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Gr33nday43
New Member
Uzbekistan
10 Posts |
 Posted - 06/19/2008 : 14:43:26
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Lets say I have a foundry capable of melting aluminum...
Do any of you know how I would go about making ingots out of them for easy storage?
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davycoppit
Penny Pincher Member
USA
126 Posts |
Posted - 06/19/2008 : 15:16:42
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| I dont really know anything about foundrys or melting metals, but would those small bread baking pan work to dump the metal in. I think they look like ingots. |
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HoardCopperByTheTon
Administrator
USA
6807 Posts |
Posted - 06/19/2008 : 15:22:46
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They make some really nice casting things for your ingots. I think they are made out of heavy iron. Depending on the temperature of the metal you are trying to cast those bread making pans might just melt if you try to use them.  |
If your percentages are low.. just sort more. If your percentages are high.. just sort more.
Now selling Copper pennies. 1.6x plus shipping. Limited amounts available. |
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Kurr
1000+ Penny Miser Member
2906 Posts |
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n/a
deleted
13 Posts |
Posted - 06/19/2008 : 16:41:49
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1 part clay and one part fine sand will be good for mold.
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n/a
deleted
13 Posts |
Posted - 06/19/2008 : 16:44:10
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do not mix alloys
make sure your scrap yard will take them.
if the ignots are made of cans label them cans etc
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Gr33nday43
New Member
Uzbekistan
10 Posts |
Posted - 06/19/2008 : 23:01:32
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| How would you label a bar? With a sand mold? I was going to use ingot mold made specifically for ingots... Also does anyone know how to get the impurities off the top of the molten metal? Would something iron just work? What is Kurr talking about with borax and flux? |
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deleted
13 Posts |
Posted - 06/19/2008 : 23:19:22
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magic marker
just skim the junk off the top
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redneck
1000+ Penny Miser Member
1273 Posts |
Posted - 06/19/2008 : 23:51:34
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Molten metal can be Extremely Dangerous...! 
Full protective clothing and eye wear are mandatory...
Use Extreme Caution when using sand molds,any water or moisture in the mold can cause a steam explosion sending molten metal everywhere.
If you decide to do this, I would recommend trying to find somebody that has been trained in this area to help guide you.
Molten metal does not just wash off...  |
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Gr33nday43
New Member
Uzbekistan
10 Posts |
Posted - 06/20/2008 : 02:24:23
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I tried googling borax and flux...what are these and what are they used for in simple terms? I got something about metals oxidizing...In metal casting jargon I don't get.
lol |
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deleted
13 Posts |
Posted - 06/20/2008 : 03:42:21
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aluminum oxidizes when you gravity pour it anyway because you're exposing it to air at a molecular level
this doesn't matter if you're using it to store ingots
borax is used for prevention of steel oxidation..
just cover your ingots in the used motor oil you use for your furnace to prevent oxidation because your scrap yard will pay more for bright ignites
You must be logged in to see this link. <you can build a furnace for under 100 dollars that can metal cast iron with free used oil
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horgad
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
1641 Posts |
Posted - 06/20/2008 : 08:19:30
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I agree with what some others have already stated that your questions are probably best answered at other sites.
That being said I will go ahead and say a few things based on my very limited experience. First it is difficult (not impossible) to melt aluminum cans. They are very thin and surrounded by air. When you try and heat aluminum up to melting temperature it loves to turn into aluminum oxide instead of melting and cans are the worst. In my own melting experiments, I have at best gotten about 50/50 oxide/molten metal and at worst about 100% oxide from cans. 
Aluminum oxide melts at 3600 F and Aluminium melts at 1200 F. Once you have turned your Aluminum into Aluminum Oxide you are pretty much pooched.
So most casters of aluminum avoid cans and use larger heavier chunks of aluminum that have far less surface area and far less exposure to air. (A chunk of ladder for example.)
As for making ingots, there are lots of different ways to go: cast iron cooking pans, cast iron ingot molds, sand, steel cupcake tins, etc. To mark them you could buy yourself a set of punches dies (numbers and letters) and whack them with a hammer. |
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Ardent Listener
Administrator
USA
4841 Posts |
Posted - 06/21/2008 : 16:59:37
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As much as I would like to pour such a bar too, Horgad and Redneck are right on the money with their replies. You would be better off crushing cans to reduce their size and for easy storage. Even if you could melt cans into a bar would a scrap dealer still want to buy it? How would he know what it really was?
