6 Quart Dutch Ovens

[trys357]

Tractor supply has RedStone Dutch Oven 6 qt. with 3 Feet on clearance for $14.99

[propwashp47]

did not see any of them, but I garbed two combo sets of cornbread molds and square fry pans for $14.99 each

[Hurtback]

I've been looking for a cheap melting pot for WW, sadly the little old ladies in my area clean out all the cast iron cookware from the goodwills and thift stores. Would this be a decent pot for the job?
I'm just starting down this road of casting as father in law works for a salvage yard and now looks like I have a free source of WW.

[Jon]

I had a HF pot for a few years. Don't try to move it with any lead in it, and it'll probably be ok. Mine cracked from moving it around on the burner when it was full of range scrap. I made a pot from an old propane grill tank, and it's much tougher.

[Le Loup Solitaire]

Many folks have successfully used dutch ovens for smelting/casting. Some have had bad experiences with them; cracks formed, ovens split and the mess/danger resulted. A six quart dutch oven is not a big oven. At half full it still contains a good supply of melt and weighs quite a bit. Cast iron does not like to be struck/tapped/banged on when cold and even less when hot/heated. It does not like quick heat-up or cool-down. Original casting pots sold by Lyman, RCBS and others were relatively small (around 10#) and worked fine. But they were also heavier gauge/thickness that may be less in a dutch oven. If you use a six quart DO, don't overfill it and I would suggest treating it gently. Better yet if you can use a vessel made of stainless or something similarly stronger, use that if possible. LLS

[Hurtback]

I appreciate the information, I'm trying to be a good member here and reading as much of the stickies and archives as possible. There is so much information out there that often times I feel like I know even less now than when I started looking into this.

[ACrowe25]

Hurt give it some more reading... And it'll all "click". Just takes time to do things right. Watch some YouTube videos just to "see it" done. Didn't find many that actually knew what they were doing but it helped to see it done.