Many of the things you do are correct, however, one major mistake in the construction of this furnace is the lack of a bust out hole 270 degrees from the burner. If you are melting metal, a common problem is that after a while the crucible gets old and sometimes will catastrophically fail. When that metal dumps into the bottom of the furnace, it can snuff out the flame but the hot metal will then reignite it. Foundries have burned down as a result of this kind of explosion and people have been either killed or seriously burned. The solution that all professional furnace builders use, is a hole 270 degrees from the input hole, that is at the very bottom of the furnace. In a catastrophic failure, the metal has a place to come out, therefore, it doesn't snuff the burner (it also make cleaning the furnace a lot easier after a bust out). On a furnace this size, that bust out hole should be at least 2" in diameter. It is OK for some flame to go out that hole. It keeps it hot so that molten metal does not freeze in the hole and plug it in a bust out situation. Below that hole, you want a container full of dry sand. If metal flows into dry sand, it will not pop and is easy to cleanup. If you dump it on your patio bricks, the moisture in the bricks or just the uneven heating of the bricks can cause the metal to fly as the concrete pops. It typically happens after the metal has set on a concrete surface for around a minute. The design that you have for a lift out furnace is OK. One of the things that most operators do is put a thin sheet of fiberglass under the crucible and paint that fiberglass with graphite. That keeps the glaze of the crucible from sticking the crucible down to the pedestal block, assuming you are using a clay/graphite crucible with glaze on it. If you run this furnace a lot, coat the inside of the furnace with Kyanite cement or some other refractory that can be pasted onto the surface. Your castable is only going to be good for around 2000 degrees, 3000 is you buy the expensive stuff. Continual use will wear the face down and the uneven surface will reduce furnace efficiency and damage the crucible. I did not see the relationship of the crucible to the burner. Generally, it is a bad idea to allow the flame from the burner to directly hit the crucible. You want the crucible high enough off the bottom so that the flame hits the furnace wall and then spirals up the wall, giving an even heat and not burning the bottom of the crucible. I always build my furnaces with the burner hole a bit larger than the burner and then pull the burner back so that it just barely goes into the hole. They last much longer that way and are easier to light. Never start a furnace out on high flame. You want to start on a relatively low flame for the first 5 to 10 minutes. You can increase the flame as time goes on. Listening to the flame and the rumbling it makes will tell you if you are running too hard early on. A deep rumble means that the coolness of the wall is causing an incomplete burn. This releases a lot of carbon monoxide and it represents a condition where you can blow out the furnace momentarily then reignite it. That can easily throw the lid right off your furnace if enough gas got in before it reignited. I have built and run these things professionally for 40 years. I'd rather you didn't get yourself hurt.
+cfjulian1225 Thank you so very much for your excellent points. Since this unit is of a modular design, I am able to implement a blow-out hole into this unit. I will simply make 2 bricks with a hole much like I did with the hole for the input of the burner. Foundry safety is paramount and before I created this unit I did consult with a foundry professional. He gave me many key points to follow in designing a furnace around a crucible. He did not mention a blow-out hole however, which I agree with being a key component in any furnace design. I have had a few minor spills in this, and its just a matter of taking it apart and cleaning it all out. Burner placement was one of the key points in the design of course and this unit has the burner placed at the bottom of the crucible off to the left side. My spacing from the exterior (A8) crucible wall to the interior wall of the furnace is 2.37" the wall thickness is also 2.37" with a 1" thick pyro mat wrapped around that. My pedestal is made from refractory and is about an inch high. Thank you again for sharing with us some very good points.
+Designsbyg One other common mistake people make in running gas furnaces is that they turn them on high, once warmed up, and leave them there till the metal is molten. I put type K thermocouples in ceramic tubes (available from Omega) to monitor the liner temperature. In a typical furnace melting aluminum, you don't want the liner to go over 2100 degrees. I do that with North American valve motors and Honeywell controllers. The crucibles will degrade quickly at temperatures over that. You can do that manually by watching the color of the liner. The color of orange juice is around 1750 degrees. When the liner gets that hot, throttle the burner way down to just maintain that temperature. The furnace and the crucibles will last longer. It also helps keep you from overshooting the pouring temperature. The metal will still melt. It just takes a little longer. Since you are using an open top lift out furnace, make sure you put cover flux on top of your metal to protect it from oxidizing as you are melting. Before you pour, use a drossing flux that you stir into the metal. Adding a tsp of finely powdered potassium nitrate to the dross (aluminum only), will heat up the flux and help it drain the good metal out of the dross. Put the dross on a tilted deck of fire bricks with a steel pan at the bottom. Fill the gaps between bricks with refractory cement. As the dross sits, the KNO3 will keep reacting and release more of the metal, that you then catch in the steel pan at the bottom of the bricks. This is called a drossing table. My furnaces are designed a bit differently than yours. I use a steel shell that I then line with firebrick to make the shape. Even complete rebuilds are relatively quick. I always put a row of uncemented firebrick at the top of the furnace, above the steel and below the lid. In the event that you pop the furnace, the blowout bricks release the pressure without launching the top. No one likes that to happen, but inexperienced operators often manage to do it. My furnaces are much larger than yours. We use silicon carbide crucibles, that are thermally more conductive than clay/graphite, and dip the metal out with ladles. Don't use silicon carbide for a lift out furnace. The crucible is not strong enough for that.
