Member postings for the artfull-codger

As Chris Trice says ici etch primer, I use it for alloy,brass,steel & everything else, I painted some alloy castings I made with cellulose primer & the stuff just chipped off with my fingernail,I blasted it all off & brushed on [no need to spray as it's self levelling] ici 2pack etch, I could not scrape it off at all & I've sprayed enamels,cellulose & 2k on top of it & no bother,as with any paint job you need a good primer, I accidently spilled some on my tea mug [glazed surface]in the workshop & it went through the dishwasher for over a year & didn't wash off & dishwashers take the logo's of most mugs!!eventually, I've not used it but 2pack epoxy primer is even better as it's water resistant so you can prime frames etc & leave it for yrs.

I've never smelted lead, only melted scrap, & the dross allways floats to the top of the melt without any flux but I might try beeswax next time as I used to keep bees & have lbs of it, I also have typemetal which as stated above gives good definition as it remains the same size when cool as when molten, I also have ''roses metal'' which expands on cooling we used it in the glass trade to secure armourplate doors before rubber gaskets & the hydraulic press was introduced.

graham ''t''

I've done a number of lead castings in the home foundry & used co2 sand for long case clock weights

& quite a few castings using ''petrobond'' sand & the beauty of petrobond is that the lead's not hot enough do any damage to the sand ie it's 100% reusable, unlike when you cast bronze/alloy etc you loose the burned sand in contact of the metal.

graham 't'

Hi Stephen, I've been looking for some sort of magnifier [it's my age!!!] I was looking at what appeared good quality headband loups with glass lenses from ''the loupe store'' after much ringing & emailing by my brother & myself they didn't even bother to reply so I'm interested in an optivisor, sounds just like the piece of equipment I'v been looking[he he] for.

I also make my own & I've not seen many cheap redundant stock rolls[I'm allways on the look out] most of what I've bought is from auto jumbles, I got a roll last week for £25 3/4" x100ft, starrett I'll get 12 blades out of that so it works out @ just over £2.00 a blade as opposed to machine mart price about £11.69.each but as you say there doesn't seem to be much about.