Except for perhaps lead, none of the metals are real practical for the 'average joe' to melt into bars and even lead has its dangers. |
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Think positive. |
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No82s
Penny Pincher Member
USA
198 Posts |
Posted - 06/21/2008 : 23:53:18
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| Agreed. Unless I'm missing something, whats the advantage of cashing AL cans over using the time, energy, and risk of having an ingot? The only reason would be if you think AL will jump exponentially in price. But hey, thats what most of us are doing with copper pennies, only we aren't melting them. |
The difference between an optimist and a pessimist is that the pessimist is better informed. |
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moboman
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
2555 Posts |
Posted - 06/22/2008 : 01:02:04
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Easier storage with an ingot is the only reason I can think.
I would like to have a couple bars and say that I made them. |
"99% of all lawyers give the rest of them a bad name" 
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Kurr
1000+ Penny Miser Member
2906 Posts |
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tmaring
Penny Collector Member
USA
302 Posts |
Posted - 06/22/2008 : 11:37:41
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To heck with doing it as an investment... it's just a helluva lot of fun to melt aluminum! It's no big deal. In our circle of friends we have big parties every once in a while. We all save aluminum cans and bring them over to my friend's house where we build a wod bonfire. It's not a big fire... maybe three feet wide and long. He has a large iron ladle about four inches across with a four foot rebar handle welded on it. Once the fire gets going we stick make a hollow place down near the bottom in the coals (reducing environment) and stick the ladle (now a crucible) down there, and using long-handled fireplace tongs we toss three or four or however many crushed cans will fit in there. (Copious beer drinking is taking place during the process to generate more cans!) Anyway. it does not take long before they start melting and you throw in more. Maybe 25 or 30 cans later we have a nice little pool of molten aluminum down there with a frothy dross on top.
Somebody artistic (usually one of the ladies) has been busy carving a mold in a metal pan of sand just moist enough to hold its shape. The ladle is drawn out, dross pushed away from the lip with a stick, and the aluminum poured into the mold. You wait a few minutes and then throw the thing in water and now you have a mementoe of the party. We've been doing this for years and they have a whole bunch of little aluminum sculptures sitting around the garden and on windowsills... little fish, stars, shells etc. If you wanted to do something really boring like an ingot shape, it would be easy. The key is to not drink TOO many beers so that they process becomes dangerous.
By the way... molten aluminum is far more dangerous than molten steel as it has a much higher heat-of-fusion... heat that is given up as the metal freezes. A droplet of molten aluminum that falls into your shoe will burn to the bone, where a droplet of steel will just burn the flesh. SO BE CAREFUL. |
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knibloe
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
1066 Posts |
Posted - 06/23/2008 : 15:18:46
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| If we ever have a get together, I would like to see this process. It must work, I have ended up with numerous pools of aluminum after bonfires, but have never tried to actually capture it. |
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n/a
deleted
21 Posts |
Posted - 08/04/2008 : 00:58:06
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Melting recognizable cans that have a market value into ingots to be sold at a scrap price is a waste of time and energy if your not making them into something useful.
if you were rolling it into sheet for something useful, and sold them, it makes sense, the art sculpture thing. Ok, it makes sense as they do something with it.
keep it as cans and let the professionals do it. there are better things to invest in than Al. Sell the Al and use the proceeds to do something more profitable. Buy scrap gold under market, or invest it in a business. or something else, All the proceeds I get from recycling base metals just goes right into my gold fund, or I use it to buy lunch. Hording Al seems like a dead end, Al is far more valuable used in cars, cans and other consumer goods doing the job it needs to do. Like copper, is it better to have it in a bar? or is it better to use it to carry Electrons so your computer can work and you can read this forum? One is doing something useful...maybe, the other is just there. |
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Neckro
1000+ Penny Miser Member
Saudi Arabia
2080 Posts |
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horgad
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
1641 Posts |
Posted - 08/04/2008 : 07:47:12
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quote:
Originally posted by tmaring
To heck with doing it as an investment... it's just a helluva lot of fun to melt aluminum! It's no big deal. In our circle of friends we have big parties every once in a while. We all save aluminum cans and bring them over to my friend's house where we build a wod bonfire. It's not a big fire... maybe three feet wide and long. He has a large iron ladle about four inches across with a four foot rebar handle welded on it. Once the fire gets going we stick make a hollow place down near the bottom in the coals (reducing environment) and stick the ladle (now a crucible) down there, and using long-handled fireplace tongs we toss three or four or however many crushed cans will fit in there. (Copious beer drinking is taking place during the process to generate more cans!) Anyway. it does not take long before they start melting and you throw in more. Maybe 25 or 30 cans later we have a nice little pool of molten aluminum down there with a frothy dross on top.
