Member postings for PatJ

Would it be sacrilege to suggest brass powder and resin casting?

In foundry circles, yes it would be.

In the modeling world, anything goes.

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There is a fellow in the Pacific Northwest who build an iron furnace, and his neighbor complained about the noise.

He added a six foot sheet metal chimney that is lined with ceramic blanket, and installed that over his lid opening, and build a box for his combustion air blower.

He verified a very low dB with an inexpensive measuring unit.

My neighbors have not complained (yet) about my furnace, but I do live next to an expressway, and the dB level from cars and trucks passing is absurd already in my back yard.

One trick I have used is to place small sections of rubber floor mat under each wheel of my furnace, and this takes out a lot of the low frequency rumble that many hear.

An oil burner and furnace is basically acting like a V1 pulsajet, and thus the noise created, plus the blower noise.

At some point soon I will move my blower indoors, and stretch a hose out to the furnace, to eliminate that noise.

I have excess combustion air, and so the pressure drop across a long hose is not a problem.

If an oil burner is tuned correctly, and especially if it is operating on diesel, it should start cleanly, and operate with no smoke at all. It should not produce any smoke upon shutdown either. In some of my videos, you can see what looks like a lot of smoke, but it is actually steam from water that has crept into my ceramic blanket.

I keep my furnace outdoors at all time.

A muffler stack is an option, but uncoated ceramic blanket in the exhaust stream will produce fibers that you do not want to inhale.

Here is the fellow with the muffler stack.

Be sure you have some outriggers on your furnace if you crane out your crucible like this, because it is easy to flip over your entire rig with a crucible full of iron.

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Edited By PatJ on 03/01/2022 20:11:18

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This fellow in the States uses a tabletop electric furnace.

He told me that the crucibles do not last very long (perhaps five pours?, check me on that).

You can melt brass with propane if the burner is tuned correctly, and a combustion air blower is used.

Avoid the zinc fumes, they will make you sick.

Edited By PatJ on 03/01/2022 17:54:24

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That is very clean work on those items.

I would expect that they would bring top value in that condition.

The machined surfaces can easily be buffed out to a bright condition again, but I would not recommend doing it unless you are familiar with the process.

I buffed the surfaces of my dad's engines, which had been sitting for a long time, and they all looked new again.

Edited By PatJ on 03/01/2022 17:45:35

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I am still working out the exact details of my new pressure nozzle burner, but this is my progress to date.

The fuel line on the output of the pump is rate for 100 psi continuous, and I think is automotive injector fuel line.

I hope to get this unit operational this year.

Note that my initial rough sketch is not quite complete, so don't use it literally.

Fuel flow will be adjusted using the needle valve to about 2.6 gal/hr, and then the combustion air blower tuned for that fuel flow.  My combustion air blower is a varialbe speed Toro leaf blower running on its lowest speed.

Edited By PatJ on 03/01/2022 17:38:15

I meant to mention that I have seem some use packaged heating units for a foundry furnace.

The output burner tube on a packaged unit is generally about 4 inches diameter, which is a bit large, and may or may not impinge flame on the side of the crucible (which must be avoided).

I am installing my pressure nozzle inside of a 2.5" diameter thinwall stainless burner tube, and that diameter works well with my furnace, which has a 13 inch interior diameter, and a 14 inch interior height.

The burner tube entry should be at the junction of the top of the plinth and the bottom of the crucible.

I generally elevate my crucible on a plinth as high as possible in the furnace, leaving about 1.5" between the top of the crucible and the lid.

Hey Noel-

I am trying to get lots of people into making their own iron castings, but so far have only roped one into it, but he is doing it successfully.

The central heating unit is the same configuration that I am going to change to, except mine will not be a packaged unit, but will consist of the same parts mounted separately, to be more modular, and because I don't have a spare central heating unit.

Central heating units use a gear pump with pressure nozzle, generally operating at about 100 psi (that is where I will operate mine on diesel). And the beauty of them is that you don't need an air compressor, which is really what I am after. The siphon nozzle and pressure nozzle operate the same, except one uses compressed air for atomization and the other uses pressure from a gear pump.

I have tried a drip-style burner, an Ursutz which is a precombustion chamber type burner, dual nozzle burner, propane, etc. The siphon or pressure nozzle burner is the most reliable and infinitely controllable/stable burner that I am aware of, and no degredation over the life of the burner (which is infinite). Both of these burner types do need clean fuel that is well filtered, which is why I use diesel. Waste oil can be used, but generally it is thinned with diesel, and it must be filtered clean.

I use about 10 psi pressure on my diesel fuel tank with my siphon nozzle, but when I convert to a pressure nozzle, I will not pressurize my fuel tank.

Pouring iron is not much more difficult than pouring brass/bronze, and easier in many respects since you don't run into the zinc problems that brass has.

Using good heat shields on the skimmer handles and pouring shank is a must with iron, to prevent overheating the gloved hand. And gas welding goggles are required to shield the eyes from the intense IR that comes off the furnace and crucible.

If you want to pour iron, and are not exactly sure how to do that, I can save you a great deal of grief.

