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Just tested our new metal melting furnace. Anyone else into this kinda thing?

bbhaag

bbhaag

Diamond Member
So I purchased a Metal Melting Furnace Kit off Amazon and it arrived today so my son and I decided to melt down some aluminum cans we have been saving. We also bought some random stuff at Goodwill like an aluminum anchor holder, pewter plates, and a copper plate but I haven't had a chance to cut them into smaller pieces yet with my band saw.

Anyway, we fired it up in the garage and heat treated the crucible then threw in several aluminum cans to try and melt them down for later use. We screened out the impurities and were left with a 3oz aluminum ingot. I think for our first experiment we will try to replicate TheBackyardScientists when he poured molten aluminum into a mixture of water and water beads.

Anyone else into this kinda thing? If so any tips or tricks for a couple of newbs just starting out??

So this is getting a little long so how about some pics!

This is the setup after assembly.
IMG_20210108_172432_01.jpg

Here we are heat treating the crucible.
IMG_20210108_175451498.jpg

This is the crucible glowing hot.
IMG_20210108_182602746.jpg

And finally our 3oz ingot of aluminum!
IMG_20210108_184745333.jpg
 
Also sorry for the quality of the pics. I was doing most of the "heavy lifting" since it was our first time and my son was taking the pics. He's only 13 so they came out a little close/blurry.
 
lxskllr said:
Not sure what I'd do with it, but that looks kind of cool.
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Oh yeah make no mistake about it this serves NO practical purpose. This is just a 40 yo man with his 13 yo son trying to connect and do something together as a father and son. Just a couple of guys hanging out in the garage doing some cool stuff together ya know what I mean?
IronWing said:
Cool! Stay away from zinc including galvanized steel. Zinc poisoning really sucks, feels like you’re freezing from the inside out.
Click to expand...
Thanks, that's good to know. I was aware of not melting down brass and galvanized metal because of the fumes but not zinc. That's good to know because one of the experiments I have lined up is making our own alloy together. We're going to add a bunch of different metals together in different amounts and see what we get. haha
We'll stay away from anything made out of zinc.
 
bbhaag said:
So I purchased a Metal Melting Furnace Kit off Amazon and it arrived today so my son and I decided to melt down some aluminum cans we have been saving. We also bought some random stuff at Goodwill like an aluminum anchor holder, pewter plates, and a copper plate but I haven't had a chance to cut them into smaller pieces yet with my band saw.

Anyway, we fired it up in the garage and heat treated the crucible then threw in several aluminum cans to try and melt them down for later use. We screened out the impurities and were left with a 3oz aluminum ingot. I think for our first experiment we will try to replicate TheBackyardScientists when he poured molten aluminum into a mixture of water and water beads.

Anyone else into this kinda thing? If so any tips or tricks for a couple of newbs just starting out??

So this is getting a little long so how about some pics!

This is the setup after assembly.
View attachment 37381

Here we are heat treating the crucible.
View attachment 37382

This is the crucible glowing hot.
View attachment 37383

And finally our 3oz ingot of aluminum!
View attachment 37384
Click to expand...
Nice office desk.
 
I remember my dad melting down lead pipe to sand cast fishing weight. blow torch, plier holdining the swivel with holes in sand in a paintcan.
 
[DHT]Osiris said:
Make some sand molds of knife/whatever shapes and pour some iron into them (assuming that can melt iron).
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Yeah, make a mold of just about anything you want. Play around with that too.

Some of those ant hill molds can be pretty cool looking if you're into that. Just be careful doing that.
 
One last bump as kinda a follow up to let you guys know what we are up to. Today we made bronze by melting down varying amounts of copper, tin, and antimony. Still not sure what the end goal here is but like I mentioned above it's cool hanging out in the garage with my son doing it together.
Anyway, here is what we did today.

This first pic like above is the furnace heating the copper to around 1800F which is the melting point of copper. My brother joined us and that's him in the background.
IMG_20210123_143535703.jpg

This pic is our first attempt at making bronze. It's around 85% copper, 13% tin, and 2% antimony.
IMG_20210123_144518545.jpg

This last pic is of all three. The one on the far left is 100% aluminum, the next one is our second attempt at making bronze, and the far right is the one from above.
IMG_20210123_153900890.jpg
 
Red Squirrel said:
Looks like a fun time.
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Oh man it's really fun and honestly more educational than I thought it would be. Like today when we cast the aluminum and then compared the size and weight vs the bronze it was really cool. I mean yeah it's an obvious difference but to actually put it into practice and see it in the real world especially when you're 13 like my son is.....I guess what I'm trying to say is yeah he learned it in the classroom but to actually see it and feel the difference in his own hands is something different ya know what I mean?

Anyway, next up is maybe trying to make brass. I know @IronWing warned us about zinc poisoning so we will take extra precautions. It will likely be a few weeks from now anyway because right now we want to hone our bronze making skills. Maybe even make a few simple molds like spear or arrow heads and see how they turn out.
 
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Wait those are from the same size mold? I did not realize the shrinkage was that different between metals. That's actually pretty cool.
 
Red Squirrel said:
Wait those are from the same size mold? I did not realize the shrinkage was that different between metals. That's actually pretty cool.
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Sorry I should have been more clear on that. The aluminum ingot is just shy of 8oz, the middle bronze ingot is also just shy of 8oz, but the far right bronze ingot is just shy of 4oz so around half the weight of the other two. The first bronze ingot we cast also has a higher copper content which I think gives it that more gold color vs the second one??

If anyone can confirm this let me know!

We added more tin and antimony to the second one just to see what would happen....the casting has less flaws but we like the color of our first one better.
 
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IronWing said:
Cool! Stay away from zinc including galvanized steel. Zinc poisoning really sucks, feels like you’re freezing from the inside out.
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Good advice!

Also stuff like the paint on those cans or anything containing lead should be handled with great care. Hope you had the garage door open!

Really you CAN melt down any of that toxic stuff provided you are properly prepared to deal with the fumes safely... really looks like fun actually just be careful!

🙂
 
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Ah, you are beginning the descent into metalworking.
Allow me to FEED a soon-to-be addiction:
Go watch the Man at Arms series on YouTube.

Next thing you’ll know, you’ll have a forge and try to forge your random steel objects into a knife.
 
OK, fun stuff to do with your son and those products.
1) weigh each.
2) Measure volume by immersing in a fluid.
3) calculate densities and compare to known data.
4)Discuss how the displacement method is used to verify/identify various carat weight/purity of gold.
5)?
6) Profit!
 
My tip is if you are melting things other than iron and steel, watch out for the fumes some recycled materials can produce when melting, even when outside. Sealants, dyes, toxic bonding agents, etc you don't want to breathe any of that. I see IronWing covered the zinc, that might be the most common one to avoid. Precious metals from anything other than jewelry would be sus in my book. A lot of lead, and arsenic, other nasties out there.

My other tip is to go find a used anvil, a good hammer, a vise and some files. Learning how to blacksmith is a hell of a lot of fun. I used old rusty bolts and scrap steel (all carbon steel) and turned them into arrows heads and a couple spear points when I was a kid. Will probably be revisiting that when mine are old enough.
 
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Torn Mind said:
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Not just a testament to craftsmanship, his design is spot on too. Gave that blade plenty of belly, as all chefs knives should have. I see lots of handmade stuff that looks great, but doesn't work good for those of us with large hands. Lame.

Put 15 degree bevels on her then strop that sexy bitch. Mmm hmm.
 
im not *into* this sort of thing, but i love sword-smithing, although i dont think i could ever get into it.
 
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