but it was rrreeeaaaly cool!!!
As promised, here's some photos of my first firing of the furnace. I even melted down some aluminum using an old mug for a crucible.......the mug didn't survive, but it was a nice test of whether or not this thing would work.
Here's a picture of my popcorn tin furnace when I first fired it up. It's using charcoal for fuel, and yes, that's a hairdryer on the end as a blower for fast oxidation (turning it into a damned blast furnace once I'd fired it slow to make sure the walls wouldn't blow up from trapped steam......I know, details.........)
I haven't poured a lid with a chamber and vent yet, so I had to switch over to a terra cotta flowerpot over the top to reflect enough heat to melt the metal, but after that it worked pretty well. I'm pouring a lid tomorrow.
Here's the inside, although you can't see the sweet looking glowing coals and flames shooting around yet.
Here's some of my "salvage" for smelting, as you can see, "poponium" ruled the day.
The remains of my crucible in the upper right.
And some of the "ingots" that I made with all this effort. The thing on the right is a quarter if that gives ya any idea how crappy pop cans are as a source of aluminum for casting.
And although I haven't started casting yet, here's how I felt when I scooped out some of the molten aluminum and my furnace had actually worked.
That's right. Smelt smart. Smelt smug-mart...........never mind the part where I set the gloves on fire scooping out slag.
No. I didn't get near the flames, just the scoop got that hot after the first scoop or two. Gotta get some real welding gloves. Which brings me to the disclaimer. If you're going to try this at home, read up first, I'm not responsible for anything you might be try, including imitating me, and suing me will only get you about twenty bucks and won't bring your feet or eyebrows back. Having said that, wow! I made my very own shiny aluminum. Tommorow, i'm thinking zinc.......look out pennies, here I come...........