It took me six years (on and off) to master the iron process.

I am across the pond, but with the internet, we are all close, and brothers in casting for sure.

There is nothing like pulling fresh iron castings coming out of the sand mold (when all goes well that is).

Note, leave iron castings in the sand overnight to cool, else you will get hard spots in them.

Pat J

Edited By PatJ on 03/01/2022 17:14:10

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Edited By PatJ on 03/01/2022 17:16:51

I have been casting gray iron since 2012, and have tried a variety of fuels and burner types.

I use a siphon nozzle burner with diesel, but am converting to a similar pressure nozzle with gear pump to avoid having to have an air compressor for atomization air.

Cast iron can be melted with propane if you have a sufficiently large tank, or you carefully warm (without overheating) the tank as the gas is being used. The vapor pressure inside of a 20 lb propane take will drop too much as the tank cools, and so it is difficult to maintain enough pressure to melt iron (without tank heating).

I use diesel exclusively since it does not contain heavy metals, and it lights easily with a siphon or pressure nozzle type burner, without using propane.

I have started and run my siphon nozzle burner on diesel at 30 F.

Most I know mix at least 20-30% diesel with their waste oil to assist in starting and operating the burner.

The red hot burner tube type burners don't last long. A siphon and pressure nozzle burner tube run cool to the touch if operated correctly.

It is easy to melt cast iron, brass, bronze, or aluminum using diesel.

Generally a #10 crucible full of iron requires about 1 hour to bring up to pour temperature, which is extimated to be about 2,500 F.

A #10 crucible holds a little less than 30 lbs of iron.

Most folks I know run their oil burners at about 2.7 gal/hr, and the combustion air blower is adjusted to accomodate this fuel flow, using either a variable speed blower motor, or a dump damper to get rid of the excess blower air.

My casting videos are on Vimeo.

I will try to post a link here; hopefully it will work.

Good luck with your metal casting. I must say I really enjoy metal casting, and it creates unlimited opportunities as far as the engines you can make.

Hit the "scroll down" or "load more" at the bottom of the Vimeo page to get to my casting videos.

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It would seem the Alva B engine is sort of a semi-Corliss, in that there is more than one rocking valve, but the valves have not migrated out to the ends of the cylinder like a Corliss, and there are only two valves, not the standard four found on a Corliss.

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Jason-

Thanks much for the info.

I totally forgot about your rocking valve engine.

You builds just keep getting better.

I suspected the rocking valve may be a wrapped d-valve and port face, since I could not work out any other arrangement that would give the correct timing.

For the Alva B, there are clearly two rocking valves visible, and so I am guessing that the lower valve is connected to the passage on the lower end of the cylinder, and the upper valve is connected to the passage on the upper end of the cylinder.

There would be a common exhaust between the two valves, and you can see a band around the cylinder, which contains the exhaust passage, with the exhaust pipe coming off the side of the cylinder opposite of the valves.

Why two rocking valves, and three eccentrics?

I think using two rocking valves allows an early cutoff, without affecting the exhaust on the opposite side, which needs to close later than an early cutoff.

I think there is a reversing link in there too.

Thanks again; this helps a lot.

You across the pond guys put us to shame, but what can I say?

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These are the only photos of non-Corliss rocking valve engines that I have ever found, and I am not sure who owns these.

The function of these engines is not entirely clear, but certainly more understandable than the Alva B engine valves.

I am trying to assist a boat friend of mine, and he is proposing to build a model of the steam tug Alva B.

He posted a few drawings of it, and I told him I could help him with the engine, however, the engine appears to have dual rocking valves, and a rather complex valve gear, with at least three eccentrics.

I assumed rocking valves were relatively simple affairs, and I understand the Corliss valve concept well.

When I look online for non-Corliss rocking valve information, I am coming up empty. The rocking valves used outside of Corliss engines seem to be far and few between.

I originally assumed that one rocker on the Alva B engine was steam, and the other exhaust, but it would seem that both valves much be both steam and exhaust, with the lower valve serving the lower part of the cylinder, and the upper valve serving the upper part of the cylinder.

Any ideas on how these valves function?

Edited By PatJ on 26/12/2021 17:09:19

I hear what you are saying, but I am not so convinced of the "trivial" part.

Only time will tell the full story.

My large extended family is divided like the Hatfields and McCoys, often within families.

I can't recall many things in my lifetime being so devisive and detrimental to family and relationships, except perhaps the Vietnam war. That divided a lot of folks in the US, mostly in a generational way (young vs old), mainly because the young got sent off, and came back six months later in a body bag.

I just missed that war.  I was about two years away from the draft when it ended, but I remember sitting up at night, wanting to defend freedom and country, but knowing how it would most likely turn out for me.

Let hope that COVID will soon become a distant memory, with no appreciable cases anywhere in the world.

That is my wish.

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One can hardly call a vaccine unproven when it has been administered to millions.

The fact that millions have taken the vaccine proves nothing.

Lots of people drank the Jim Jones coolaid, but they are not available for comments at this time.

Basic fallacy lesson 101: Everyone else is doing it, so it must be the right thing to do.

