Sand casting car club plauqes!

I thought some of you might like to see what else I do with some of my aluminum I find besides scrapping it for cash! I own and have owned a number of classic cars/hot rods it is my other hobby, I belong to a pre-1964 made car club.....for those of you that are not hip on traditional hot rods back in the 50's and 60's young hot rodders formed clubs and one way to identify who belonged to what club besides looking at the car club logo and name stitched into their jacket was by the car club plaque/drag plaque hanging from the rear bumper or back window...kinda like a bumper sticker or billboard.....the rurmor is that most likely it started by a high school kids with hot rods that were in a car club started it by taking a casting class in school and thats how car club plauqes came about....but who knows for sure?

Our car club name is "LuckyLosers" were are a small club of 5 guys that are close friends that hang out and work on each others classic cars and BBQ and cruise to car shows together ,we did some reading up on sandcasting and picked up a furnace cheap on craigslist and tried our hand at casting or own plauqe!!

heres what happend:

Getting aluminum melted:
http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04885.jpg

http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04865.jpg

http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04842.jpg

making the mold:
http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04835.jpg

http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04832.jpg

http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04840.jpg

mold ready:
http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04845.jpg

poured:
http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04847.jpg

open mold:
http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04881.jpg

http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04850.jpg

finished product besides cleaning it up and painting:
http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04886.jpg

http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i9...2/DSC04874.jpg

plaque painted and mounted:
http://i976.photobucket.com/albums/a...nnz/005-32.jpg
http://i976.photobucket.com/albums/a...nnz/006-23.jpg

We havent tried anything else yet but plan on casting or own parts...the possiblity's are endless of what you can reproduce....I even thought about making a brass plaque instead of aluminum......

I also plan on using it for scraping...was thinking i can get the formed aluminum seperated off steel like motor shafts and such and pour my own ingots....

Well done, the aluminum from the motor rotors is not one I would prefer using.

My favorites are aluminum rims, engine and transmission scrap.

If you really want to produce some really nice castings source out Petrobond sand. it is so fine you can capture a finder print. Also you might want to ditch that steel crucible for a silicon carbide one.

Believe it or not the steel from that crucible is contaminating your aluminum. Aluminum which has other unwanted metals could give better pouring quality's but probably the opposite will happen where the quality depreciates.

Bad aluminum could freeze before filling the mold, become brittle and break like glass at the slightest bump.

I had a bunch of silver solder used for refrigeration that came in sticks, for an experiment added a stick to my aluminum melt. The finished casting came out fine but very brittle.

If it hadn't been brittle the one quality it did have ( tone ) would have made it a perfect alloy for casting a large bell.


Fishing weight mold.
http://i1207.photobucket.com/albums/...2CP_finned.jpg

Great couple of hobbys. I like the old pu. Mike.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gustavus

Well done, the aluminum from the motor rotors is not one I would prefer using.

My favorites are aluminum rims, engine and transmission scrap.

If you really want to produce some really nice castings source out Petrobond sand. it is so fine you can capture a finder print. Also you might want to ditch that steel crucible for a silicon carbide one.

Believe it or not the steel from that crucible is contaminating your aluminum. Aluminum which has other unwanted metals could give better pouring quality's but probably the opposite will happen where the quality depreciates.

Bad aluminum could freeze before filling the mold, become brittle and break like glass at the slightest bump.

I had a bunch of silver solder used for refrigeration that came in sticks, for an experiment added a stick to my aluminum melt. The finished casting came out fine but very brittle.

If it hadn't been brittle the one quality it did have ( tone ) would have made it a perfect alloy for casting a large bell.


Fishing weight mold.
http://i1207.photobucket.com/albums/...2CP_finned.jpg

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Thanks for the info, I read about petro bond after I already oredered the clay to make green sand, we want to try it out.....I also was looking at different porcelain crucibles on line also just havent bought one yet....the one we used was just what came with the furnace and what we used because we were so stoked on making plaques, I hear ya on the purity and weak aluminum for objects of use , I was thinking more about the motor shaft aluminum for pouring my ignots to sell to the scrape yard ,I did quite a bit of reading up before I ever tried to cast pretty interesting stuff!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by miked

Great couple of hobbys. I like the old pu. Mike.

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Thanks!

Save your fuel and time - scrap yards frown on accepting cast ingots they always assume the worse of the seller in that his/her ingots are contaminated.

Nice scrap to work with an get predictable castings, pistons, hydraulic pumps, transmission casings, any engine parts made of aluminum.

I strongly recommend silicon carbide crucibles, for straight aluminum melts you will get a year or more out of it, melting copper and bronzes much less because of the addition of fluxes.

The graphite crucibles are alright, but your not going to get the same millage as the carbide is going to give you.

When ever I'm doing a casting that needs to be machined - I degass, for example a large dish or motor mount for a vibratory lap similar to the one shown below.

The fishing weight mold was cast in Petrobond without the addition of a degassing agent.

The flat lap used in lapidary work for polishing the flat surfaces of stones is easy to make, the small motor has an eccentric weight attached to the motor shaft which oscillates the flat plate.

That particular lap sells for $343.65 the home foundry is one of the few hobby's that can pay off in real dividends.

http://i1207.photobucket.com/albums/...18Covingto.jpg

Nice sandcasting!

I love seeing recycled goods being taken all the way from recycle, to retail product. It's taking the profit out of the hands of the huge corporations, and giving it back to the little guy. Not to mention the fact you can make a good living doing so.

Great post!

Scott

im looking for some cast reproductions to sell in my ebay store, specifically 57 chevy cameo taillights and the bezels for them, If you can cast and polish them for me then i would be glad to buy them from you. The problem ive been running into with cast reproductions is they are about 5-8% smaller than oem so fitment issues arise. If we could get them to oem size there would be a ton of money to be made here as they sell for $1000+ per pair.