You have some very good key points that need to be addressed in his design, but you have to give credit where credit is due...this thing does have some really good design aspects (modular blocks,torch head). I see some other DIY builders here on RUclips and it surprising they haven't burnt down their house or ended up in the hospital...molten metal isn't the most forgiving thing. To see a design that looks fairly well thought out is a nice change.
Saw your design over a year ago. Still the best I have seen. Neat and professional carefully thought out and made. Well done. Experience has shown me that furnaces that can be broken down are useful for melting odd sized scrap as they can be cleaned and used again as intended.It is not kind to the furnace bricks but large lumps can be melted down to run off and then popped into a crucible to be re-poured into an ingot mould. Thanks for posting.
That's a awesome craftsmanship of a foundry furnace. This is a very nice build & designed foundry furnace that can be easily assemble and disassemble (interlocks), I absolutely love it! You should put this in the market where professional smelters, metal casters, metal forgers, enthusiasts, hobbyists or anyone, anybody with an interest in melting & casting metals could buy or purchased this very nice, good foundry furnace. Oh, very good song chosen, Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody! :)
7 months late, i ment also to compliment you. i have finally scrathed some time to build mine..35 gallon drum. 4 piece design...i must say that the ability to assemble and reduce size in your design is a tremendous advantage....also the spillway in the bottom being pieced together is a good redundency...my compliments.
Absolutely BRILLIANT way to take the top off. I may end up copying that idea. I was just thinking about what to do with my lid - using an old trashcan for the shell and the trashcan lid doesn't make a good foundry lid (no room for refractory). I was basically going to accept that my lid would look halfassed no matter what before seeing this. Since mine will also be on a platform with wheels, this is a fantastic way to go about it. Even gives me some other ideas so I don't end up just copying your idea
I found some plans for an electric foundry on a site called Dan's Workshop. There were a bunch of websites of people who had built one, so I bought in. I'm going to get started this afternoon buying materials. The best advice I think is to use firebrick for the inner liner. Refractory is a great insulator, but chips really easily.
Although i've not tried it yet, i'm very confident that it would easily melt any non-ferrous metal. When I run it to melt aluminum, i'm only running at about 10% throttle! It was designed with melting bronze, brass and copper in mind. I do intend to melt these in this furnace at some point. It will also melt silver/gold just as easily.
Wow, tou sure have a lot of good features built into that furnace. The only things missing are lockable casters, and a way to limit how far the lid swings (minor niceties). Excellent work! :-)
is their anyway that shop would make those molds i really like the idea of being able to put away mine is always in the way im in Pa so wishing your up this way
beautiful craftsmanship great design gotta put this in my favorites i know i wont be able to build my own anytime soon, not like that, but it is great for the future and for current ideas to do in the near future thanks for a great vid
Dear Designsbyg, I appreciate your DIY-foundry a lot. Your philosophie to just take a little more effort and make it quite nice is also mine. The look is professional and the handling with the bricks seems a big plus for hobby usage. I am planning my own foundry for some weeks now and I am happy how much information and great ideas I can find on the net. Could I get in contact with you to exchange even more info? Thanks and always a good melt, Tom
the fire ring at the top is held in by the outside bottom and verticle lip the blocks being tight together and probably interlocking on edge keep them from falling in...
@hennyforapenny :I've designed this to melt all non ferrous metals. It easily exceeds my initial expectations and i believe it will do higher temperature melts quite easily. Since this vid was made, i've also wrapped a 1 inch thick pyromat around the furnace body which keeps in much more heat.