One large online media company in the US (I won't name it) shut down a 100,000 person chat about all the adverse affects and deaths that the vax was causing.

Why does this information have to be censored across all social media?

Wouldn't an open scientific mind want to read everything and decide for themselves?

I fully expect this thread (or at least my posts) will be deleted; it seems censorship is the new science these days.

Censor anything that goes against the "narrative".

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The dishonesty of the main stream media is basically malpractice.

A story today mentions ".......in an attempt to force doctors to give her Ivermectin, a de-wormer".

The narrative that the MSM writes over and over is that Ivermectin is a horse dewormer.

But the truth (and fact that you will never read in the mainstream media) is that the folks who invented Ivermectin won the Nobel Prize for it, for use in humans, not horses, and it is on the list of the World Health Organization List of Essential Medicines (for humans).

Only a naive person would believe that any medicine can only be used for one discovered purpose, and only be used either on animals or humans, but not both.

I know that even if Ivermectin is proven beyond any shadow of a doubt by science to be an effective treatment for COVID, many would never accept that. Why is that?

And I know many who are vax'ed who hope that I and other un-vaxed die just so their point can be proven (that only the vax works).

Its not about saving lives, or treating disease, it is about being right, and insisting in forcing your vision of what is right on everyone else in society. It is a pathological thing in my opinion.

I personally hope that both the vax'ed and unvax'ed people all remain healthy and survive this thing called COVID.

I wish no ill feelings or harm on anyone else, regardless.

Can others make this statement with a clear conscience?

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Edited By PatJ on 17/11/2021 00:18:13

There wil be no end to it.

Once the politicians determine that they can force you do to anything/take anything they decide to dictate, then you are no longer a free person who can determine your own destiny.

You are their test animal, and if the tests don't work out, they have zero liability.

You on the other hand will be stuck with massive health bills (in the US) and/or funeral costs should you get the all to often massive blood clots or heart inflamation.

If the vax works so well, let them stand behind it, and accept liability or it.

Let them help and pay for the damage the vax is causing in so many people of all ages.

Just my 2 cents, to give you my line of reasoning, which is not based on fear, paranoia, ignorance, or any other irrational base.

Anti-vax is not anti-anything, but rather a common sense approach, to wait and see how clinical trials turn out for a new and untested drug of any type.

Common sense has perished in the rush to find a simple one-size-fits-all solution to a highly complex disease, and in the end, I think people will pay a terrible price for that (many already have, including children).

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I am not trying to force anyone to take any medical treatment, but the same cannot be said for many.

The "Its for the good of the group" mentality has met with disastrous results in previous history; look no further back than 1930's Germany.

A straw man arguement is being used, ie: this vaccine is just like all the others, however, this vax is not like the others, and has never been tested in the normal trials that the other vax's have undergone.

And they assured us very vocally that "Nobody will ever be forced to take the vax". And yet this is precisely what they are doing now.

What is next, forced monthly booster vax's? Boosters for the boosters? Once you allow someone else to make your medical decisions, you are subject to their tyranny.

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Why would only one treatment to any disease be considered? That would not be a scientific approach to solving diseases.

A real scientific study would look at any/every treatment, and objectively determine which method is working best.

The scientific method that has always been used for vaccines in the past has been shut down for this vax, and anyone raising a red flag about all the vax casualties is attacked and shouted down in the public square.

That is why I say it has become politicized. It has become akin to the Salem witch hunts.

Once they determine that you are a witch (unvax'ed), the only solution is the stake burning thing.

Logic and rational go out the window once hysteria takes over, and hysteria has most definitely taken over.

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So now they are going back and resvising the actual COVID death numbrs, and finding that COVID deaths are perhaps 1/12 of what were reported at the height of the hysteria.

A few weeks ago, one of the largest states in India with a population of 230 million saw their death rate drop to zero, with the use of Ivermectin. This is not blissful ignorance, but rather fact, and rather hard to overlook.

It would seem that society is divided into two camps, and the vac camp cannot and will not consider that there is any other treatment for COVID other than the vax. I am not sure why this single-mindedness is so pervasive.

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My intent to post here about COVID is to just inform other of what is going on here, and not get into an involved arguement about vax/novax. Each person will have to decide whether they want to get the vax, and should have the choice about what sort of medical treatment they get, without force/coercion/threats.

For the record, my wife and I are not vax'ed, and will never get the vax or any booster.

The logic being that the vax has never gone through the normal vax testing period, and indeed, they even had to change the definition of vax since the "experimental gene therapy" was previously not considered a vax.

The testing for the vax was never completed because all the test animals died, so that does not really inspire confidence in the vax.

The vax has the highest death rate among all the vaccines that have ever been produced.

The chances of surviving COVID here are over 99%, and my wife and I have both had COVID, and recovered with no lasting ill effects. Thus the body's normal immune system did what it has been designed to do for perhaps 1 million years.

Around here, every death regardless of the cause is counted as COVID. Car crashes, suicides, you name it, because if they declare it a COVID death, then they get a significantly larger payout from the government.