Casting a lead house name plate.

[worms]

There's probably already a pirate copy on YouTube!

 

[Lime]

If I were undertaking the project it is about this time my wife would decide to change the house name.

 

[Onetap]

Perhaps one day we might be able to see this in moving pictures on a kinetoscope.

There are a lot on Youtube,videos by someone called Myfordboy are quite good, showing sand casting of aluminium engine casings for a Stirling engine he built.

 

[MdB]

I've been reading this thread with interest as I did almost exactly this casting an aluminium junior hacksaw handle at school as a kid. I can't imagine that being allowed now though...

 

[DJH]

Hmm. I've just managed to lose half a page of script so I'll start again...

When I was casting aluminium Onetap I used an oil based sand such as Petrobond because of the very fine finish achievable. Greensand is fine for almost all other work, I've cast bronze, gunmetal, aluminium, pewter, spelter and of course lead with no problems to speak of.

Anyway here's the warning bit. Lead is a very heavy metal and even the smallest piece belies itself with it's weight, so care must be taken when lifting it and wear gloves as much as possible although, as I said before lead, in it's natural state isn't absorbed through the skin but by ingesting it so no lead sandwiches then!!

I've melted the lead in the pot slowly without overheating it. Working temperature for this sort of sand casting is between 350 and 400 degrees. If you have a pyrometer then well and good but I poke a DRY bit of wood into the melt for a second and when it's withdrawn it should be honey coloured. Again, this is one of the methods I use but I'm sure there are different and safer ways of doing all this.

I always warm any ladles I use before put them into the melt. In that way you don't get any flying bits of molten lead whizzing around the place as moisture on the ladles will cause a mini explosion. A ladle full of molten lead is very heavy so a bit of strength and care is necessary.

Here's the pour..





After a while when it's set I've dug the sand away from around the sprue or pour hole so that I can lift off the top box without bringing the sprue and casting with it.

 

[DJH]

The next installment. I should finish soon..

here's a bit of steam coming out of the mould as I'm removing sand from around the pour hole....



and with the top box lifted off some more steam...



and after lifting the casting from the sand I'm just picking away some of the sand that's stuck to the casting. This is not unusual especially near the pour hole where the sand gets hot and crusty

 

[DJH]

This is finished job which I've fettled by removing the sprue and vent and any sharp edges and a quick rub over with a soft wire brush.. ..



the flow line and any other marks will soon fade away as the plaque starts to form it's own patina. After this photo I dunked it in a butt of rainwater (soft water) which has accelerated the patina immediately. There are acids which will make the lead go dark but I haven't used any because I intend to guild the letters but that's another topic if anyone's interested?



Thanks for reading and your kind comments. My next job is to cast some small finials which will be cast hollow to cut down on the weight a bit. I'll take some more photos of that process if you like to show how I do it. It seems to me that I've posted a lot on here but as I spend most of the day sitting around I tend to read all the postings and I've gone back quite a few pages so far but there's still a lot more to look at!!

 

[LadyArowana]

Really enjoyed that series of pictures. Very interesting, hope you share the gilding too, Joce and I particularly like shiny gold things. Wish I needed a house name, ours gets referred to as Pachyderm Palace, but there isn't anywhere to mount a nameplate, it only exists in the virtual world as the name of our wi fi network.

 

[Flyfisher]

This is an excellent post Doug - thanks for taking the time and trouble to put it all together.

I particularly loved the bit about estimating the lead temperature with a piece of wood - that's the sort of thing that only experienced craftsmen can get away with! :lol:

Anyway, this is now on my 'to do' list because we have plenty of space for a name plate and I have plenty of old lead.

 

[DJH]

Not a bother Flyfisher, good luck with it. I'll send a disc on to you later and I'll include the slush casting of the finials. It's a bit gloomy here in Co Tipperary so I'm sitting in the warm thinking if I should start the gilding topic or not. I don't want to give the impression that I'm teaching granny how to suck eggs... :lol:

I should have added that a screwed up spill of newspaper does the same thing when testing the temperature of the melt which is that it shouldn't burst into flame! Another method is by eye when you kind of scrape back the surface of the molten lead and if it shows a whitish film on the surface that is generally about right. A more definite way of testing is that if the lead sticks to the inside of the bowl of the ladle then it's too cold.

Sometimes the addition of solder or even a few wheel weights in the pot will make for a nice casting but don't put too much in as the lead can go a bit sugary in the casting particularly where the contraction point is weakest in two or three sided casting such as a pipe collar.

A little smidgen of tallow wrapped in a paper parcel and pushed to the bottom of the melt can clean the lead and make it flow a bit better but you can believe that or not..

Thanks for the comments

Doug

 

[Jellyfire]

I personally think that was a great post Doug, really interesting. Also useful to have in the site archives should anyone ever need to attempt this in future it's a really thorough guide from a pro. I quite often look back through old posts before attempting various jobs and this kind of thing really adds to the depth of knowledge available on here.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Really loved this thread Doug. Your work is fantastic and the explanation so clear and interesting. Love the finished product, and very glad you're posting about gilding too as this is something I've tried and mucked up.

I'd like one of those name plates! ( providing I survive the 4th Jan) Could you PM me if you'd like to do another?

 

[Carol]

Fascinating thread, a real craft. Thank you for sharing. Am quite taken with the idea of gilding something now, don't think I could manage a cast though!

C

 

[Sonyaclegg]

We will get DJH out of retirement yet!

 

[88v8]

.... here's the warning bit. Lead is a very heavy metal and even the smallest piece belies itself with it's weight, so care must be taken when lifting it and wear gloves as much as possible although, as I said before lead, in it's natural sate isn't absorbed through the skin but by ingesting it so no lead sandwiches then!!

I've melted the lead in the pot slowly without overheating it. Working temperature is between 350 and 400 degrees. If you have a pyrometer then well and good but I poke a DRY bit of wood into the melt for a second and when it's withdrawn it should be honey coloured. Again, this is one of the methods I use but I'm sure there are different and safer ways of doing all this.

I always warm any ladles I use before put them into the melt. In that way you don't get any flying bits of molten lead flying around the place as any moisture on the ladles will cause a mini explosion. A ladle full of molten lead is very heavy so a bit of strength and care is necessary.

This is one of the best threads I've seen on any forum. Thankyou.

30 years ago I had to cast lead weights for our sash windows, 16 weights in all. I made a wooden mould (yes, mad) and melted the lead in the bottom of an old pressure cooker on the kitchen stove. Up to 20lb of it in one go. And then carried it outside to pour - well, the first time I poured it in the kitchen with the mould in a bucket on the lino, the mould caught fire and filled the kitchen with smoke, so after that I moved the pour outside.
But what you say about the heat - leather glove plus oven glove, the intense heat coming through especially on that little secondary (plastic) handle on the back of the pressure cooker, the sense of it being a race between getting it poured and it burning through the gloves. And, worst of all, the inertia.... how can I describe it, the malevolent viscous surging and sloshing of the molten lead as I carried it outside and down the steps, 20lb of inertia trying to climb up the sides and tear the cooker from my fingers. Perhaps the most terrifying job I ever did. After the first one, I didn't want to do any more but I had to do sixteen. Shame there were no interweb in those days, I'm sure you would have had a few words of wisdom for me.

Ivor

 

[AMc]

Thanks for the comments

Doug

Thanks for the posts Doug, I have no particular need to do this myself and even less inclination now I can see the effort involved but it was brilliant fun reading it anyway.