Hi, great job. i have been a millwright for over 30 years and love to see people take the time and pride to do things right. I was thinking of building a furnace similar to this one now that I am about ready to retire, did you use plain refractory cement or was there some mix of perlite or something else? Alot of people are comenting on the expensive tools needed but I think most could be able to lay it out with a router and circle cutter now that you put the idea out there. Thanks job well done
Really nice! About 3 years have past since you built the furnace, if you were to make a new one today, would you change any parts of the design? How critical were your dimensions for the burner?
i am also in the tool/mold industry,and have use of cnc,and specialise in edm,i am friends with our graphite supplier,and he has let me have all his scrap graphite.instead of refractory cement, i was going to use graphite peices to make a big block and machine the foundry.. what are your thoughts?,also if you dont mind ime totally hitting up the lathe to copy your burner!..great job!..best ive seen..simple..beautiful,and super powerful!
@Designsbyg How much heat did the design lose by not having the pyromat? Would it have made sense to make the walls thicker instead? I'm about to start casting parts for an iron melting oil fired furnace using a similar model, and my concern have been whether or not I'd get leaks between the bricks (possibly I'd seal with something). Very nice job on this, it's a good design.
Will it melt iron? What a great design. I have been thinking in classic terms, ie a bucket or barrel of some kind to construct the furnace. This makes me think 'out of the bucket'.
Very nice. How many unique brick molds did you create? Did adding the port for the burner nozzle require separate molds or did you bore it out afterwards? How do you monitor the temperature? Cawthra Park, holy crap!
Hey, I'm planning on making a double-wall-structure forge, so I can put wood in between the 2 rims for drying the wood (first step charcoal making), I would also use ventilation with a condensator and filter so I don't breath these fumes when I'm working. Now what I need to know is: 1) If the wall would conduct enough heat for the moisture to evaporate from the wood? 2) what's minimum thickness the wall should be for a save forge? 3) Wich brand is that of the product you're using? Thanks, greets
I like the Design. The Concept of modular parts is what I have been working on. This will allow you to replace parts that Crack or break over time. I noticed that you had a CAD drawing in the video, Is that something you are willing to email out to others? I would like to get Both the Burner design and the Furnace in DWG or DXF files. I am working on a Cart that will hold my system. I have not started on the new Furnace yet.
DIY? You fooled me by the professionalism of the design/mnfr of the product, as well as by the quality editing of the video. Great job! Certainly an inspiration to other DIY-ers. Just wondering though... For those who are not as handy in making things of this nature, do you sell this in a kit, or would you be willing to? And if so, how much would you charge for it? Thx!
@ruow2000 - thank you. I used (are you sitting down?) 450lbs of mix to make this furnace! Hard to believe, but those little bags (each bag being about 12x5x24") weighed 100lbs each. I bought 5 bags (eventually) and have a half bag left.
so i have analysed this furnace 3 or 4 times now and i finally found why it's not perfect : the base its too big and heavy opposed to all the little pieces of the furnace itself and you do not have a hole in it (in the bottom) just in case melted material spills it will be left on the bottom of the furnace until it cools and you can take it apart apart that its perfect
Designsbyg Are you an engineer? I've always felt like my ambitions are held back by my knowledge. I wish I had that "knack" for problem solving a lot of engineers possess to design things like this on their own. Great project man.
@Mrflashlite - The refractory cement used is a common mix I obtained from a local foundry supply vendor (in 100lb bags). This vendor had EVERYTHING you could possibly need to run or operate ANY foundry. He is only 45 minutes from me. This really helped.
When I built my furnace, I was fortunate enough to be given information by a local foundry supplier. otherwise, i doubt i would have gotten the results I did. I know nothing about forges. I believe many cement manufacturers produce a line of high temp/refractory grade products. I don't recall which one I used, sorry...
I love this furnace but the thing is, I'm trying to make a furnace you'd be able to make at home, with CHEAP THINGS not fancy shmancy shtuff, but I admire it for being aweseome
It is possible to melt aluminum with a hole in the ground and a coffee can if you just want to do a couple of cans for fun. If you want to get more serious after that you can start spending money on better equipment.
@dekonfrost7 - 'DIY' means just that. Being resourceful is part of DIY. I happen to be a CNC programmer/engineer/designer, so access to the computers/machines is rather easy. So, in one respect you are right that this is somewhat beyond the norm. This project can be built without a CNC. It all depends on how ambitious and resourceful you wish to be...(btw, the only thing I paid for, was the cement and the metal...)
