Nicely done, thank you for taking the time to make this very helpful video.

this video is a slideshow presentation in and of itself! thanks a bunch

Great coverage of your techniques! Thanks!

Thanx. You’ve answered many questions.

I just wanted to thank you for making these videos. Well done Sir...

Very informative. Lots of good information. Thanks for sharing.

So much useful information to digest, thanks for taking the time to do the research and make the video. I enjoyed it very much.

I've searched for days for the information you deliver here! Great video! Thank You!

When making the sprue, you may make the cone, have a J shape or and L shape. This helps get the metal in at the bottom of the casting, so that way the gases go up the riser and don't fight the metal. The gear you had didn't really blend itself to the L or J shape, but other patterns would. You would have the metal enter at a low point. I've seen it on some the commercial videos. When I took metal casting a long time ago, I remember hearing this.

Excellent video and great compilation of techniques. Thank you so much for sharing the knowledge.

Thanks for the video dude. I had so many questions about casting and your video answered them all and more.

Yes! Martin is the best on You Tube!

Excellent video. I think these tips will really improve my lost foam casting. Thanks for taking the time to do this.

Great video!! I really appreciate the sense of humor and going into detail about how to improve the process, thanks. I really like the idea of the large plaster feeder, that's great.

Straight out of the mold... OUTSTANDING! 👍😎

Great videos! I've been struggling with casting and every time I screw one up I watch one of your videos to clam down and think about what went wrong its been very helpful.

Really useful video - thanks for making it for us.

This is monumental! Thanks for doing this!

Thank you so much for your video. It is very interesting and well explained.

Just starting out and I found your video very helpful, thanks for the detailed video

this is what I learned watching the experts, 1 you make the foam model , 2 you dip the model in a light slurry of ceramic mixture this is important to get fine details, and let it dry well. 3 hold the dried model in a container 4 pour sand all over it to cover it well , (the sandbox was on a platform that shakes like a paint shaking machine) this allows sand to fill in evenly to all sides. 5 pour the metal of choice and voila a perfect precision cast.

Very nice explanation putting venting holes in the green sand to help release the gasses using a large to small riser and the same on the vent riser works really well

I've never done casting of this type, but I feel like an expert after watching your video. It was very informative, and very well planned and communicated.

Fantastic! 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾

cheers mate for the recommendation of olfoundry as he is in my neck of the woods.

Grate video. I have been at this for some time one of the most informative videos I have seen on the subject grate job.

Awesome job thank you.

Very nice!!

Thanks for doing this. I hope to pour many knives and tools plus some other stuff with Aluminum Bronze and I appreciate you sharing your knowledge. Cheers from Texas.

Brilliant! I'm still working on getting a usable piece. I believe this will help.

Just started messing with my first portable foundry and this video is helping relieve all my fears before officially casting aluminum. My first hairdryer didn’t have a cool setting so i had to shut it off before it was hot enough. Now that I bought a better model of hairdryer I stumbled across your videos helping me avoid common mistakes. The tin can candle paintbrush combo blew my mind and thanks for all your hard work!

Love this video!

Brilliant! I'm following in your foot steps and have found that coating the edges of the cylinders with a wiping of mineral oil makes removing the plaster easy.

Great video. Just saw this. Excellent example (complicated pattern) of ‘make do’ lost foam, vibrating sand, vacuum using bike pump and light shell coating

Bloody brilliant

Great video, I will definitely be putting some of these tips into practice. I have also had really great success with coating my foam part in a shell of plaster prior to placing it into sand. This eliminates the need for green sand, or even hard packing dry sand. The plaster holds the mold and metal in place, while insulating it to dry more slowly and evenly. You can still add the risers as you do, but encasing the foam part in plaster has been a huge help for me.

When I was in the Navy the submarine tender I was on had a foundry on it. First off they kept the green sand at a very warm temp at all times and after packing the molds they would place them in an oven to bring them up to a higher temp before pouring. Of course they didn't use foam but solid patterns but preheating your sand would help.

