brass smelter

[jballs918]

well gentleman i have been tossing around an idea about making a heavy duty smelter for melting many different metals. so this comes to the first question. can a turkey cooker put off enough heat to do this. i have 2 curcibles that are related up to 2500 degrees. so i my stat playing with a few things. thankis for any input guys.

[No_1]

JBalls,
They are prettyt easy to make. Take a look at this PFD file which you can save to your computer and print later: http://www.green-trust.org/junkyardprojects/FreeHomeWorkshopPlans/SmeltingFurnace.pdf

Robert

[jballs918]

i just found that, i was wondering if there was anything a bit less the tubing looks pretty tuff to get everything done. that maybe a bit tuff for me

[dnepr]

I have lurking here for a bit , reading and learning. now I can finally ad something. If you are thinking of casting brass be warned it doesn't sound easy. I do my own aluminum castings ( and cast lead bullets obviosly) I have done a fair bit of aluminum castings but I haven't attempted brass yet. brass has its own challenges, the temps are up there and the risk of zinc fumes are reason to proceed with caution. I don't wan't to discourage you, but I want to give you a heads up .

[flhroy]

This should help you out


http://www.lindsaybks.com/dgjp/index.html


http://www.lindsaybks.com/dgjp/djgbk/series/index.html

Roy

[Jetwrench]

no_1, cool file, thanks.
flhory, Lindsay has some really cool books. They get way too much of my money. JETWRENCH

[toecutter]

A few years ago, a number of friends of mine got involved in the whole "build your own lathe" Gingery books. For the most part, we decided casting was more fun than making lathes, and managed to buy some lathes fairly cheap that had more features than we could make ourselves on the gingery pattern.

We used a 15 gal metal trash can, and then packed it with refractory with a hole in the middle. And then used a big propane cylinder with a welding regulator and a burner made from some junk pipe.

It will melt down a full crucible of aluminum or brass in fairly short order. We have made cannons, bells, picture frames, all sorts of stuff. The gingery pattern is very good for the melter itself, then look around for the plans to make your own propane burner online. It will take longer for the refractory to properly dry than you to put all the parts together.

As far as using a cajun cooker/turkey fryer. While these things put off a lot of heat, you loose most of your heat to radiation. Wheras if you had it all put up in a single hole, you could get much better use of your gas. The other thing, despite the heavy construction of the cajun cookers, steel is pretty soft at 2500F I've used the foundary we made for doing steel forgings. Using a pair of pliers to hold it, I could bend a piece of 1/2" bar stock like it was a piece of string cheese.

[Urny]

Welcome to our patch, dnepr. You wouldn't be a motorcyclist would you? If you take your board name from your bike, I can understand your casting aluminum. The idea has passed through my mind for some of the old iron that wanders in and out of my garage.