Please tell me, i am trying to understand how to make a lid with six pieces and a metal ring but can't understand how they will stay in form when lifted. I notice you have a grove in your mold...is this filled with rebar or some kind of support? Is that grove the only thing needed for the support of those six lid pieces?
Awesome design. Beautiful ingots as well. Though, with all the foundry RUclipsing I've been doing recently, the one thing I didn't know much about was the crucible itself, which is what led me here, but it's also nonexistent in this video. :p I'd be interested in what you used.
@Designsbyg Just curious, i stubbled upon this video, what is the purpuse of all this in the long run, what are you melting aluminium for? are you reselling the aluminium instead of recycling them to get the melt value? that would be my guess. (thirsty for knowledge)
@agentxoo7 - This design was purely experimental. The nozzle was inspired and based on a typical propane torch design. This is the only attempt made. There was no trial & error involved.
Would you build one for me and if so what would the price tag be for something like this ? I would love to build it but time is money for me and I am all out of time lol . Thanks Greg .
hey deadly job. what did you use for the crucible? and what did you use to make the molds out of? was it easy to remove the metal from the molds after it had gone cold again?
okay fancy pants. I think the idea of diy are practical projects that people who don't have a bunch of extra money to throw around can actually do at home. show off!!!
This project is very practical and there are ways to do it more cheaply such as found metal. a friend and I are making one for the first time this summer with found metal and a cement refractory recipe, also building one their own self is a much cheaper way
This is a spectacular design, if you sold this as a kit on Etsy I would definitely buy this! By any chance could you disclose how much this project set you back? I would think no less than $300?
ya....the refractory cement alone was close to that. The metal cost was not excessive and the whole project cost was around $800 There was also the cost of things like a 40lb propane tank and regulator/hose.
@STRIKER520 Dude high tolerances aren't needed here, not even thousandths of an inch. The Babylonians were making glass & Bronze stuff back in the day & they didn't even have store baked buns... (Jack in the Box anyone?) doing it super cheap just purchase a $5 jigsaw at the local pawn shop & go to town with wooden pallets... (an angle grinder will probably be needed later too) Of course with my wood shop I'll use a few other tools...
Would you be interested in making a few of those side molds and top molds for a fee? I would love to be able to make these blocks but no way to make the molds!
Many of the things you do are correct, however, one major mistake in the construction of this furnace is the lack of a bust out hole 270 degrees from the burner. If you are melting metal, a common problem is that after a while the crucible gets old and sometimes will catastrophically fail. When that metal dumps into the bottom of the furnace, it can snuff out the flame but the hot metal will then reignite it. Foundries have burned down as a result of this kind of explosion and people have been either killed or seriously burned. The solution that all professional furnace builders use, is a hole 270 degrees from the input hole, that is at the very bottom of the furnace. In a catastrophic failure, the metal has a place to come out, therefore, it doesn't snuff the burner (it also make cleaning the furnace a lot easier after a bust out). On a furnace this size, that bust out hole should be at least 2" in diameter. It is OK for some flame to go out that hole. It keeps it hot so that molten metal does not freeze in the hole and plug it in a bust out situation. Below that hole, you want a container full of dry sand. If metal flows into dry sand, it will not pop and is easy to cleanup. If you dump it on your patio bricks, the moisture in the bricks or just the uneven heating of the bricks can cause the metal to fly as the concrete pops. It typically happens after the metal has set on a concrete surface for around a minute. The design that you have for a lift out furnace is OK. One of the things that most operators do is put a thin sheet of fiberglass under the crucible and paint that fiberglass with graphite. That keeps the glaze of the crucible from sticking the crucible down to the pedestal block, assuming you are using a clay/graphite crucible with glaze on it. If you run this furnace a lot, coat the inside of the furnace with Kyanite cement or some other refractory that can be pasted onto the surface. Your castable is only going to be good for around 2000 degrees, 3000 is you buy the expensive stuff. Continual use will wear the face down and the uneven surface will reduce furnace efficiency and damage the crucible. I did not see the relationship of the crucible to the burner. Generally, it is a bad idea to allow the flame from the burner to directly hit the crucible. You want the crucible high enough off the bottom so that the flame hits the furnace wall and then spirals up the wall, giving an even heat and not burning the bottom of the crucible. I always build my furnaces with the burner hole a bit larger than the burner and then pull the burner back so that it just barely goes into the hole. They last much longer that way and are easier to light. Never start a furnace out on high flame. You want to start on a relatively low flame for the first 5 to 10 minutes. You can increase the flame as time goes on. Listening to the flame and the rumbling it makes will tell you if you are running too hard early on. A deep rumble means that the coolness of the wall is causing an incomplete burn. This releases a lot of carbon monoxide and it represents a condition where you can blow out the furnace momentarily then reignite it. That can easily throw the lid right off your furnace if enough gas got in before it reignited. I have built and run these things professionally for 40 years. I'd rather you didn't get yourself hurt.