Very nice! I had one thought to look out for...making your plaster filler funnel out of several layers could pose a tisk of seoeration and dangerous spillage of molten metal. Maybe try a simgle pour or add wire between layers for integrity to avoid any accident.

good tips. i like look little pockets grove pack foam. allows know it lost foam casting. that said in side window computer there lost foam owl that looks super shine and smooth so i get that don't always want be ruff

Man, there are some op notch tips here! Thanks for sharing

Subscribed. Brilliant tutorial.

Many brilliant points, it's great that you have credit where it's due. Definitely going to subscribe to both of you. I have been casting for a while without the accuracy or detail to do much with the castings. After moving my shop and starting to get back into it I'm trying to get some casting projects going and will absorb all the information I can get. Excellent video

Glad to see you persevered with the comment I left on your other plaster casting video… about an hour ago... LOL!

this looks good i would like to do this at my home

Very nice. I may try to make a few things. Thanks.

Thank you

When youre picking your foam , Theres some types of building foam insulation thats white with little blue dots . Dont use that , the blue dots are fire-retardant , and cause gas pockets . Also ,when Im doing long drawn out detail , I put a foam balloon at the points . Impurities turn into a gummy spot that causes an inclusion ,the balloon gives those a place to exit out of your casting .

Very cool and helpful video.

Waxing the foam that tip is priceless thanks

Thermal sleeves are available as Kalmin sleeves. I cannot recommend more the us of ceramic foam filters which a fit in the sleeve. ( forty odd years in aluminium and steel foundries.)

Very impressie

New subscriber here and I am absolutely impressed. I am about to start a KZfaq channel with a build of a replica 1928 Morgan RIP Killer MG Special 3 wheeler with 4 wheels. Charlie Martin raced it on a hillclimb in 2015 and I fell in love. The car was made exactly as if it were an airplane without a propeller or wings. It is a wood over steel frame with aircraft cloth stretched over the wood. It has a plasticizer just like the planes of that year. This particular one that seems to be the only one in existence has 4 wheels from a GN rear. I am using an opposed twin aircraft engine for the power plant in the front. Then I am casting a two piece adapter to mate this engine to the flywheel of an MG 4 speed transmission. Instead of the GN chain rear, I am using the MG differential with the beautiful black wire wheels. I have done a lot of thinking and figuring to determine the adapter from the PTO of the engine which will be one half in order to be able to bolt the other half first to the flywheel and then to the mating adapter. Otherwise it couldn't be done easily. I am so excited to start that I am actually giving away some of my other projects so I have room to do this build. Thank you for all the instruction. I feel more confident casting the parts instead of paying someone to make them out of billet. I believe the cast will work better because I can use really high quality aluminum from other castings.

Have you played around with nighthawkinlight's starlite any? I think it might do well for this

A neat trick for creating a sprue fast is to place a funnel mouth down onto a smooth surface. Then place a suitable can, with the top and bottom removed, around it. Fill the can with sand, and ram. Lift up the can, and remove the funnel. Quick and easy.

Wooh. Honest self criticism. You're a legend these days

Very, very cool. Yours by far is the most informative. I've watched alot of videos. You had all the info I needed, and at a pace that made it easy to make my notes. Again thanks. Ed in indy5

6:30 Great tip thanks 👍

nice video, very well done.

So much helpful information packed into a single tidy video! Thank you! Is there a video showing the sanded sprocket(cleaned up)? That I would love to see:)

oh man. What am I getting myself into lol. I will probably use a wooden cone to make the feeder cast and just cover it with polyester resin to waterproof it.

Thanks for that. I have a few projects in mind that would benefit from lost foam casting. I will definitely try the plaster sprues & risers. If you want a fast set silicon putty, try mixing between 20 - 50% by volume, Corn flour with an acetyl cure sealant. (tile and bathroom sealant) The more flour you use, the firmer it sets, but in any case it goes off in about 10 minutes & is fully set in about 1 hour. You must wear gloves and work in an open area, because the acetic acid fumes are strong.

