a helluva lot longer than it looks like on YouTube, don't it!!

Pete

 

thanks Peedee and Yes it does Pete! I cant believe I spent 6hrs machining that stuff. I hung a TV in the garage and watched the old Monty python's flying circus tonight. With the Air cranked nice and cold, the hrs flew by. I've got good mats to stand on, but my heels hurt like hell. The flip flops probably didnt help either.

The piece was open cast in a shell tube. I'm sure the crack had something to do with it Shell cracks are definitely the Achilles heel when it comes to this method. The good thing with bronze, it's so easy to fix and repairs vanish. I'll try to piece together a short video this weekend. One thing I learned, HSS does a great job on bronze, but if I have the depth, carbide makes a shinier finish. I need to get better at sharpening my HSS blanks.

 

I have a book thats probably older than you and I put together that could bore you to sleep with HSS cutting tools/profiles. I've moved most of my stuff out of storage and now I can't find anything but I'll at least try to find it for the title.

 

And blondi JUST came out with this video 5days ago. It helped me out a lot on this project. University Youtube!

 

Thanks, yeah it only took 6ft of 3/32" tig rod to fill that crater.

 

Seeing the storm absolutely trashed my garage door...


Someone goes and finds this one tonight. Even I don't even have the stones to ask what one of these cost. ( I am taking this catchy tune for my next video. )

 

It's in work. I'm almost done recovering from an epic hail storm.

Been a little busy. All hand forged by me.
Hardware for mahogany shutters going on my house!

 

Very nice work, the texture adds a lot of character. It must have taken time to forge this batch.

 

Oh man that's cool. Are those iron/steel?

Pics of what you are making with shutters?

 

Thanks guys. I've been wanting to replace my shutters with functional shutters and after the storm, I figured this is a priority. I tongue and grooved mahogany in typical board and batten style. Those nuts are 1inch tall and the washers are 2x2. I used 1/4" steel and the nuts were forged from 3/4" square stock. My right arm still hasn't recovered after 2 weeks. Right now I'm attaching the bracketry to the brick. Now THAT'S a pain In the ass. I've only got a little warrior hammer drill. But I've found running a 1/4" drill bit on hammer makes a good pilot hole. Then I upsize it to half inch slowly on drill with water for cooling.

Pretty bad when the lumber costs more than that trailer did when it was NEW!


Pretty stuff... too nice to just be shutters.


I tried lag shields in a sample brick and it just split.


Then I found these. They have teeth on the first few threads and actually thread the brick if you work them in and out like tapping a hole.



This is my method.


I cheated and welded hex head nuts to the tops of bolts, then forged into a square head.


Army of predrilled Nuts. After shaping on the anvil, I opened them up and tapped to 3/8".



They dont all make the cut, so ya make spares.


That's about it for now.. If I was going to get heavy into blacksmithing, I'd get a power hammer real fast. This shit is seriously hard work. The forge ran for hours without a single hiccup. All for just pennies of natural gas. Love it!

 

Thats pretty cool man. Didn't know you had a forge.

I saw on Facebook there was a guy selling reclaimed mahogany locally to me in CT for $10 per board foot. Looked to be in decent shape, even looked to be recently planned. Not sure if that's a good price or not. I have no use for it at the moment but still interesting to see it for sale.