Thread: One down, five to go

Originally Posted by POD

About 5 minutes on the log splitter to reduce one Range Rover alloy wheel to suitable sized chunks of aluminium for my crucible furnace, I have five more that will go the same way. It seems not very long ago at all that I absolutely HAD to have a set of the original 3-spoke alloy wheels for my Range Rover. Could not attract an offer on them now so they are excellent melting scrap for my projects.
I thought I'd show this to help put into perspective that accessory / gadget / whatever that we absolutely HAVE to have next.

Hello POD,

Can you please post up some photographs of your crucible furnace? Is it a DYI one or is it one from a manufacturer? Is it fuelled by drip fed waste oil?

I am in the buy, then read books and watch YouTube stage of furnaces and casting.

Kind regards
Lionel

But they are ugly alloys - and I told Meccles that too and suggested he put the old RR steels back on - the furnace is the best place for those Art Daggie alloys - they did not look good on their original RRC.

I found 3 alloy rims amongst other rubbish along the side of the road. Thought about melting them down - but already have a stack of aluminium - but no big casting projects yet so I took them to the scrapper instead.
Lionel, My 2 furnaces are home made. One is fuel by LPG and the other is waste oil.
If interested in casting check out Alloy Avenue forum.

Originally Posted by Lionelgee

Hello POD,

Can you please post up some photographs of your crucible furnace? Is it a DYI one or is it one from a manufacturer? Is it fuelled by drip fed waste oil?

I am in the buy, then read books and watch YouTube stage of furnaces and casting.

Kind regards
Lionel

Hi Lionel, my furnace was built to the design of Colin Peck who goes by the handle 'the artful bodger', I bought his little book 'the artful bodger's iron casting waste oil furnace' About the book - The Artful Bodger's Home Foundry and followed his design with my own variations according to what I had on hand. It's oil-powered obviously. I've got some photos somewhere, will try and dredge them up. I'm discovering that the casting caper is pretty demanding and the furnace is just the start; I built a moulding bench that holds about 200kg of sand, made a big steel crucible for melting aluminium and then had to build a hoist and trolley to handle it, I've just built a disc sander so I can make better patterns- it's quite a rabbit hole.

Here you go, photo of a test run just after I built it. I'll try and get something more recent.

test run.jpg