Smelting ingots - wood or wax

[oldsalt444]

It's been a while since I've made a batch of ingots, but I heard of using sawdust or stirring with a wooden dowel to create carbon, which pushes the alloys back down into the lead. Supposedly, using wax as a flux will bring the alloys to the surface along with the impurities and steel clips from COWW which you'd skim off, leaving you with a softer lead. And what about Marvelux? Any thoughts?

[lightman]

I use both when smelting. Pine sawdust or chips followed by wax of some kind. I did not like the Marvelux. It leaves a film on the pot and your tools that absorbs moisture. I only use wax in my casting pot.

[ShooterAZ]

I use just plain pine shavings and stir it with a DRY paint stir stick. I agree with the above post about Marvelux, or the Frankfort Arsenal fluxes. They draw moisture and don't work as well (for me). With COWW I will usually flux 2-3 times, and on the final flux I will add a little Beeswax to the mix. Comes out nice and clean, leaves the pot clean too. Before stirring the charcoal into your melt, make sure it's all cooked down. If you push a piece of un-burnt wood chip that has any moisture in it into your melt, things can get exciting. Same with the stirring stick, make sure it's dry. I can't overemphasize this!

[robg]

Wax then stir with a bit of wood .seems to work .

[mold maker]

Wood (sawdust), and then wood and wax for the final here.
Marvelux is an explosion waiting to happen and leaves a real mess behind. Wood and wax leave both clean lead and pot.
Don't scrape the pot with a stick as it leaves carbon held between the pot and the lead. After wood fluxing, scrape the pot surfaces with a metal spatula to bring the carbon to the top for extraction.
BTW I've even used pine needles which are rich in rosin.

[country gent]

Smelting I also use both wood shavings and paraffin. I will add the wood chips and a small chip of wax on top of them when it ignites I stir and scape pulling the lead up thru the chips/wax and then pushing them down thru the lead. The stirring motion is as important as the flux. If all you do is stir and not mix them together you don't get a lot of results.

[georgerkahn]

I've used Marvelux with superb results, HOWEVER it is my "last resort" as it does, indeed, make/leave a mess as others have correctly so indicated. Generally I use sawdust from beneath the table saw -- mostly pine -- and add some red wax: the coating on cheeses. Not guessing any numbers of percentage, but a GREAT amount of time the sawdust + cheese wax is all I need to drop bullets which pass my inspection for use. However, on rare occasions where I can't seem to drop good bullets, I do in fact flux with the Marvelux. Back to the saw-dust, if you leave it atop your melt, it does slow down oxidation, and does not reduce your tin: two more pluses. Glenn E. Fryxall, Ph.D., has quite a bit on fluxing in his treatise you may read for free, the 1st listing at http://www.lasc.us/ArticleIndex.htm . I strongly suggest you do in fact spend the time to read it.
BEST!
geo

[Grmps]

I predominantly use pine sawdust I got from a pallet manufacturing plant.
On occasion, I need to add a little Bees Wax to get a complete fluxing.

I flux multiple times when smelting, with sawdust, burn the sawdust off; flux in with a large Strainer Ladle Stainless Steel Wire Skimmer Spoon attached to a handle. I find it gives me a more thurough fluxing and can be used to remove a lot of the dross

https://i.imgur.com/ZsWDTyq.jpg?1

I also flux once with pine sawdust (heat it, burn it off, flux in with potato masher then wire whisk) in my casting pot
I like to leave the fine granules on top of the lead to prevent oxidation and splashing when returning the sprues to the pot.

https://i.imgur.com/bpvQkKM.jpg?1

Occasionally the granules don't become fine so I flux once with Beeswax and get the granules I'm looking for.

Very un-scientific but I get the result I'm looking for.

[Kraschenbirn]

Wax then stir with a bit of wood .seems to work .

Same here...a bit of canning paraffin and stir with a piece of scrap white oak 1x2.

Bill

[gwpercle]

I use them all. If you have a film of Marvelux left on top ....you are using way too much.
I stir in some wood shavings from a pencil sharpener, then add a teaspoon of marvelux, stir with a wood paddle , it chars.
Skim and add a little more wood shavings and a half teaspoon of melted bees wax or paraffin.
Stir well with wooden paddle . Skim well
The wood shavings absorbs any beeswax or marvelux on the surface, stirring with the paddle gets it down into the mix. The carbon left from the wood shavings is easily skimmed and removed with a spoon.
I have found using all tyhree products does a complete fluxing job...better than just using one type flux.

