New casting setup [Archive]

tomf52

12-28-2006, 05:54 PM

Here is a picture (I hope) of a cabinet I made to cast in the garage and be comfortable. 3/4 plywood cabinet and door panel, which also allows me to run emergency generator in the garage porting the exhaust through the aluminum panel in lower left corner. Fan unit on cabinet is the exhaust fan from a junk gas (or propane) hot water heater. 5 1/2" hole in top of cabinet. Exhaust pipe is 2" PVC. Front of cabinet is yet to get a piece of plexiglass that comes half way down. Cabinet will be painted with white on the inside. Low wattage Craftsman drop light (high intensity bulb) provides light. I test ran it with my Lyman 10# pot and PLENTY of beeswax to make lots of smoke. All smoke went outside. Temp of discharge air was in the fifties (47 deg in the garage). Discharge pipes cool to the touch. Door panel held in place with four barrel bolts. Garage door handles on panel facilitate handling of the panel. Tomorrow hope to post pics of smelter I fabricated from outdated (no OPD valve) plumber's pot. This retirement is great!

kodiak1

12-28-2006, 07:05 PM

tomf52 Good looking Set up like the fan for positive air flow to get rid of the fumes.
Was wondering if a steel bottom may have been better. Not trying to bash your idea at all just flipping out an off the cuff idea.
Thanks Ken.

tomf52

12-28-2006, 07:29 PM

Bottom seems to stay cool. If it becomes a problem I have some 1/4 plate aluminum to put there.

rebliss

12-29-2006, 08:33 PM

Nice job. You planning on smelting in that set-up too? If so, I'd definitely put the aluminum down--it's always so easy to pick up splatters off aluminum. Wood, not so much.

I really like your idea of sliding the rig up to the doorway, and having your exhaust set-up right in that panel.

Looking forward to seeing your smelter when it's done!

tomf52

12-30-2006, 10:34 AM

Rebliss - No, smelting will be done outside on a much larger scale. Have enough clean ingots to keep me going for quite a while. This will be used solely for casting the bullets from the electric pot. What makes it nice is that you get thorough ventilation without the heat in the garage being sucked out too.

rvpilot76

12-30-2006, 02:46 PM

Nice job. You planning on smelting in that set-up too? If so, I'd definitely put the aluminum down--it's always so easy to pick up splatters off aluminum. Wood, not so much.

I really like your idea of sliding the rig up to the doorway, and having your exhaust set-up right in that panel.

Looking forward to seeing your smelter when it's done!
HEY, I LOVE YOUR AVATAR! DOWN WITH ALL DICTATORS! Seriously, that's a great one.

Kevin