Somebody artistic (usually one of the ladies) has been busy carving a mold in a metal pan of sand just moist enough to hold its shape. The ladle is drawn out, dross pushed away from the lip with a stick, and the aluminum poured into the mold. You wait a few minutes and then throw the thing in water and now you have a mementoe of the party. We've been doing this for years and they have a whole bunch of little aluminum sculptures sitting around the garden and on windowsills... little fish, stars, shells etc. If you wanted to do something really boring like an ingot shape, it would be easy. The key is to not drink TOO many beers so that they process becomes dangerous.
By the way... molten aluminum is far more dangerous than molten steel as it has a much higher heat-of-fusion... heat that is given up as the metal freezes. A droplet of molten aluminum that falls into your shoe will burn to the bone, where a droplet of steel will just burn the flesh. SO BE CAREFUL.
Now that is what I call a party! |
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n/a
deleted
25 Posts |
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horgad
1000+ Penny Miser Member
USA
1641 Posts |
Posted - 08/29/2008 : 20:04:49
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quote:
Originally posted by derrickvanderwall
You must be logged in to see this link.
Would that do the trick for melting copper pennies? I mean it's illegal, I know, just curiously asking.
It is hard to say. Different furnaces get hotter than others. It depends on heat, air-flow, and insulation. Even two people building the same thing might get slightly different results. I think the trick is to go for it and if it doesn't work throw it out and build another one.
Personally, I would try to overbuild a bit. Worst case if you build too big and powerful you end up something that can melt copper faster and in larger quantities... |
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n/a
deleted
2 Posts |
Posted - 05/23/2009 : 14:36:06
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Yes. In fact, copper pennies are far easier than aluminum to melt - they're not actually copper. (At least, post-1982 pennies -- they're mostly zinc.) Several points:
A) I've done a LOT of home metal casting, with zinc, aluminum, alloys, etc. I've built 'flowerpot furnaces', and now have a commercial furnace that will go to over 1,500F. I now have a full home chemical and machining workshop (with metal melting/casting) - and a company with a lab that does high-temperature/pressure work with hazardous materials.
I know what I'm talking about.
B) No, it's not illegal (melting coins). You can't deface US bills, but coins are fine - otherwise every zoo in America would get fined for those penny-rolling souvenir machines. OTOH - the cost of pennies as a raw zinc-alloy is a bit wasteful. (But - if that's your most immediate source, it ain't actually bad -- you could make, say, a cool medallion out of a $1 roll, and that's not so bad.)
C) You can melt pennies on the dang stove in a cast-iron pan (and I have). They melt at far lower temperatures than aluminum. That said - DON'T. I guarantee that, if you spill the stuff, the BEST thing that's gonna happen is that it'll melt through your kitchen floor and start a small fire. Worst case - you'll be severely injured and your house will burn down, and you'll face prosecution.
If you want to melt metal, you REALLY need to do some research, have a plan, and work with a friend. You're talking about something that's potentially FAR more dangerous than just firing up a tablesaw that you've never used before.
You need to understand why you need to be wearing clothes made of natural fibers (no polyester, for example -- wool or cotton), LOOSE leather gloves, and why you NEVER pour metal over concrete/cement. (If you're going "huh? why? -- that's exactly my point.)
Backyardmetalcasting.com is an excellent resource. Also Google for "Gingery" and look at his book on building a simple forge from sand, a paint bucket, etc. (If that sounds like too much work - you probably shouldn't even try any of this.)
Don't bother with aluminum - start with zinc-aluminum, or "pot metal" - it's half the melting temperature and far stronger, and it's all over the place (old hard-drive cases, for example, or just about anything made of really dull grey metal).
I use muffin tins, and an old $5 set of fireplace log tongs, for casting ingots (which I've done in a 'forge' I made from a small steel trash can, a bag of sand, a flowerpot, a soup can, a hair dryer, and some roof flashing). Lots of people seem to cast ingots using a cast-iron cornbread mold that makes fake 'corncobs' -- cute, but hard to re-melt. ;-)
Look - it ain't HARD. It's actually damned easy, and quite fun. But the consequences of mistakes are really, really, really bad. Like losing an eye, or spending 6 weeks in the burn unit, or finding out that your insurance isn't going to cover your burned-down house because it was, well, stupidity.