If limited to just one flux it would be beeswax stirred with a wooden paddle.
Gary

[bangerjim]

For me - it is a couple pea-sized pieces of bees wax and sappy pine sawdust. Bees wax is far superior to parafin wax!!!!!!

Works great and gets the garbage out very well.

Banger

[plainsman456]

Wood works for me

[ABJ]

I use both, also a lube stick quickly dipped and stirred works as well. As for as the sawdust, I don't have a ready supply so I use pine kennel bedding. I think you need to use both and I do use a double handful of the pine shavings, just push them into the melt to char them then stir and remove. If you running a real high temp the shavings will flash and burn so be careful.

[Budzilla 19]

Pine sawdust, ( we have a sawmill in the family), processed rosin from a plant I used to work at, and beeswax, if necessary! It works for me. Sometimes use sulfur also. Boy, that makes a smell!

[Wayne Smith]

Wood makes charcoal which purifies (attracts impurities). Wax reduces the ozidized tin back into the alloy. Two different processes. Wood/oil/anything that makes charcoal will clean your alloy when making ingots. Tin oxidizes on top of your melt when you are casting - and really does if ladle casting (lot of alloy exposed to air). Wax reduces this oxide back into the melt, so use it when casting.

[mdi]

I got tired of "mooching" paint sticks from the local hardware store so I looked around and found some "shims", but don't know their real name. They are obviously used in construction as they are rough cut, 1 1/4" wide, 12' long and taper from one end, 3/8"-7/16" to a point on the other end. They were sold in bundles of a dozen for $3:00-$4:00. They work a bit better, I think, than the smooth sided paint sticks. Outside I'll use anything handy for fluxing; candle stubs, lube wax, even tried motor oil, but mostly wood chips/sawdust. Many times there re lubed bullets in with the other alloy and I believe this supplies a bit of wax during the casting process. Inside I'll just use one of the shims and stir aggressively...

[fredj338]

Sawdust during the ingot process & only stir the casting pot with wooden spoon or paint stick.

[RogerDat]

Still using chips from a surface planer a deceased friend gave me. And some sawdust from table saw (his and mine) being careful to only collect when glued wood was not being cut. Bees wax in the casting pot, junky thrift store and garage sale candles for the smelting pot. Big thing with bees wax is it doesn't ignite as easily in hot lead, paraffin flashes up at a much lower temperature. So bees wax spreads out and drives the dross back into the melt.

Note do not put the lid on the Dutch oven after dumping sawdust and wax in there. Unless trying to smother a fire. When the lid comes off and all that wood a wax smoke comes pouring out it can ignite from the burner flash off in a big way. I don't want to talk about how I know. I always use a different pot than my melter for making of ingots. I don't want dirty lead, sawdust etc. in my pot So I use the Lee melter for casting and pot on burner for smelting.

[bbogue1]

I got tired of "mooching" paint sticks from the local hardware store so I looked around and found some "shims", but don't know their real name. They are obviously used in construction as they are rough cut, 1 1/4" wide, 12' long and taper from one end, 3/8"-7/16" to a point on the other end. They were sold in bundles of a dozen for $3:00-$4:00. They work a bit better, I think, than the smooth sided paint sticks. Outside I'll use anything handy for fluxing; candle stubs, lube wax, even tried motor oil, but mostly wood chips/sawdust. Many times there re lubed bullets in with the other alloy and I believe this supplies a bit of wax during the casting process. Inside I'll just use one of the shims and stir aggressively...

Go to the same place you bought the shims and ask for sawdust, if they don't keep it day to day, ask them to or go to Lowes, Home Depot, Home Base and ask, they will give you plenty.

[glockfan]

i'm fluxing with parrafin only. however i might start to add some wood dust to ''protect''' the melted metal from oxidation.....i'm a starter so i'm adding new techniques to my
caster arsenal slowly.....i'm trying to ''understand''' the effects the ''additives'' has on the material.

[Bigslug]

I may get roundly flamed for saying this, but I've quit fluxing entirely, having concluded it's largely voodoo for a couple reasons.

