The Bucket Foundry

[Flettner]

Not really, but through no fault of the hydrogen that burns with an almost invisible blue flame. The visible flames came from the burning lacquer on the hull.

And magnesium.

[husaberg]

Hi i was talking to Neil the other day about this dudes work



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3oaRDKulwA

[husaberg]

[ken seeber]

Old mate has spent a lot of time setting up a tidy and efficient “boutique” style foundry. The sign at the front might read: “We can cast anything as long as the pattern plate can fit into our one design of corebox.”
Couple of well thought out features there. The aluminium sand feed ducting and the long corebox threads look to be a bit annoying.

[husaberg]

Old mate has spent a lot of time setting up a tidy and efficient “boutique” style foundry. The sign at the front might read: “We can cast anything as long as the pattern plate can fit into our one design of corebox.”
Couple of well thought out features there. The aluminium sand feed ducting and the long corebox threads look to be a bit annoying.

i wondered, How does that feed system work was it a pneumatic vibrator on a gravity feed with a guillotine slide
thats how we used to feed or cement from 200T silos.

[ken seeber]

i wondered, How does that feed system work was it a pneumatic vibrator on a gravity feed with a guillotine slide
thats how we used to feed or cement from 200T silos.

Hooser, had another look at the vid and right at the start he shows a square stainless tapered trough with a mixing arm in it. From the underneath it looks like an inclined auger that takes the sand up high and discharges into the aluminum duct.

Looks like he must have had good access to some used machinery/equipment joint and designed it all about what came up. Good on him.

Wonder what his main products are?

[husaberg]

Hooser, had another look at the vid and right at the start he shows a square stainless tapered trough with a mixing arm in it. From the underneath it looks like an inclined auger that takes the sand up high and discharges into the aluminum duct.

Looks like he must have had good access to some used machinery/equipment joint and designed it all about what came up. Good on him.

Wonder what his main products are?

You are going to make me watch the video aye.
I was thinking the same thnig a lot of gear that's useful but Spendy to set up even SH.
i never watched the whole video or any others on his feed to see what he actually did.
Looks like he builds model steam engines.


edit i must have fast forwarded it through the first bit lol
i know how much all the auguer etc cost as i have the same set up on my coal fired boiler

in the comments me mentions the sand is oil sand called mansbond never heard of that one.

[Flettner]

Finally getting around to finishing off this sand water gallery die, copy cast in cast iron. So I can use the Shell Sand Mould method. Much stronger sand cores. After market Subaru EA81 heads.

[el chupacabra]

For anyone interested here is my first (second) attempt at lost foam casting. It’s a crankcase for a Honda c50/Lifan motor. I decided I wanted a v twin after watching Allen millyards videos. It’ll be bucket legal too. I am still amazed by the dimensional accuracy and how cheap it was to make/prep.

[Flettner]

Ejector pins fitted. Need to be shortened to the correct length yet.

[lohring]

CPI has been in the two stroke cylinder casting business a long time. The founder, Calvin Pollet, had a lot of interesting discussions on cylinder design with other members of this forum, but no one questioned the quality of his castings. The video below shows the production process. Sand casting doesn't need to be the crude method people think it is.

Lohring Miller

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2uvgoUCh3g

[F5 Dave]

Um, actually people have questioned quality. My first Cheetah block caused me all sorts of grief trying to tune an inconsistent big bore. Until Wobbly suggested one of his customers had a porous barrel. Hmm. Dumped mine in a bucket with an airline. . . Ahh! Powervalve machining was leaking water into the engine at inopportune times.

All replaced by Trinity the distributor and they started testing every one going out the door.

But I'm not bitter about it, it was good customer service on a low volume part. I'm just mentioning it.

At the other end, several years ago there was some talk from Steve Rothwell on the Aprilia forum and Calvin joined in. He was very knowledgeable and went into depth on how they had to develop the shape of the pistons to cope with thier application. Steve on the other hand was a complete Turkey with wild theories about the bore under the transfer area overheating. Calvin was rational and only stepped out when Steve was saying the Athena was the way to go. I think Calvin was quite sick at the time. It was a pity as it was an interesting story of development.

[Flettner]

A first sand water core set from my cast iron dies.
Perhaps Ill get in and cast an Autoflight / Subaru head this week, or at least have a go. At the moment Im manually filling these dies with Shell sand and heating them in the oven to set the bond off. Slow but good for test runs.

[Flettner]

Ive been thinking about how to make the exhaust piston for this engine. Id like to make it from 4140 steel but the machining is going to be quite complex and not really what I want.
Thought came to me, make it in two halves, tig weld it together, finish machine the outside. That way I can machine the inside of the piston quite thin and easily. Just a 3D die cut on the CNC, or better machine a carbon eletrode and spark erode, get very fine detail that way. Keep the weight acceptable.

[Grumph]

if you were making enough to make it worthwhile, you'd press the piston in two halves from sheet. Then TIG weld and finish machine.

But dies are time consuming to make - unless someone can 3D print a master to use to cast them.