Good video. Martin is a treasure plaster risers should help green sand castings too. Metal in the risers could stay fluid longer so less shrinkage.

Glad to see you got better restults! I've been looking at Martins channel as well. One obvious difference from Martins casting and your is that the feeder in Martins case is used as a resrvoir, a riser as he sometimes calls it. The narrower tube is the actual sprue through which the metal is poured. Is the reason for switching these around that you are using lost foam? Maybe have a look at a channel called Makercise here on YT! He coats his foam patterns with plaster of paris and says he got better results! Best regards Karl

This channel deserve more subscribers than kings of random. This channel is pure science.

Thank you. I will try to modify the Tips and see if I can use the technique on brass and aluminum casting.

Which type of foam use for casting aluminum

Hi VOG, How about pre heating the sand before pouring the molten metal? Cheers

For a finer finish than sand you can try dipping the foam in gypsum drywall compound that has been thinned slightly with water. allow for several thin coats to dry and then pour the part as normal in sand. I enjoyed your video and the tips. I will try them to improve my casts.

Just before my foundry decided to destroy itself after a gas hiccup mid firing we were using plastic straws every 3 inches as air release holes on large items, just a small bit of wood glue to hold them. Also look up Jewelers plaster used in the making of rings etc better than just normal and cost more. Also take all your used plaster and crush it up and mix with a new batch you get a stronger plaster.

I wonder if this works with lost polymer casting too ? Can you lost wax cast in delft clay ? Delft clay is not absorbent and thus the wax should be able to run out ? What about spray painting the wax with high temp paint first and then casting it in zinc ? I want to find a cheap and easy way of casting undercuts without using the expensive and involved process of using invetment plaster and burn out cycles and all that stuff.

Cool matey very informative video , I will definitely use some of those techniques over on my channel as I need all the help I can get 😁👍🏻. I’ve chatted with Martin quite a few times and yes he’s definitely a casting God😀

nice video, great voice

Thanks for the great video!!! Lots of good info and I got some resolutions to a few problems that I've been having. It's always the old guys who are the guru's with this kind of stuff, isn't it? Sometimes I think and wonder if technology actually makes us better or lazy and uninformed, lol; I always think about that cartoon movie Wall.e . But, then without technology, you wouldn't have been able to connect with your guru and pass your learnings from him on to all of us.

I have been a patternmaker for over 30 years and a lot of this has me scratching my head, but, bottom line, if it works for you it's good. Normally we cut drafted patterns with 0.010 inch per inch shrink. There is nothing left in the sand but a hole where a pattern used to be, and a metal filter etc. This is the best way. It is also the most expensive way involving several hundred thousand dollars in equipment and software. If you can figure out a way to get the pattern out before you cast it that's cool. If not pour away. I have some home projects to cast and my need to " do it right" has kept me from completing them. I actually have the furnace, equipment, and software to do it. Procrastination is a bad thing. I would keep doing it your way. Cheers,

I really appreciate the time you've taken to do this. I want to make aluminum bronze knives and axes, and I want them to be as free of air bubbles and imperfections as possible. I was convinced using borax was the answer, but you've convinced me the mold itself is the most significant factor. I do wonder about your thoughts on borax, and if you've used it with any success?

Great tutorial. Thanks. I've been kicking around ways to approach a part I want to cast. I may have found my approach in between the lines of your video. I want to cast a socket with a hole that passes all the way through the piece. You used plaster for your vent and gate. What if I made plaster inserts to creat a cavity and the passthrough hole, placed them in the foam model, and then into the sand? Then remove the plaster from the voids after casting?

Very informative, thanks. Maybe a more cost effective way to make those sprue's would be sodium silicate bonded sand. no need to bake off the moisture either.