+cfjulian1225 Thank you so very much for your excellent points. Since this unit is of a modular design, I am able to implement a blow-out hole into this unit. I will simply make 2 bricks with a hole much like I did with the hole for the input of the burner. Foundry safety is paramount and before I created this unit I did consult with a foundry professional. He gave me many key points to follow in designing a furnace around a crucible. He did not mention a blow-out hole however, which I agree with being a key component in any furnace design. I have had a few minor spills in this, and its just a matter of taking it apart and cleaning it all out. Burner placement was one of the key points in the design of course and this unit has the burner placed at the bottom of the crucible off to the left side. My spacing from the exterior (A8) crucible wall to the interior wall of the furnace is 2.37" the wall thickness is also 2.37" with a 1" thick pyro mat wrapped around that. My pedestal is made from refractory and is about an inch high. Thank you again for sharing with us some very good points.
+Designsbyg One other common mistake people make in running gas furnaces is that they turn them on high, once warmed up, and leave them there till the metal is molten. I put type K thermocouples in ceramic tubes (available from Omega) to monitor the liner temperature. In a typical furnace melting aluminum, you don't want the liner to go over 2100 degrees. I do that with North American valve motors and Honeywell controllers. The crucibles will degrade quickly at temperatures over that. You can do that manually by watching the color of the liner. The color of orange juice is around 1750 degrees. When the liner gets that hot, throttle the burner way down to just maintain that temperature. The furnace and the crucibles will last longer. It also helps keep you from overshooting the pouring temperature. The metal will still melt. It just takes a little longer.
Since you are using an open top lift out furnace, make sure you put cover flux on top of your metal to protect it from oxidizing as you are melting. Before you pour, use a drossing flux that you stir into the metal. Adding a tsp of finely powdered potassium nitrate to the dross (aluminum only), will heat up the flux and help it drain the good metal out of the dross. Put the dross on a tilted deck of fire bricks with a steel pan at the bottom. Fill the gaps between bricks with refractory cement. As the dross sits, the KNO3 will keep reacting and release more of the metal, that you then catch in the steel pan at the bottom of the bricks. This is called a drossing table.
My furnaces are designed a bit differently than yours. I use a steel shell that I then line with firebrick to make the shape. Even complete rebuilds are relatively quick. I always put a row of uncemented firebrick at the top of the furnace, above the steel and below the lid. In the event that you pop the furnace, the blowout bricks release the pressure without launching the top. No one likes that to happen, but inexperienced operators often manage to do it. My furnaces are much larger than yours. We use silicon carbide crucibles, that are thermally more conductive than clay/graphite, and dip the metal out with ladles. Don't use silicon carbide for a lift out furnace. The crucible is not strong enough for that.
You have some very good key points that need to be addressed in his design, but you have to give credit where credit is due...this thing does have some really good design aspects (modular blocks,torch head).
I see some other DIY builders here on RUclips and it surprising they haven't burnt down their house or ended up in the hospital...molten metal isn't the most forgiving thing. To see a design that looks fairly well thought out is a nice change.
Yeah it happened to me
cfjulian1225
Saw your design over a year ago. Still the best I have seen. Neat and professional carefully thought out and made. Well done. Experience has shown me that furnaces that can be broken down are useful for melting odd sized scrap as they can be cleaned and used again as intended.It is not kind to the furnace bricks but large lumps can be melted down to run off and then popped into a crucible to be re-poured into an ingot mould. Thanks for posting.
That's a awesome craftsmanship of a foundry furnace. This is a very nice build & designed foundry furnace that can be easily assemble and disassemble (interlocks), I absolutely love it! You should put this in the market where professional smelters, metal casters, metal forgers, enthusiasts, hobbyists or anyone, anybody with an interest in melting & casting metals could buy or purchased this very nice, good foundry furnace. Oh, very good song chosen, Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody! :)
I love to see the planning , the whole idea of self assembly , and the lid design and the attention to detail . Very proffesional approach. Well done
7 months late, i ment also to compliment you. i have finally scrathed some time to build mine..35 gallon drum. 4 piece design...i must say that the ability to assemble and reduce size in your design is a tremendous advantage....also the spillway in the bottom being pieced together is a good redundency...my compliments.
very good craftsmanship....a lot of pride goes into your work
Absolutely BRILLIANT way to take the top off. I may end up copying that idea. I was just thinking about what to do with my lid - using an old trashcan for the shell and the trashcan lid doesn't make a good foundry lid (no room for refractory). I was basically going to accept that my lid would look halfassed no matter what before seeing this. Since mine will also be on a platform with wheels, this is a fantastic way to go about it. Even gives me some other ideas so I don't end up just copying your idea
Nice design and build. At least half the enjoyment of this furnace has got to be knowing you crafted it.