With a bottom-pour smelting pot full of 40-60 pounds of molten lead, the sand, grease, etc... is going to be the lightest thing in there. A bit of stir and scrape to dislodge it from the sides of the pot, and that stuff is floating to the top where it is easily skimmed. If any separation of the alloy is going on, that same stirring should keep it under control. Oxides only happen where there's oxygen - I can live with a few microns worth at the top of the melt. . .which is as far from the ingot or bullet-making spigot as you can get.

A bunch of charcoal from sawdust is going to be even lighter than most of the random debris. I've used my tempura "spider" to press it under the surface, but I'm highly dubious of how well it actually gets mixed. It's like trying to push a foam surfboard underwater and hold it three feet down - that ain't happening.

I still keep my sawdust handy for when I smelt large quantities of rejects or get gifted a box of factory cast that still have lube on them - easier to get rid of when held in a sawdust "wick" - but that's as close as I get to fluxing anymore. "Gravity fluxing" with a skim off the top of the smelting pot and a skim off the top of the casting pot seems to be all the separation that's required for clean metal. The end results show no observable difference.

[bangerjim]

Wood makes charcoal which purifies (attracts impurities). Wax reduces the ozidized tin back into the alloy. Two different processes. Wood/oil/anything that makes charcoal will clean your alloy when making ingots. Tin oxidizes on top of your melt when you are casting - and really does if ladle casting (lot of alloy exposed to air). Wax reduces this oxide back into the melt, so use it when casting.

That's why I use both wood AND beeswax.

[WRideout]

A while ago, I had a bottle of vegetable oil from the kitchen that had turned rancid, so I put it to use for general shop lube. When I used it to smelt COWW, the steel clips released very cleanly from the lead, and the smelted lead turned out very clean. In general, wheel weights have enough paint, grease, or rubber adhesive on them that they don't even require flux. Nowadays, I flux with used motor oil, which works quite well for me, although others have offered theoretical criticism of that process. In my Lee dipper casting pot, I only use wax. I found that partly burned birthday cake candles are just the right amount of wax for fluxing my little pot (Yes I am really cheap).

FWIW, when fluxing with vegetable oil, everything smells like french fries.
Wayne

[copdills]

I also use wax and then stir in alittle saw dust

[Wolfer]

Like most I use pine sawdust, parrifin, beeswax, broken crayons and stir with a pine stick
Not all at the same time but whatever is handy. A broken crayon stirred in with a pine stick works very well for me.

[bangerjim]

Like most I use pine sawdust, parrifin, beeswax, broken crayons and stir with a pine stick
Not all at the same time but whatever is handy. A broken crayon stirred in with a pine stick works very well for me.


And "colored " boolits are reeeeeel nice....too! HA....ha!!!!!! [smilie=s:

[woodbutcher]

[smilie=s: To keep the neighbors happy when smelting I used bees wax and cedar shavings saved when I cut firewood.Worked pretty good too from what I could see from the crud that I skimmed off.
Good luck.Have fun.Be safe.
Leo

[glockfan]

i've noticed that after the fire induced by the parrafin i'm fluxing with,the lead appears clearer and the bad smell generally present goes away.

[RAK2018]

Went to Home Depot and they filled a 5 gallon bucket of saw dust for free.

[sundog]

Went to Home Depot and they filled a 5 gallon bucket of saw dust for free.

What kind of saw dust? If it was from a mix of things that included plywood, 'pressboard', and treated lumber, I would not want that in my casting pot. But that's me. It might be good for rendering WWs and range scrape though. I wouldn't breath the smoke.

I just finished a 5 gal bucket of chain saw rippings (not cross cut) from some elm that was too tough to split until made a little smaller. Rippings had been dried and stored just for flux. Worked really good, nice and clean. I just took down a storm damaged elm a few days ago and some of it will be used to replenish the aforementioned empty bucket.

I've also used cedar saw dust. Smells good.

[justashooter]

i use an oak molding scrap stick to scrape the side of pot and bottom when recovering lead from junk sources. i find iron oxides in roofing lead that has been in contact with steel sink to the bottom. the white oak stick chars to charcoal in the liquid lead and makes most other junk float. no wax, no sawdust, just a stick.