I am trying to make the thermostat cover of my old Daihatsu but I am having troubles with the curved form and its hollow inside.

have you tried refactory coatings to create a far smoother finish ?

Thank you for sharing your expertise. Considerably better than watching so much of the gibberish on the topic.

As a dental techitian have casted frames and crowns fo ages, but with a centrifugal casting machine as what I do is small. A 3D scanner for larger parts and 3D printer or is there a foam/styrofoam milling mashine?

normally the drag which contains the pattern is made first on a flat surface then inverted and the cope created on top.

how do you make a female mold for duplicating foam parts for production runs?

Hey VOG I really enjoy your videos! that said I have a improvement to offer to you! I am originally from the field of chemistry and started with metal casting recently. The first thing I thought about when I saw the lost foam casting method was: " WHY isn´t solvating the foam with acetone?" If you pour some acetone in your mold you can easily remove all of the foam!! just flip it over and let the resulting slime drip out of the mold. Rinse the mold a second time with acetone dry it and you have a perfect mold for casting! (it should be noted that this only works with the plaster method) mfg hazelChem

it must be noted there is 2 types of uhu glue ordinary and power, for normal applications they work the same, however uhu power is twice the price, in the pound shop the tubes of uhu power are half the size for the same money(a pound), uhu power can be used as an impact glue too.

can I ask a question about crucibles - I know steel degrades with use, but how does stainless steel stand up to use, ie. there are loads of balti bowls that are a decent size for next to nothing

Thanks for the great video and the original research. When I seen plaster I was thinking you would coat the foam pattern with plaster. I recall others doing it but not who. In terms of loosing heat, plaster should make sense for the pattern too. It might also give you the sort of detail you can get with lost wax and maybe not have to heat the aluminum. I don't fully understand it but pouring too hot can cause defects too.

hot glue is best for gluing foam together, it burns away very easily.

Great tutorial Martin. Question: how much detail you can get with this method? I need to make a custom aluminium heatsink, would the fins be too thin for the molten metal to get through?

Wall paper paste makes a great glue thin as you can

I'm not sure if it was your vid or not, but the last casting vid I saw, I realized the mold needed more vents. no or too few vents the metal simply won't flow as well.

What if you preheat the mold to remove foam and keep metal from cooling too quickly?

HI VOG. It's Damon here again, I went back to some of your old videos and pondered other casting techniques some of which you don't use and wondered if you have a good reason why you don't use them? Ceramic shell casting vs investment casting, investment casting vs petrobond sandcasting (without foam core)... also- I don't have a burnout oven for plaster investment casting and am toying with the idea of boiling out the wax- I have seen this for ceramic shell casting. Any thoughts on advantages/disadvantages of each method?

could you dip the foam in liquid wax or would it deform?

Why not burn off the foam before the pour. Or does this degrade the casting?

Hi Jeff, great video full of lots of interesting information, and like you I have had the pleasure of getting to know Olfoundryman [Martin], and hopefully soon I will be meeting with him for some one on one tutoring. We are both Melbourne boys. ;))

If Plaster of Paris resists molten metal, would it be feasible to use plaster in place of sand?

Have you made any stand-by plaster sprues for when your current one wears out or gets damaged? It could be handy to have at least one back-up in reserve for unexpected events. I was well pleased by your improvised wax melter. It's a clever idea. Are you familiar with Tubalcain/mrpete222/Lyle Peterson? He's a retired high school shop teacher who is pretty knowledgeable too. He's made hundreds of vids since 2006. If you don't want to bend up any more copper pipes when you remove them after molding, cross drill it near the top and insert a rod (or dulled nail) to use as a T handle. Keep up the good work. I really enjoy your vids and approaches to problem solving (I like to call it dragon slaying).

theres not technically more gas due to conservation of matter but there is higher pressure and the foam is mobilized due to the gas state and pressure/temperature but I know what you meant. Just being pedantic for thoroughness thank you these projects are awesome.

Why do you use green sand instead of dry sand?