That's a beautiful piece of work. Superb engineering, and the most beautiful burner I've ever seen.
I believe that this is the furnace I am going to build. It is just so professionally done.
Good job.
I found some plans for an electric foundry on a site called Dan's Workshop. There were a bunch of websites of people who had built one, so I bought in. I'm going to get started this afternoon buying materials.
The best advice I think is to use firebrick for the inner liner. Refractory is a great insulator, but chips really easily.
Excellent design, construction, successful completion and choice of music. Well done!
Really a great job....I like the detail work...your a perfectionist I see...
Excellent design. This is the best I've seen. I'm going to replicate for my foundry.
The baddest DIY foundry I have ever seen!
Very nice, I have a sneaking suspecion you like building things more than melting them.
the best video ive seen so far on the subject of diy foundries...indeed you get out what you out in..good work
One of the best builds i have seen
Love the design, really like how it can be broken down. Would make for easy repairs or modifications. Looks great.
Nice Furnace. I like that fact that it is moduler. easy storage. I think I will consider this befor pooring a Popcorn can full of cement.
Very impressive! I am building one tomorrow, but not quite as elaborate as yours. Thanks for the videos!
Although i've not tried it yet, i'm very confident that it would easily melt any non-ferrous metal. When I run it to melt aluminum, i'm only running at about 10% throttle! It was designed with melting bronze, brass and copper in mind. I do intend to melt these in this furnace at some point. It will also melt silver/gold just as easily.
Wow, tou sure have a lot of good features built into that furnace. The only things missing are lockable casters, and a way to limit how far the lid swings (minor niceties). Excellent work! :-)
Finally a youtuber with a a taste of music
Beautiful design! You could, of course mount the whole thing on a custom cart and it'd be easy to move by one person, without the setup required.
dude seriously amazing work if u were to sell these ppl on here would go nuts that torch is a thing of beauty
is their anyway that shop would make those molds i really like the idea of being able to put away mine is always in the way im in Pa so wishing your up this way
After 2 years, how has the foundry held up? I've been watching DIY foundry videos for almost 2 months but this design has really caught my attention.
The foundations of your build are greeat. I especially love the burner
beautiful craftsmanship
great design
gotta put this in my favorites
i know i wont be able to build my own anytime soon, not like that, but it is great for the future and for current ideas to do in the near future
thanks for a great vid
Absof$#@inglutely Amazing. If your not an engineer, you are a DIY Genius. Seriously, there is nothing like this on You Tube. Thanx for Sharing!!!
This is simply amazing and beautiful craftsmanship. Is it possible to aquire the plans for this?
Dear Designsbyg,
I appreciate your DIY-foundry a lot. Your philosophie to just take a little more effort and make it quite nice is also mine. The look is professional and the handling with the bricks seems a big plus for hobby usage. I am planning my own foundry for some weeks now and I am happy how much information and great ideas I can find on the net. Could I get in contact with you to exchange even more info? Thanks and always a good melt, Tom
Great video, excellent choice of tunes!
love the music choice made my morning
the fire ring at the top is held in by the outside bottom and verticle lip the blocks being tight together and probably interlocking on edge keep them from falling in...
Very very nice job. That gas grill looked a little intimidated by the testing of the burner.
@hennyforapenny :I've designed this to melt all non ferrous metals. It easily exceeds my initial expectations and i believe it will do higher temperature melts quite easily. Since this vid was made, i've also wrapped a 1 inch thick pyromat around the furnace body which keeps in much more heat.
Hi, great job. i have been a millwright for over 30 years and love to see people take the time and pride to do things right. I was thinking of building a furnace similar to this one now that I am about ready to retire, did you use plain refractory cement or was there some mix of perlite or something else? Alot of people are comenting on the expensive tools needed but I think most could be able to lay it out with a router and circle cutter now that you put the idea out there. Thanks job well done
wow i'll take one. that looks awesome. well done sir.
best home built on youtube... by far. GREAT VIDEO. I would have loved to see your crucible though and maybe a pour or two..
