The International Hobby Metal Casting ezine.
Brought To You By:
Col Croucher, administrator of: www.myhomefoundry.com
Australia.
July 2010 - Number: 80
What is it with the time we are allotted each day, where does it go? I guess because we are deep into winter here in OZ, the days are on the short side, but things are on the improve, the days are getting noticeably longer, which is good for us, but not so for the northern part of the globe, where the relentless summer heat is probably getting a but much at times.
A big welcome if you are a new ezine subscriber, I hope we can help you to get your head around the intricate art of hobby foundry.
Two of my wife’s cousins called on us in the past week, during the walk around the property, they also wanted to see the workshop and the foundry gear, they were asking all kinds of questions, so I quickly ran them through the whole process, naturally in that situation there is no time to go into fine details of the processes and techniques etc, but I could see the looks of bewilderment as I explained about patterns, ramming of the green sand moulds, preparing scrap metal, explaining the furnace, and finally, how to melt and pour the metal.
later in the day I thought a foundry demo might be the thing to do, so I entertained them with a mould making, melting & pouring session, wow, you should have seen the eyes light up then, with the demo over, it all started to make sense to them.
This July ezine is number eighty, and the archives in the membership area are bulging at the seams, perhaps we should be having some kind of celebration, giveaways, freebees, discount sales, what do you think... Should we do something, I will think of something before I finish this letter!
We welcome this month new hobby casters from; Canada, USA, Maldives, Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, Qatar, great to have you onboard guys.
You might like to take a look at the photos below, they were taken while on our recent holiday trip to Western Australia, at the Yarloop Workshops, the sign at the front says: Take A Step Back In Time: YARLOOP WORKSHOPS AND STEAM MUSEUM. the workshops are located at: Railway Parade, Yarloop Western Australia 6218, open hours are: Daily 10am to 4pm.
If you like to immerse yourself into things of yesteryear, then what ever you do, if you are ever passing through Yarloop WA, do not miss out on this experience. We were lucky, as on the day we visited, it was very quiet, so we had the run of the place to ourselves, it takes quite awhile to walk around the entire complex, and for the steam buff, the giant steam engines being restored are something else, it is quite a sight.
But what took my attention was the old foundry, there is stuff lying around... and it just looks like the workers left on the Friday afternoon, and never returned to work again. The place is a wonderful collection and presentation of an earlier era of engineering.
Hobby Foundry Knowledge Tool Kit.
Pattern Making ebook.
Decorative Metal Work ebook.
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Metal flasks stacked on the foundry floor.
Bevel and Straight cut gear patterns.
More gear patterns.
A very simple wood
turning pattern making lathe.
A wall collection of some amazing timber
foundry patterns and core boxes.
The pattern store room - many thousands of foundry patterns on show,
parts that were cast and machined on site for the steam engines and
other equipment in use at the Yarloop Steam workshops. I could have
spent many, many hours just looking and learning at Yarloop.
Do You Really Need Practical Skills?
Have you noticed just what is happening with traditional trade skills in the western world? Why is it that so many training facilities and tech & arts colleges have been shut down over the past few years?
Even on the local scene here in OZ, there have been countless old technical schools banished to scrap the heap, they simply no longer exist.
Maybe the world has changed, perhaps we don’t need to know how to make things anymore. But then, why do so many people want to learn about old trade skills, there is a great resurgance and need to learn by many people, I know that is a fact, and we only need to look at the traffic to our foundry site to realize that.
If you take the time to learn a spread of practical skills, you will have & use them for a lifetime, you don't forget what you learn... well OK, the memory might get a bit rusty on the recall, but with a bit of refreshing it will come streaming back to you.
It is amazing to think that I still have several models that I made during my old tech school days, useful things like sugar scoops, small and large funnels, ornamental things... all made from sheet metal, and still in use today 46 years after they were made... there'd be very few things made in China today that will still be working over four decades later. I also have various useful tools machined and milled out of solid chunks of metal in the old school machine shop that are also still in use today.