Read. Learn. Use Google and Wikipedia and Yahoo Groups. Enjoy full stereoscopic vision, and 2 hands, for the rest of your life. >;-)
quote:
Originally posted by derrickvanderwall
You must be logged in to see this link.
Would that do the trick for melting copper pennies? I mean it's illegal, I know, just curiously asking.
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n/a
deleted
2 Posts |
Posted - 05/23/2009 : 14:42:25
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quote:
Originally posted by Allen72289
1 part clay and one part fine sand will be good for mold.
"BZZZZZT!!!!" Wrong.
Or at least drastically incomplete.
"Clay"? Do you mean Play-Doh? A big block of riverbed clay that pottery artists make pots out of? Bentonite powder? And - any thoughts on actually moistening the mix? Water? (Are you talking about making 'green sand'?) Or maybe oil?
Dude - I know you were trying to be helpful, but listen carefully: when you're advising someone on how to (hopefully, safely) do something fairly dangerous -- incomplete instructions are worse than no help at all. You might "help" someone to seriously injure him/herself. |
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Gr33nday43
New Member
Uzbekistan
10 Posts |
Posted - 05/23/2009 : 14:45:02
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quote:
Originally posted by sumgai
Yes. In fact, copper pennies are far easier than aluminum to melt - they're not actually copper. (At least, post-1982 pennies -- they're mostly zinc.) Several points:
A) I've done a LOT of home metal casting, with zinc, aluminum, alloys, etc. I've built 'flowerpot furnaces', and now have a commercial furnace that will go to over 1,500F. I now have a full home chemical and machining workshop (with metal melting/casting) - and a company with a lab that does high-temperature/pressure work with hazardous materials.
I know what I'm talking about.
B) No, it's not illegal (melting coins). You can't deface US bills, but coins are fine - otherwise every zoo in America would get fined for those penny-rolling souvenir machines. OTOH - the cost of pennies as a raw zinc-alloy is a bit wasteful. (But - if that's your most immediate source, it ain't actually bad -- you could make, say, a cool medallion out of a $1 roll, and that's not so bad.)
C) You can melt pennies on the dang stove in a cast-iron pan (and I have). They melt at far lower temperatures than aluminum. That said - DON'T. I guarantee that, if you spill the stuff, the BEST thing that's gonna happen is that it'll melt through your kitchen floor and start a small fire. Worst case - you'll be severely injured and your house will burn down, and you'll face prosecution.
If you want to melt metal, you REALLY need to do some research, have a plan, and work with a friend. You're talking about something that's potentially FAR more dangerous than just firing up a tablesaw that you've never used before.
You need to understand why you need to be wearing clothes made of natural fibers (no polyester, for example -- wool or cotton), LOOSE leather gloves, and why you NEVER pour metal over concrete/cement. (If you're going "huh? why? -- that's exactly my point.)
Backyardmetalcasting.com is an excellent resource. Also Google for "Gingery" and look at his book on building a simple forge from sand, a paint bucket, etc. (If that sounds like too much work - you probably shouldn't even try any of this.)
Don't bother with aluminum - start with zinc-aluminum, or "pot metal" - it's half the melting temperature and far stronger, and it's all over the place (old hard-drive cases, for example, or just about anything made of really dull grey metal).
I use muffin tins, and an old $5 set of fireplace log tongs, for casting ingots (which I've done in a 'forge' I made from a small steel trash can, a bag of sand, a flowerpot, a soup can, a hair dryer, and some roof flashing). Lots of people seem to cast ingots using a cast-iron cornbread mold that makes fake 'corncobs' -- cute, but hard to re-melt. ;-)
Look - it ain't HARD. It's actually damned easy, and quite fun. But the consequences of mistakes are really, really, really bad. Like losing an eye, or spending 6 weeks in the burn unit, or finding out that your insurance isn't going to cover your burned-down house because it was, well, stupidity.
Read. Learn. Use Google and Wikipedia and Yahoo Groups. Enjoy full stereoscopic vision, and 2 hands, for the rest of your life. >;-)
quote:
Originally posted by derrickvanderwall
You must be logged in to see this link.
Would that do the trick for melting copper pennies? I mean it's illegal, I know, just curiously asking.
Sumgai,
Thanks for responsding to this very old thread. O_o
Anyways, nice post, but it is in fact illegal to melt pennies and nickels. Other than that, you gave us some really good information.
Taylor |
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Using a foundry to melt aluminum cans into ingots.
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