Printing with MOLDLAY

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pyronaught
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Re: Printing with MOLDLAY

Post by pyronaught » Mon Jun 06, 2016 10:20 pm

That's pretty cool. Seems like the furnace parts would be very large for 3D printing.

I just bought some of this stuff: http://shop.petrobondforsale.com/Mulled ... ond_c2.htm

That's the sand Brian is using to get a very smooth surface finish. I'm going to try making my own sand later, but I need something commercial to compare it against and I don't want to have issues with sand when starting out. This is for a paying job anyway and it will get charged to the client. I'm not selling casted parts, but I need aluminum molds to make the actual compression molded carbon fiber parts the client wants. Luckily they are not in a rush and I have time to get through the learning curve of casting.
Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted.

Mach
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Re: Printing with MOLDLAY

Post by Mach » Tue Jun 07, 2016 4:46 am

Thanks for the link. Post pics when you get going. Yes, the size requires that I print the furnace in parts and then glue it together. Not a big deal since I'll need to remove the forms anyway after casting.

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pyronaught
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Re: Printing with MOLDLAY

Post by pyronaught » Sun Jun 12, 2016 2:44 am

The tongs on budget casting were indeed expensive, and you had to buy two different types-- one for extraction and one for pouring. I decided to build my own single extraction/pour combo like what Brian has. I was able to just use some square steel tubing and flats from the hardware store and my next door neighbor did the welding part for me. I bent the metal using a ring roller to exactly fit the #3 crucible I bought off amazon and it turned out pretty good. I modeled it in Rhino first to make sure the dimensions were correct.
casting1.jpg
casting2.jpg

I'm getting pretty close to being ready to cast some ingots. I was drying out my furnace today when I discovered there's a problem with my burner tube heating up. You can see in the picture below that it heats up enough to turn colors even way back near the connector, so I have to get that fixed before it melts the hose and causes a disaster. Either my propane jet stream isn't fast enough or the nozzle is off center, causing the fire at the tip to occur inside of the nozzle instead of just outside of it like it should. Once I get that fixed I'll be ready to go.
casting3.jpg
Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted.

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pyronaught
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Re: Printing with MOLDLAY

Post by pyronaught » Mon Jun 13, 2016 4:40 am

Furnace is ready to go. I ran it like this for two hours today to dry it out and it didn't crack.
casting4.jpg
Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted.

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pyronaught
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Re: Printing with MOLDLAY

Post by pyronaught » Mon Jun 13, 2016 9:11 pm

Did my first pour today... in the middle of the day with 90 degree heat, long pants, long sleeve flannel shirt, welding gloves and face shield. From now on I'm only doing this at night!

My first discovery is that melting aluminum cans is not worth the effort. It takes about 30 cans to fill the crucible and you get 30% waste due to excessive dross caused by the coating on the cans. Not only that but they stink when melting them. A #3 crucible can make 3 muffin ingots with good clean scrap, but with cans you only get one and a half and it takes a lot longer to fill the crucible one can at a time. So no more messing with cans. Even a five gallon bucket filled with sheet and extrusion scraps I had accumulated over the last two or three years only made six muffins. What you really want is big chunks.

I made a simple skimmer from a piece of metal conduit that works well too. Just split the end and hammer it flat, then fold it at 90 degrees and round the edges on a grinder. Then you can dip it straight down with the furnace lid still on and spin it around to collect the dross. Drilling holes in it would probably make it even better.
casting5.jpg
casting6.jpg
Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted.

ErikAkia
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Re: Printing with MOLDLAY

Post by ErikAkia » Mon Jun 13, 2016 9:39 pm

pyronaught wrote:from a piece of metal conduit
You may not want to use conduit for anything dealing with high temperatures, especially welding but I think your use would qualify. Most conduit has a zinc coating and when it is heated it will off gas creating a noxious gas you don't want to breathe. Looking at the picture of the skimmer I think I see a yellowish coating around the conduit at the bottom which says to me that you have already heated it enough to off gas. I am not sure how much more it will off gas at this point. If you are really attached to it then I would recommend you get a good gas mask and burn off anything still there with the burner. Otherwise you might want to just replace it.

My 2 cents
Erik

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pyronaught
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Re: Printing with MOLDLAY

Post by pyronaught » Mon Jun 13, 2016 10:44 pm

ErikAkia wrote:
pyronaught wrote:from a piece of metal conduit
You may not want to use conduit for anything dealing with high temperatures, especially welding but I think your use would qualify. Most conduit has a zinc coating and when it is heated it will off gas creating a noxious gas you don't want to breathe. Looking at the picture of the skimmer I think I see a yellowish coating around the conduit at the bottom which says to me that you have already heated it enough to off gas. I am not sure how much more it will off gas at this point. If you are really attached to it then I would recommend you get a good gas mask and burn off anything still there with the burner. Otherwise you might want to just replace it.

My 2 cents
Erik

It would be easier to just make another one from a piece of steel tube. It only takes about 15 minutes to make one. It was pretty breezy out when I did this today, so at least any gases that might have been created were blown away from me.
Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted.

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