Really nice!
About 3 years have past since you built the furnace, if you were to make a new one today, would you change any parts of the design?
How critical were your dimensions for the burner?
i am also in the tool/mold industry,and have use of cnc,and specialise in edm,i am friends with our graphite supplier,and he has let me have all his scrap graphite.instead of refractory cement, i was going to use graphite peices to make a big block and machine the foundry.. what are your thoughts?,also if you dont mind ime totally hitting up the lathe to copy your burner!..great job!..best ive seen..simple..beautiful,and super powerful!
@Designsbyg How much heat did the design lose by not having the pyromat? Would it have made sense to make the walls thicker instead?
I'm about to start casting parts for an iron melting oil fired furnace using a similar model, and my concern have been whether or not I'd get leaks between the bricks (possibly I'd seal with something).
Very nice job on this, it's a good design.
Wow, I'd pay for a set of molds.
That is a very clean looking furnace . Have you ever tried to make refractory from perlite and refractory mortar?
is there any chance you would share the cad file for this project? this is one of the best projects i have seen yet.
thanks,
Jon
Will it melt iron? What a great design. I have been thinking in classic terms, ie a bucket or barrel of some kind to construct the furnace. This makes me think 'out of the bucket'.
The furnace is good but the music is freaking GREAT
Very nice. How many unique brick molds did you create? Did adding the port for the burner nozzle require separate molds or did you bore it out afterwards? How do you monitor the temperature? Cawthra Park, holy crap!
Hey, I'm planning on making a double-wall-structure forge, so I can put wood in between the 2 rims for drying the wood (first step charcoal making), I would also use ventilation with a condensator and filter so I don't breath these fumes when I'm working.
Now what I need to know is: 1) If the wall would conduct enough heat for the moisture to evaporate from the wood? 2) what's minimum thickness the wall should be for a save forge? 3) Wich brand is that of the product you're using?
Thanks, greets
I like the Design. The Concept of modular parts is what I have been working on. This will allow you to replace parts that Crack or break over time. I noticed that you had a CAD drawing in the video, Is that something you are willing to email out to others? I would like to get Both the Burner design and the Furnace in DWG or DXF files. I am working on a Cart that will hold my system. I have not started on the new Furnace yet.
very nice for your first try, you did better than me
Very impressive to say the least..! Thanks for sharing.
DIY? You fooled me by the professionalism of the design/mnfr of the product, as well as by the quality editing of the video. Great job! Certainly an inspiration to other DIY-ers.
Just wondering though... For those who are not as handy in making things of this nature, do you sell this in a kit, or would you be willing to? And if so, how much would you charge for it? Thx!
@ruow2000 - thank you.
I used (are you sitting down?) 450lbs of mix to make this furnace! Hard to believe, but those little bags (each bag being about 12x5x24") weighed 100lbs each. I bought 5 bags (eventually) and have a half bag left.
can I get a set of prints for that burner it looks like it mixes very well.
thanks, john
so i have analysed this furnace 3 or 4 times now and i finally found why it's not perfect : the base its too big and heavy opposed to all the little pieces of the furnace itself and you do not have a hole in it (in the bottom) just in case melted material spills it will be left on the bottom of the furnace until it cools and you can take it apart apart that its perfect
Designsbyg Are you an engineer? I've always felt like my ambitions are held back by my knowledge. I wish I had that "knack" for problem solving a lot of engineers possess to design things like this on their own. Great project man.
any competent woodworker could make those forms with a pattern cut with a jigsaw and router. CNC is just faster and more precise.
Wise move to put the bricks in a furnace (stove) to prevent imperfections. Imperfections can be deadly with something like this.
WOW.
I am glad I ran across your video.
Did you build the torch or did you buy it?
Great foundry and song love it 😍
@Mrflashlite - The refractory cement used is a common mix I obtained from a local foundry supply vendor (in 100lb bags). This vendor had EVERYTHING you could possibly need to run or operate ANY foundry. He is only 45 minutes from me. This really helped.
Wow you do great work!
When I built my furnace, I was fortunate enough to be given information by a local foundry supplier. otherwise, i doubt i would have gotten the results I did. I know nothing about forges. I believe many cement manufacturers produce a line of high temp/refractory grade products. I don't recall which one I used, sorry...
Awesome job.
WOW this is so impressive.