But society is not like that today is it... use it for a short while.... when you’re sick of it, or it get's abit worn, turf it out and buy something else to have fun with, now don’t get me wrong I'm not for a minute advocating we keep everything forever, you cant do that, things do wear out and have to be replaced.
But have you noticed that most of the things we treasure are the hand made items, these things get handed down from generation to generation... they become family heirlooms, and what of the people who made them, who taught them the skills? or did they teach themselves simply by picking up the tools and have a go, and found success through trial and error... not happy the first time around... Mmmm, lets make another one & see how that turns out, and isn't that pretty much what hobby foundry is all about.
You have to take the basic knowledge as it is presented and then read and understand the principles to learn what you can do with the acquired knowledge, it wont happen over night, it wont happen in a week, but if you do something each day, each week, before you know it ,you will be well down the road to success.
Below is an email I received from a subscriber which I have permission to share with you, it pretty well sums up and confirms what we have been talking about above, so I would like you to read it.
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Message Sent Using The Contact Form On www.myhomefoundry.com
Message from: Philip Lebow.
Subject: The e-zine.
Message:
Keep it up! A few years ago when I was Director of Shops at an expensive art college here in Los Angeles, I required the cast metal sculpture students to read over your materials. It made a huge difference in the quality of their efforts.
I left the college when they eliminated the foundry and some other programs due to budget cuts, I was deemed too expensive for a much smaller dept. I went back to the firearms industry where I had been for decades.....
Phil.
USA
Time: 11:07:28 on 22/07/10.
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So there you go, skilled learning is being interrupted in the cause of budget restraints and other issues, the trouble is, every time that happens, it may take decades before someone somewhere decides to reinstate practical courses like this, and a whole generation misses out on the opportunity to learn.
Foundry Patterns - Are They Difficult To Make?
Not if you follow some simple patten making rules, pattern making can be as simple or as complex as you wish to make it, but for the basic hobby worker the less complex you make it the better it will be until you gain considerable experience.
The subject of pattern making, is the result of years of practical experience, providing clear and concise instructions and illustrated by drawings, will supply a comprehensive insight into the complexity of the art of pattern making.
The pattern making ebook we offer will assist the pattern making artisan by simplifying many difficult and seemingly impossible tasks; it is an indispensable source of educational advantage to the learning pattern maker, the requirements; some basic woodworking tools and an eagerness to put into practice what you learn.
There is absolutely nothing known as to the origin of the process of casting metal forms from wood patterns. Among the relics of prehistoric man there are weapons, implements and vessels of bronze, which, by inevitable inference, we must concede were cast in moulds made by embedding either a pattern of wood or other material in sand or earth.
The very discovery of metal, in all probability, owes its origin to the accidental fusing of some kind of ore, and the form of the cavity in the earth in which it has cooled suggested to the mind of primitive man the wonderful process of moulding, which has been so great a factor in the marvellous development of the human race.
Where would we be today without the amazing technology of pattern making and foundry?
A first-class foundry moulder can take nearly “any object” for a pattern and succeed in getting it out of the sand, leaving the mould perfect, and make a successful casting. There has been instance of a foundry moulder who indicated that he could mould the pronged horns of an antlered buck from the natural pattern as it grew on the animal's head.
Castings are usually made in a flask. This is composed of two or more rough boxes, generally constructed of the same size, dowels/pins or other devices are used to retain their relative positions (Register) at all times during the moulding procedure. This is absolutely necessary, otherwise the casting would be one-sided or would show a jog or mismatch at the joint or parting.
The rest of the story about pattern making is available right now at a good discount on the normal price, click here now: The Pattern ebook to check it out.
Thank you for reading the July edition of the ezine, I hope you have enjoyed it, and apologies for the late publication, we were on track to get it out earlier but then other tings got in the way. What is your next project, I bet the photos above have got you thinking.
Maybe you are only just thinking about getting involved in the hobby casting game.. .this issue of the ezine might be the trigger to spure you into action, there's some good discounts available if you take action now.
Col.