Bullshop
11-21-2006, 03:08 PM
G day all
Lately I know I have been rather a wise acre and not realy trying to contribute much, just mostly pokin fun.
In my defence its been between -30 and -40 for three weeks now and think I'm goin a bit daffy. Gonna be a long winter ya know. I had to photo some boolits for auction arms so thought I would pic my casting nest while at it so you can see how its set up. Exp. has tought me to set thing up for a minimum of movement for sustained volume production. I will try to point out some things the untrained eye might mis.
Pot area, see that big tic tok westclock up there thats a metranome that sets the beat. Dont even have to look at it the tic tok works great.
On that draw fan over the pot ya see my old log counter, that helps me keep track of order #'s. Wont make a bit of differance to you all but I like to keep track.
To the left are the cooling fans as I work left handed. Cant see it well but those two fans angle in to cool from each side. They sit on a thick aluminum plate that also has a realy thick flat copper bar on that.
To the right you can see the pre heating hot plate. I like it because you can preheat to a very precise temp and hold it there.
Oh yea if you look real closly at the pot you can see the stop drip mod. It changes it to a down touch which was real easy to get used to. Been using it for over a year now and converted all my pots this way.
In the very right corner you can see the edg of my quenching troth and it is in the other photo. It is undercut to set on a bucket but drop boolits in the center. It has a hanging baffle that stops the forward fall and drops them straight down. Its thickly padded inside so the soft boolits are not damaged on thier way to the water. Its also coverd to eliminate any splashing.
See that hanging scale under there? That is used for weighing lead to keep alloys consistant. That seems to be good enough for the lead keeping things within an oz. or two but I use an electric postal scale to weigh tin and antimony.
You dont see a place for sprue's because I cut them with my gloved hand and the still very hot soft sprue goes from my hand to the pot. No sence wasting all that heat. This way when I have run through a 20lb pot I have made 20lb of boolits not half sprues. Oh yea see that old MR coffie under the troth I fished it out of the dumpster. Cut the top off and it works great for melting lube for filling a press. If I am doing a bunch of big boolits and will have to fill the press a couple times to fill an order I just leave a can of lube on it. Gets hot enough to melt slowly but not hot enough to burn.
Thats my system about as smooth and fast as I can get it. For right handers you will just have to stand on your head.
OK OK give me a break its -36 this morning.
BIC/BS
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v239/bullshop/P1010004-1.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v239/bullshop/P1010005-1.jpg
Lately I know I have been rather a wise acre and not realy trying to contribute much, just mostly pokin fun.
In my defence its been between -30 and -40 for three weeks now and think I'm goin a bit daffy. Gonna be a long winter ya know. I had to photo some boolits for auction arms so thought I would pic my casting nest while at it so you can see how its set up. Exp. has tought me to set thing up for a minimum of movement for sustained volume production. I will try to point out some things the untrained eye might mis.
Pot area, see that big tic tok westclock up there thats a metranome that sets the beat. Dont even have to look at it the tic tok works great.
On that draw fan over the pot ya see my old log counter, that helps me keep track of order #'s. Wont make a bit of differance to you all but I like to keep track.
To the left are the cooling fans as I work left handed. Cant see it well but those two fans angle in to cool from each side. They sit on a thick aluminum plate that also has a realy thick flat copper bar on that.
To the right you can see the pre heating hot plate. I like it because you can preheat to a very precise temp and hold it there.
Oh yea if you look real closly at the pot you can see the stop drip mod. It changes it to a down touch which was real easy to get used to. Been using it for over a year now and converted all my pots this way.
In the very right corner you can see the edg of my quenching troth and it is in the other photo. It is undercut to set on a bucket but drop boolits in the center. It has a hanging baffle that stops the forward fall and drops them straight down. Its thickly padded inside so the soft boolits are not damaged on thier way to the water. Its also coverd to eliminate any splashing.
See that hanging scale under there? That is used for weighing lead to keep alloys consistant. That seems to be good enough for the lead keeping things within an oz. or two but I use an electric postal scale to weigh tin and antimony.
You dont see a place for sprue's because I cut them with my gloved hand and the still very hot soft sprue goes from my hand to the pot. No sence wasting all that heat. This way when I have run through a 20lb pot I have made 20lb of boolits not half sprues. Oh yea see that old MR coffie under the troth I fished it out of the dumpster. Cut the top off and it works great for melting lube for filling a press. If I am doing a bunch of big boolits and will have to fill the press a couple times to fill an order I just leave a can of lube on it. Gets hot enough to melt slowly but not hot enough to burn.
Thats my system about as smooth and fast as I can get it. For right handers you will just have to stand on your head.
OK OK give me a break its -36 this morning.
BIC/BS
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v239/bullshop/P1010004-1.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v239/bullshop/P1010005-1.jpg