What I Learned About Satanite

Well, I didn't learn much on the internet. It seemed like there was not much for instructions so I thought my mis steps might help someone else.

What I knew

1 Satanite is used for protecting parts of knives during heat treating and is called clay.
2 Satanite is recommended to be brushed on brick and ceramic fiber to make a hard surface forges
3 Satanite is recommended to be brushed on surfaces in foundry furnaces to make a hard coating

What happened

I began burning WMO in my furnace and was making copious amounts of white smoke. A little scary if it were to flash. I fed way too much oil trying to get it started.



Brick laid loose on the bottom with bung holes left open. Smoke coming out of the holes. Unburned oil must have been getting to cool areas behind the brick and just smoking.

What I did

I decided to put Satanite on the floor of the furnace to minimize oil seeping to cooler parts of the furnace. I mixed up enough to make a 1" layer and trowled it in like refractory. It didn't set up overnight. Or after another 24 hours. It was just drying, shrinking, and curling.



Just like clay. Hmmm, it's clay that vitrifies upon firing. So I took out the thick layer and found it would reconstitute with water, just like clay.



So I brushed it on and it dried in twenty minutes with a hair dryer.



Three more layers with the hair dryer between each layer then two hours of hair dryer and it was 200F inside and looked great. So I fired it and made two melts.



It is still hot inside but looks like the coating is intact. The smoke has mostly gone away, mainly because I'm getting it good and hot with propane before putting oil in and I added an air damper to my oil burner. It's the yellow guillotine.



I have a 1/4" ball valve on the oil and a tube to the business end. I'm trying to use a ball valve so I can open and close it back if it should plug. Propane just goes into the pipe and has a globe valve.

 

Veryyy interesting. Keep us updated on the way it handles over the next couple uses. I'm about to use it on ceramic blanket and ceramic fiber board and see how it does. But thats a couple months away and it would be nice to know its the right stuff for the job first.

 

I've never had any luck using 1/4 turn ball valves for adjusting my oil or jet-A mixture. I added some 1/2" needle valves and use the ball valves to cut the fuel on and off as needed. Your setup is looking good. I had excess fuel collecting in my drain hole and found it's way into the kaowool on the floor under my mizzou. First time I saw it, I was convinced I had a Centralia fire in my driveway. I plugged that hole hard with kaowool, learned how to work the fuel and no more underground fires. ( If you've never heard of Centralia, PA, it's an interesting story...https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia,_Pennsylvania ) I'll never get another under the floor fire... Why? I'll NEVER build another drain hole into a furnace OR use kaowool in my floor ever again. Totally not necessary, but that belongs in a thread of it's own. Hole or No Hole?

Zap I think the trick with this stuff is multiple thin coatings. Vitrifying it between layers would probably be even better. ? maybe?

 

My brick floor is probably as bad a kaowool for collecting oil. I have never understood a drain in a furnace. It seems to be a flame outlet. My bung holes are there because I had no plugs and the other end of the drum was used for the bulk melter. If I can't find some plugs I'll plug them with mortar. As I watch other oil furnace videos I see the white smoke is a common occurrence. Getting the furnace good and hot before switching to oil seems to eliminate it, as well as keeping enough air to burn all the fuel.

The Satanite looks great this morning. One expansion crack pretty much across the middle but all the corners seem to be crack free.



I am getting some ash I think where the oil stream is hitting the hot brick.

 

OIF,
Here's the way Satanite should be applied.
Paint a thin layer on, fire your burner. The Satanite will turn black then gray. When it's gray, it has been cured. You can then apply another layer and repeat the firing. Keep doing this until you have achieved the thickness you desire.
If you apply it too thick before firing it will develop shrink cracks.
Satanite is composed mainly of Aluminum oxide, Mullite and Kyanite plus about 6 other ingredients.

 

Thanks!

 

Your furnace looks nice and healthy OIF. Mine WAS snow white inside until I started melting bronze.
Do you have a first name?

 

I'm expecting the brick to last a long time in this service al long as it doesn't get physical damage.

I do have a first name. I've looked for a signature function but can't find it on this forum. I'm Andy Martin, and that's my name on Yesterday's Tractors. I do farm with "old iron", Farmalls from the forties and fifties. I started with old iron farmer when I was selling wrought iron from an old bridge on eBay many years ago. I'm also oldironfarmer on Garage Journal. Now I'm actually old.

Andy

 

You young guys know all about computers.

 

Don't feel bad Andy, technology sort eludes me at times too. I once reset our WiFi router on accident, locked us out of the Internet, and wound up with all the animals under the bed and broke a cooler that somehow went airborne. May God bless my loving, patient wife...

 

See Andy, ya can teach an old dog new tricks. Nice to meet you!

 

my job is computers....and I'm pretty sure everyday their going to figure out that I have no Idea what I'm doing and show me the door. But so far I'm got them snowballed going on 6 years now. The secret..... BS and Google searches!

Bruce

 

Fall of 1999 I had the pleasure of serving on a Y2K committee. I thought it was bunk. I went home one night and set my home computer to 12/31 23:58 and watched it roll over nicely. Told the geeks that in our next meeting and got the deer in headlights look. So then they did every computer in the company but were still not convinced. Did Al start that too?

 

Thanks for calling me a dog. Nice to meet you, too.

I started foundry work 18 months ago and have learned a few things. At least when I started I knew I didn't know anything.

 

Old dog, young dog, dog tired, dog eared, dogged, whatever....interesting thread with useful info. Thanks.

 

My neighbor borrows my stock trailer because his brother stopped letting him use the brother's. I don't mind, and lately he's been installing aluminum siding and has been bringing me scraps. PVC coated they smoke a lot but melt pretty well, and some structural. He has done all kind of things and was looking at my furnace yesterday. Said he has several boxes of Kaowool from several years ago when he was a refinery bricklayer and refractory installer. One box or a dozen, that's a nice deal.

I can feel an all Kaowool and Satanite furnace in my future...

Maybe a gas forge too.

 

Does applying a thin coat, firing, applying a second coat also apply to ceramic fiber furnaces that are being painted over?

How many coats are needed for protecting ceramic fiber?

 

I'd do a couple or three coats then fire it. As long as you get a smooth surface (not soaking in) you have covered the fibers then one more coat gets you some thickness but thickness is not required. You can always recoat it if you ever see a failure in the coating. It goes on good and dries fast. Also, any leftover in your bucket can be remelted with water after it dries so don't throw out the extra. It can easily be recoated anytime the furnace is cool and only delay firing it up for a half hour or so. Once you paint some on you'll understand.

 

Satanite is very forgiving in it's application except laying it on too thick before firing.
Paint a layer on and fire it. I've reapplied it when smoking hot and it steamed it off the brush. I've also mixed it to almost pure water and painted it on to cool down the furnace so I could add more layers. It stinks when doing this.
I've used it from one layer up to 1/2" thick, it's up to you on how much hot face you want.
It does pull loose from your lid wool if you apply it thick, I only do two coats max on the lid.