Have you ever watched a metal craftsman in action such as a Blacksmith at a country fair... most people watch in awe as the Blacksmith carefully heats a piece of iron in a charcoal forge before placing it on the anvil and then proceed to hammer it into all kinds of unique shapes, it all looks pretty simple doesn't it...and the Blacksmith would probably tell you that it's not that difficult to hammer & shape things from red hot metal simply because it is quite fluid. He's right you know, generally all it takes to work with metal is a small amount of knowledge & instruction, and some solid practice, and before too long even a novice will be producing good quality metal craft items. But there is a lot more to metal craft than just blacksmith work. While you can't deny that blacksmithing is a lot of fun, and a skilful worker can make many practical and ornamental items. With a little practice you could also produce beautiful iron work, simply by using basic skills & equipment. In the early days the blacksmith was one of the most sought after "skilled" workers in the village. But you know, you can take the art of blacksmithing another step. You could use the forge to melt metals. What if you created a small charcoal fired furnace using your existing forge, it wouldn't take much work to build up a simple circle of bricks on the forge hearth to form a deep bed of charcoal so that you could produce a bed of red-hot glowing coals which will produce a large amount of heat. Enough to heat and melt aluminium... maybe even bronze. Of course a crucible is required to place the scrap metal or ingots in for melting purposes,and the crucible needs to be buried in the bed of coals so the heat of the charcoal will do its work for you. All you need to do now is to apply a gentle blast of air from the forge bellows to begin building the heat in the charcoal, and the crucible with the scrap aluminium, or home made ingots will quickly melt in the crucible. Most hobby workers use a small electric motor attached to a blower to produce the correct amount of air blast, but for the moment, the manual operation of the forge bellows will suffice. High quality hardwood grade charcoal will produce a high amount of heat, in fact you'll notice with the added heat the alloy ingots will soon start to melt, and once that happens the pool of metal in the bottom of the crucible rapidly promotes the total melt. Once the metal has all melted, it is ready to pour into a sand mould. The idea is to prepare your sand moulds well before the metal has melted, so that everything is set up and ready to go. Once the methods & techniques are learnt, the whole process is quite easy and straight forward. Any practical minded person could do it. We have many people visit our web site: www.myhomefoundry.com looking for information about metal casting... lots of people around the globe are involved in metal casting, it can become quite addictive which is not surprising, when you realize all of the things that you can make. For the home engineer, inventor & project builder, hobby metal casting could be just the thing, if you want to create your own special castings at almost zero cost, i.e. once your mini foundry is established. If you take your time to build all of your equipment properly, it should last you for many years. To find out more about hobby metal casting and how you can employ the methods & techniques to build & create your unique projects, visit our web site to download a free ebook to begin your understanding of this intriguing metal craft. |
