Casting aluminum.

I've never bothered to clean off paint only oil grease etc, I usually melt more than I need & make ingots with the surplus [I have been known to not melt enough on the odd occasion- oops] I use extruded alloy for plaques etc & cast alloy for important things, folk get to know you[at my age] & I allways get stuff given, never bought any pot fodder.
 
One thing that I learned from using permanent mold castings (pistons, small engine blocks) is that, due to added iron in the aluminum alloy used, the solidification range is narrowed, necessitating raising the melt to higher temperatures to avoid having areas of the casting solidify before the casting is complete; if you raise the temp high enough to avoid this, excessive shrinkage or cracking may be the result. The best scrap to avoid this is aluminum that has been previously been cast, as indicated by the sand cast finish. Structural aluminum scrap has the same problem as die cast aluminum.
 
Back
Top