I would like to know were I could get the plains for the furnace
I love this furnace but the thing is, I'm trying to make a furnace you'd be able to make at home, with CHEAP THINGS not fancy shmancy shtuff, but I admire it for being aweseome
It is possible to melt aluminum with a hole in the ground and a coffee can if you just want to do a couple of cans for fun. If you want to get more serious after that you can start spending money on better equipment.
:T thanks
@dekonfrost7 - 'DIY' means just that. Being resourceful is part of DIY. I happen to be a CNC programmer/engineer/designer, so access to the computers/machines is rather easy. So, in one respect you are right that this is somewhat beyond the norm. This project can be built without a CNC. It all depends on how ambitious and resourceful you wish to be...(btw, the only thing I paid for, was the cement and the metal...)
Please tell me, i am trying to understand how to make a lid with six pieces and a metal ring but can't understand how they will stay in form when lifted. I notice you have a grove in your mold...is this filled with rebar or some kind of support? Is that grove the only thing needed for the support of those six lid pieces?
Awesome design. Beautiful ingots as well. Though, with all the foundry RUclipsing I've been doing recently, the one thing I didn't know much about was the crucible itself, which is what led me here, but it's also nonexistent in this video. :p I'd be interested in what you used.
Very cool! Would you be willing to send me the cad drawings ? I'm trying to make a furnace and need something to at least look off of.
@Designsbyg Just curious, i stubbled upon this video, what is the purpuse of all this in the long run, what are you melting aluminium for? are you reselling the aluminium instead of recycling them to get the melt value? that would be my guess. (thirsty for knowledge)
@squiffyboy > refractory was purchased from a local foundry supply. I also found it at industrial building supply places.
lol that burner looks like a small saturn rocket!
Do you have a link to the specs/plans? I'd really like to replicate for myself
Very nice build. I had something similar in mind for my next one.
I see your upload was in 2010. How is she holding up?
@agentxoo7 - This design was purely experimental. The nozzle was inspired and based on a typical propane torch design. This is the only attempt made. There was no trial & error involved.
Nice job!
how much prolixity, I congratulate Mr.
Would you build one for me and if so what would the price tag be for something like this ? I would love to build it but time is money for me and I am all out of time lol . Thanks Greg .
kick-ass furnace for a first timer ;)
can I buy one of the burners please? I am building a small mobile foundry now and am in need. thx
at 2:08 you can hear the screen door open and the wife come in to see her oven XD
hey deadly job. what did you use for the crucible? and what did you use to make the molds out of? was it easy to remove the metal from the molds after it had gone cold again?
okay fancy pants. I think the idea of diy are practical projects that people who don't have a bunch of extra money to throw around can actually do at home. show off!!!
This project is very practical and there are ways to do it more cheaply such as found metal. a friend and I are making one for the first time this summer with found metal and a cement refractory recipe, also building one their own self is a much cheaper way
awesome song, i've heard it before, i just don't know where.
i think Suicide Squad
Great crucible with lovely music! What`s the max temperature out of that F16 turbine?
not sure, but it will get hot enough to melt all the non-ferous metals for sure. I melted aluminum at 10% throttle....
Couldn't concentrate on the video because I wanted to break out into singing. Nice build tho
This is a spectacular design, if you sold this as a kit on Etsy I would definitely buy this! By any chance could you disclose how much this project set you back? I would think no less than $300?
ya....the refractory cement alone was close to that. The metal cost was not excessive and the whole project cost was around $800 There was also the cost of things like a 40lb propane tank and regulator/hose.
$300 ?? ...surely you jest
How would you explain, how you made the lid lift? does that certain lift have a name?
Do you prefer coal or propane? Which would I use to cast gold with? For gold rings, watches etc.
this is pretty amazing, but does it not leak heat without mortar or something?
It does. Not shown here but i now have this wrapped in a 1" pyromat insulation. Holds heat much better
U did a great job keep it up. Did u use only cement for casting?
I wonder whether this can melt at least cast iron......
@STRIKER520 Dude high tolerances aren't needed here, not even thousandths of an inch. The Babylonians were making glass & Bronze stuff back in the day & they didn't even have store baked buns... (Jack in the Box anyone?) doing it super cheap just purchase a $5 jigsaw at the local pawn shop & go to town with wooden pallets... (an angle grinder will probably be needed later too) Of course with my wood shop I'll use a few other tools...
good job and a good music!!!
very nice!
Would you be interested in making a few of those side molds and top molds for a fee? I would love to be able to make these blocks but no way to make the molds!